You still haven't actually provided any evidence of things blizzard has done to show this though. Your "evidence" is a bunch of out of context quotes. Blizzard calls hots, and lotv expansions all the time not games. They say they will be priced as expansions. They are clearly putting a ton of time and effort into them. There is no yearly release cycle. There is nothing except you thinking they are lying despite them doing nothing to suggest that they will do what you say. They have released a bunch of free content and updated the graphics as well as the interface a ton since sc2 has came out.
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Starcraft is my life, so without it I wouldn't exist. - Artosis
Liquid Wind posted... You posted a link talking about Activision's well known desires for exploiting gaming, but had no evidence for how Activision is influencing Blizzard, or controlling blizzard
activision bought blizzard, come on you aren't really this naive are you?
Actually they did not. Activision could not even come close to being able to afford to buy Blizzard, nor would Blizzard have any need to sell. Activision MERGED with Vivendi, but Blizzard and Activision still operate seperately.
Blizzard has shown no signs of adopting Activision's methods - They are not pumping games out, nor are they exploting gamers. They ARE profit-focused, as they have always been, but they continue to seek ways to maximize profit without upsetting the majority of the community, and thus far they have been successful in that.
-- Joyrock Fresh from my first justified ban. Ever!
TBQH, it doesn't matter all that much how either side of the argument tries to spin things. It's really, ultimately, about perception. Blizzard is a company that has always heavily staked their games on having a reputation for creating products of a certain caliber and quality. Paying $15 monthly to play WoW ultimately costs more money, but it's considered acceptable to do so. The move to "split" a game into "thirds," regardless of how it actually plays out financially or even effectively for the playerbase is moot. It makes Blizzard look bad. Anything that makes Blizzard look bad is a poor move in the long run.
The only accurate review of Starcraft 2 on the entire internet.
Really?
"and all the other nonsense that made Warcraft 3 one of the five worst game ever made and easily the worst RTS ever."
Haha, no. How 'bout I strand you on an island with WC3, E.T., the Drakkhen series, and the Hydlide series?
"There's also the issue of nearly every single player mission being a timed gimmick, but some people actually like that sort of thing."
Well...yeah. Starcraft 1 single-player gameplay was awful, because you turtle, and win. Starcraft 2 single-player is much more dynamic, because it makes you leave your base before you're ready to rescue people.
"Multiplayer is a mixed bag, honestly. It's good at the core, but a lot of stuff is blatantly missing which, of course, is a sign of how Starcraft 2 was split into three games for no reason."
You know, at GDC this year, there was a talk called "Designing an E-Sport" where one of the Blizzard designers said outright "we have no idea what we're going to do for Heart of the Swarm multiplayer--the players will be expecting us to add stuff, but we already achieved the unit interactions we wanted."
"Protoss are still too expensive despite new mobility options, Zerg are still way too fast and the Terrans are still able to counter absolutely anything."
Terrans can't really deal with a lategame Protoss Deathball very well. Terrans also strangely don't have an answer to Zerglings. Zerglings auto-surround now, and can turn into Banelings if you build millions of marines.
Zerg being way too fast--actually a common complaint from people who really liked to play Zerg in SC1 is that Zerg is way too slow now.
"Even not considering the new units, unavailable to Terran multiplayer are old staples such as the firebat, wraith and vulture."
I would be shocked if these ever showed up in newer versions of the multiplayer. Marauder replaced Firebat. Banshee replaced Wraith. Hellion replaced Vulture.
You're never going to have 30 units per race in multiplayer. The moment you have two units that do basically the same thing, people will figure out which one is better and build that. Even if you somehow do have 30 viable units per race, this would be a design failure for an E-sport; E-sports are meant to be watched; an audience has to be able to understand what's going on. This requires a small number of easily distinguishable units.
I'm actually expecting Blizzard to remove or retool a unit from each race in Heart of the Swarm rather than add units.
"In the original game, each race had their own score and it was fitting."
Zerg and Protoss have their own race music; play multiplayer >_>
"You know those Starcraft tournaments, like the ones in South Korea that do everything short of support the entire nation's economy? They're all done on lag-free LAN."
No-LAN sucks, I agree. But you know those South Korean Starcraft tournaments? They still happen with SC2. And a lot of the big SC1 pros are switching to SC2 (Boxer, July).
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Cats land on their feet. Toast lands peanut butter side down. A cat with toast strapped to its back will hover above the ground in a state of quantum indecision
azuarc posted... TBQH, it doesn't matter all that much how either side of the argument tries to spin things. It's really, ultimately, about perception. Blizzard is a company that has always heavily staked their games on having a reputation for creating products of a certain caliber and quality. Paying $15 monthly to play WoW ultimately costs more money, but it's considered acceptable to do so. The move to "split" a game into "thirds," regardless of how it actually plays out financially or even effectively for the playerbase is moot. It makes Blizzard look bad. Anything that makes Blizzard look bad is a poor move in the long run.
They didn't split a game into thirds. They released a full game, and are releasing two expansions.
-- Joyrock Fresh from my first justified ban. Ever!
I know I'm late to the party, but I've never gotten the "it's 1/3 of a game" argument. It has as much or more content as the other Starcraft releases.
Also, the way they've handled it is nothing like Diablo 2 where they outright stated that they hadn't finished the game and the rest would be available in an expansion. Having played Diablo 2 (and LoD) more than any other game in my life, I remember just how much better the balance felt with the expansion. Going from beating Diablo to starting Nightmare the first time without the expansion was a *****. THAT was an incomplete game that sold unfinished content as an expansion.
SC2 is nothing like that. It's not like your campaign gets cut off before you beat the final boss and get your actual ending. You get a complete story, and you get a complete multiplayer experience. And for people that like the game, it's worth way more than the $60 they paid for it.
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"Principally I hate and detest the animal called man, although I heartily love John, Peter, Thomas and so forth" - Jonathan Swift BT with the victory!
ChichiriMuyo posted... I know I'm late to the party, but I've never gotten the "it's 1/3 of a game" argument. It has as much or more content as the other Starcraft releases.
Also, the way they've handled it is nothing like Diablo 2 where they outright stated that they hadn't finished the game and the rest would be available in an expansion. Having played Diablo 2 (and LoD) more than any other game in my life, I remember just how much better the balance felt with the expansion. Going from beating Diablo to starting Nightmare the first time without the expansion was a *****. THAT was an incomplete game that sold unfinished content as an expansion.
SC2 is nothing like that. It's not like your campaign gets cut off before you beat the final boss and get your actual ending. You get a complete story, and you get a complete multiplayer experience. And for people that like the game, it's worth way more than the $60 they paid for it.
Really? I never knew Diablo 2 was unfinished; I wouldn't complain about it, the game still felt incredibly solid to me, but interesting to hear nontheless.
-- Joyrock Fresh from my first justified ban. Ever!
I'll give you credit for bumping this, usually trolls just slink away to start a new topic after they make themselves look this stupid. Good job owning up to it.
Blulum posted... I'll give you credit for bumping this, usually trolls just slink away to start a new topic after they make themselves look this stupid. Good job owning up to it.
I still haven't made myself look stupid, unlike the lot of you trying to argue against it :)
-- Joyrock Fresh from my first justified ban. Ever!
Liquid Wind posted... joyrock repeatedly bumping a topic in which he still denies the sale of blizzard even though it's listed on the NASDAQ
is this like some kind of masochism where you get off on embarrassing yourself?
I haven't embarrassed myself.
They didn't buy Blizzard. They couldn't afford to buy Blizzard. They MERGED with Vivendi, but Blizzard and Acti still exist as seperate entities. The same was as how Vivendi and Blizzard acted seperately.
-- Joyrock Fresh from my first justified ban. Ever!