Starcraft II Cheesy? The Original Isn't Exactly Shakespeare.

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Originally Posted by Robear

I think throwing Earth into SC2 would have been interesting. We're personally invested in Earth, so that could raise the stakes, but a significant faction of the Koprulu terrans might just not care, and the Protoss certainly wouldn't. There would be more interesting tension if for one group it was like "gotta save the world," and some Protoss are like "we understand how it sucks to lose a homeworld, we'll join you!" and others are like "who gives a shit about humans, we need to rebuild." I don't care about the whole galaxy though, that's too big and uninteresting.

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That can set the stage for SC3. If Amon's assault is for the WHOLE of the galaxy, then Earth too will be attacked. That way, we can find out in SC3 that Amon's assault had reached Earth, and so despite his defeat in LotV, that part of the Milky Way was overrun, allowing the possibility of him to return yet again.

I hope the UED is saved for SC3. They *will* be back for sure in terms of lore, and should be bigger and badder than ever; they've had years of freedom to develop and expand without warfare, they know the full magnitude of the threat posed by the K-Sector inhabitants after the loss of their first fleet, and have pockets of UED remnants in the sector that can provide intelligence data and other aid.

Also, I must correct myself, the campaign *does* mention the Dylarian battlecruisers, but it was dummied out. As Duran goes for the psi disruptor on Tarsonis and relays his advice on destroying the hives to neutralize them, there's a dummied out transmission from DuGalle, who says a small force will remain with Duran to aid him, but the bulk of the fleet is moving on to Korhal, and specifically says this is why you don't have battlecruisers in that mission. So, okay, the story specifically mentioned they were busy attacking Korhal and probably got blown up a lot by the time you finished on Tarsonis and caught up. Dunno why this trigger was dummied out but okey dokey.

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Originally Posted by ragnarok

That can set the stage for SC3. If Amon's assault is for the WHOLE of the galaxy, then Earth too will be attacked. That way, we can find out in SC3 that Amon's assault had reached Earth, and so despite his defeat in LotV, that part of the Milky Way was overrun, allowing the possibility of him to return yet again.

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A really funny/creepy aspect to it could be if K Sector humans managed to contact Earth, only to discover that it's already gone, or subjugated somehow. I like the idea of the K Sector being our last hope.

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Originally Posted by Drake Clawfang

I found it odd HotS has not even a token mention of Media Blitz. Just have Valerian go like "many civilians have left Korhal after my father's hand in the Confederacy's destruction was revealed, and military loyalty is at an all-time low. If the zerg invade, I doubt as many will rally to the defense as would have before."

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Given the story that we got in HotS, the reason why Media Blitz does not have any significant lasting ramifications to Mengsk/Dominion is because it would then invalidate Kerrigan's whole arc. The old excuse that Raynor's force is only small and can do nothing to the Dominion is a lame explanation that flies in the face of what he did do at the end of WoL when he defeated the Zerg and the Queen of Blades(!).

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Originally Posted by Drake Clawfang

Oh definitely, the campaign's gameplay is far superior to SC1's. It's just that outside the missions themselves, in their impact in the overarcing campaign, they got formulaic. Do a mission, win a few credits, collect some relics or zerg remains and get some research points, go spend your goodies.

I remember when they were demoing the campaign during development, Blizzard told us we'd be able to buy new units as we liked instead of getting them automatically with a new mission, and certain missions may be more difficult but have greater rewards. Stuff like that would generate more strategy to how we played things instead of just "okay, which mission gives me the unit/research I want next?"

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I can't really complain about this side of things because compared to Sc1, it was a gameplay element that was new and different at the time even though it was probably and eventually viewed as just a superfluous distraction down the track. The irony is that when you separate out the story from the gameplay in Sc1, one can also say that the actual campaign gameplay was just a superfluous distraction, too...

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Originally Posted by Drake Clawfang

The only time I think he dipped into melodrama in SC1 was when he talked to Aldaris. "All that you have built on Aiur is a fleeting dream, and your Conclave shall awaken from it to find themselves in a greater nightmare." But that's pretty restrained compared to SC2.

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Oh, I'm pretty sure the speech about "negative suns" and "entropies of entire realities" fulfills that melodrama quotient, too. It's reminiscent of Roy Batty's final speech in Blade Runner. As I said though, melodrama is not a bad thing if used correctly. In those two cases (Sc1 Zeratul and Roy Batty), the writing was done this way to instil a sense of gravitas and to show their characters as being warrior-poets. Sc2 Zeratul has none of this sense.

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Originally Posted by Drake Clawfang

Yeah. I think they should have, and it would have been awesome, if we saw Hybrids in the defense of Korhal somehow. We know from Skeigyr and WoL's hidden mission that Mengsk knew Moebius and Narud were making Hybrids. If Narud gave him the Xel'naga artifact, why not a Hybrid or two hiding in the palace? Make that Mengsk's final trump card after the Odin fails.

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Yep. Mengsk's ultimate defeat should've been early in HotS (to also give weight to Raynor's efforts against Mengsk in WoL) and whilst she was uninfested (to give her some time to mull over the humanity of murdering someone over revenge whilst being fully human again). The links to the Hybrids would have made for an easy transition for Kerrigan to focus on this new threat and be a better reason for her re-infestation (rather than Mengsk) on a superficial level (the Hybrids are too powerful - hence she needs to power up again) but on a more thematic level (her angst at realising she is still morally warped whilst regaining her "humanity" when she fulfills her revenge drives her to eventually forsake it by choosing/embracing the Zerg wholeheartedly).

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Originally Posted by Robear

2 reasons. 1, when I first played SC1, I was a kid, I wasn't genre savvy, and I didn't realize how referential or derivative (which ever you want to call it) so many elements were. My main exposure to sci-fi fantasy was Star Wars, and for Starcraft to take a much grittier approach, with its dystopian setting and backstories involving political assassinations, terrorism, brainwashing, betrayals, and cool alien origin stories, to me that was all exceptional worldbuilding.

But, nostalgia goggles aside, there are a lot of choices I like better about SC1 than 2. So in both SC1 and 2, they have this thing going where there's infighting in each faction and no side is totally good (except for Raynor,) yadda yadda. But in SC1, balancing the infighting with the outfighting with the other races is all there is to it. Aldaris could have won, Zasz could have gone rogue, killed Kerrigan and taken over, the Confederacy could have come back, whatever, you didn't know how it would go. And the ultimate consequence of that action would just be that that faction got to rule the sector... until more factionalism tore them down again. The one exception being that the Zerg are slightly worse for the other races to have in charge, what with the insatiable appetite for assimilation.

But then in SC2, now there's prophecies and predestination stuff? And instead of just fighting for power, now, like, galaxies/the universe are at stake? I hate all those 'the whole universe is at stake' plots. Everyone does it and it messes things up, imo. Firefly was neat because you got invested even if what happened to that crew of people didn't matter in the long run, they'd probably just die somewhere. Then for Serenity they made it a saving the galaxy kind of thing and I cared less. The first Robocop was about a single corrupt company/police department/city thing, but for the remake they had to make it so that robocop was the prototype for military robots that would be rolling out across the US and the world, making the whole world at stake.

I guess maybe I'm just more interested how characters and factions interact with each other when they're just weighing outside risks against their own self-interests. Once the entire universe is at stake it's less interesting. Like, yeah, Zeratul's gonna do anything to save the universe because he believes a prophecy. That's less interesting than finding out more about the mysterious Dark Templar who swooped in with his own motivations to kill a cerebrate, and is in opposition to the Protoss you've seen thus far.

I think throwing Earth into SC2 would have been interesting. We're personally invested in Earth, so that could raise the stakes, but a significant faction of the Koprulu terrans might just not care, and the Protoss certainly wouldn't. There would be more interesting tension if for one group it was like "gotta save the world," and some Protoss are like "we understand how it sucks to lose a homeworld, we'll join you!" and others are like "who gives a shit about humans, we need to rebuild." I don't care about the whole galaxy though, that's too big and uninteresting.

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I would add to Robear's rep given the amount of truth here, but I've already given it elsewhere. I'll just have to settle by quoting it.

I'm probably one of the rare Sc fan who actually does not actually care much for the Hybrid/Xel'Naga focus. This is due in part to what Robear said about the "stake of the entire universe" being less interesting and rote. As to the Serenity film, I think it's largely because Joss Whedon only had one more go at the franchise and had to over-extend to compensate for the cancellation of Firefly as a series. Parts of the film certainly felt like it could've been a culmination of things had there been time to develop the universe beforehand.

As to Earth, I've always felt that the UED were somewhat underserved in BW due in part to being constrained as an expansion. I reckon that if BW had not existed, the bones of BW would have made an even more weighty and interesting sequel were it fleshed out more compared to rather aimless one we have. I'm kind of mixed seeing the UED in Sc3 though since although it would re-introduce some necessary grit and grounding back, it also indicates that the universe is somewhat tired having to recur back to an old enemy again.

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Originally Posted by Nissa

A really funny/creepy aspect to it could be if K Sector humans managed to contact Earth, only to discover that it's already gone, or subjugated somehow. I like the idea of the K Sector being our last hope.

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I'd like that, having it as a lifeboat for humanity....

Also remember Blizzard said Doran Routhe was rumored to be up to some other secret experiment. I doubt they would pointedly say that if they didn't have something in mind.

As my work on SC Wiki continues, a few more questions come up to discuss :)

- The entire reason the UED were suspicious of the psi disruptor is because it could disrupt the zerg's control of their minions and thus threatened their goal to take control of the zerg via the Overmind... and then they keep it on during Episode VI? How come it shatters Kerrigan's broods but doesn't affect theirs?
- Aren't psi emitters supposed to lure zerg to them? Why do you need to take it to them, then, and how does that allow Kerrigan to control them when she apparently can't do it without the emitter. And the emitters reach across space, I doubt broadcast range was a concern at any point of this.
- If the psi disruptor can apparently be built and reassembled, why not have it moved to Korhal? Then the UED only needs to worry on fortifying two planets instead of three. And let's not forget the airtight security around the damn thing's power generators, or why random zerg were just wandering around the area.
- Kerrigan's "sneak attack" on Duke and Fenix begins with the death of a few random templar and civilians? How about send the swarm down their throats? We saw the devs come up with the valkyrie raid in Emperor's Flight, why not do that again here with an outlying base and that triggers the countdown to alert?
- Episode V ending? "Hi Admiral, I'm totally gonna go plot to overthrow you now. Bye!" and DuGalle lets her run off? Dude isn't that dumb I'd hope.

I'm not going to harp on asking how the psi disruptor actually works or how the UED is able to control the zerg by doping up the Overmind, because SC's science is so silly it cannot be questioned. :p

On more casual conversation, looking at the original game makes me realize how simplistic the first one was in terms of map making. The first SC really had no in-map cutscenes, the closest thing to one is the end of Terran 9, most of the "cutscenes" have units appear and the game pause as speech rolls. Really, vanilla Starcraft is boring from a technical standpoint.

Brood War? Hell, the Escape From Aiur alone has small-scale battles throughout the map as you find wandering zealots. Then you ramp things up to Aldaris' death, the entirety of Emperor's Fall with the ghosts and battlecruisers and Mengsk's escape with Raynor, Emperor's Flight with the opening Valkyrie raid, Raynor attacking the psi disruptor generators. It's like the developers realized "hey, we can do cool shit in-game!" when it slipped their minds in the first game.

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Originally Posted by Drake Clawfang

As my work on SC Wiki continues, a few more questions come up to discuss :)

- The entire reason the UED were suspicious of the psi disruptor is because it could disrupt the zerg's control of their minions and thus threatened their goal to take control of the zerg via the Overmind... and then they keep it on during Episode VI? How come it shatters Kerrigan's broods but doesn't affect theirs?

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Could you phrase this better? I'm not sure what you're getting at.

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- Aren't psi emitters supposed to lure zerg to them? Why do you need to take it to them, then, and how does that allow Kerrigan to control them when she apparently can't do it without the emitter. And the emitters reach across space, I doubt broadcast range was a concern at any point of this.

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Yeah, fair enough.

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- If the psi disruptor can apparently be built and reassembled, why not have it moved to Korhal? Then the UED only needs to worry on fortifying two planets instead of one. And let's not forget the airtight security around the damn thing's power generators, or why random zerg were just wandering around the area.

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Was the disruptor ever really moved?

Eh, I'm pretty lenient on gameplay flaws -- the Zerg wandering around, for example. Actually, now that I think about it, those wandering Zerg might have been a few that the UED were controlling, and it took a close range psi emitter to overcome the effects of the disruptor.

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- Kerrigan's "sneak attack" on Duke and Fenix begins with the death of a few random templar and civilians? How about send the swarm down their throats? We saw the devs come up with the valkyrie raid in Emperor's Flight, why not do that again here with an outlying base and that triggers the countdown to alert?

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Eh, it wasn't so much of a sneak attack as it was hitting the others before they were ready to fight back. They weren't expecting her to attack them so soon, and they needed that time to prepare. The sneaking aspect was the entrance into the mission, where the Zerg put their foothold on the map.

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- Episode V ending? "Hi Admiral, I'm totally gonna go plot to overthrow you now. Bye!" and DuGalle lets her run off? Dude isn't that dumb I'd hope.

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DuGalle doesn't have control of the area of that map, he simply has been able to medicate the Overmind -- after all, he spent the entire mission trying to create a presence there. There's no indication he had the resources to pursue Kerrigan at that time. Kerrigan has shown herself willing to taunt her enemies, even if it would be wiser to wait a bit. Like when she revealed Raszagal being under her mind control. The point then was to hurt Zeratul, and the point here is to make DuGalle feel like an idiot for killing Stukov.

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I'm not going to harp on asking how the psi disruptor actually works or how the UED is able to control the zerg by doping up the Overmind, because SC's science is so silly it cannot be questioned. :p

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There's always room in sci-fi for suspension of disbelief.

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On more casual conversation, looking at the original game makes me realize how simplistic the first one was in terms of map making. The first SC really had no in-map cutscenes, the closest thing to one is the end of Terran 9, most of the "cutscenes" have units appear and the game pause as speech rolls. Really, vanilla Starcraft is boring from a technical standpoint.

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I prefer no cutscenes to cutscenes with boring story. The fact that they couldn't do "good" visuals means they had to go for a more intelligent plotline. I like the look of SC just fine, particularly since the player can keep going while the talking is going on, for many of the dialogues.

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Originally Posted by Nissa

Could you phrase this better? I'm not sure what you're getting at.

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I mean, the UED keeps the psi disrupter on in Episode VI (before it goes kablooie) after establishing that having it on disrupts the Overmind's control of the zerg, and thus their ability to control the zerg through it. I guess you could handwave it as the UED technically doesn't use the zerg in battle until missions after the disruptor is gone... except then on planets like Korhal the UED have clearly been utilizing the zerg in combat already, so...

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Was the disruptor ever really moved?

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Yes, from Tarsonis to Braxis.

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Actually, now that I think about it, those wandering Zerg might have been a few that the UED were controlling, and it took a close range psi emitter to overcome the effects of the disruptor.

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Now, that would be interesting, if the emitter disrupted the disruptor :p. Except the disruptor has been disabled by that point. Okay, maybe the emitter causes some lingering effects to wear off so Kerrigan can control them, but for me that's reaching the realm of "we're not gonna explain how it works; that way it can work however we need it to at the time."

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DuGalle doesn't have control of the area of that map, he simply has been able to medicate the Overmind -- after all, he spent the entire mission trying to create a presence there. There's no indication he had the resources to pursue Kerrigan at that time.

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True. I'll chalk it up to more "DuGalle being incompetent".

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Originally Posted by Drake Clawfang

I mean, the UED keeps the psi disrupter on in Episode VI (before it goes kablooie) after establishing that having it on disrupts the Overmind's control of the zerg, and thus their ability to control the zerg through it. I guess you could handwave it as the UED technically doesn't use the zerg in battle until missions after the disruptor is gone... except then on planets like Korhal the UED have clearly been utilizing the zerg in combat already, so...

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Oh, okay, now I get it. Um, I assumed that they used the disruptor to somehow find a way to control the Overmind. If it disrupts the Overmind, then they can manipulate whatever power is used by it, or they needed the disruptor to even get close enough to the Overmind to control it.

Or the Overmind wasn't in range. The Overmind was on Char the whole time, not Tarsonis or Braxis, so by moving the disruptor, they allowed their pet more room to control the swarm.

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Yes, from Tarsonis to Braxis.

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Wait, wait, brakes. I just realized something. Okay, so Mengsk was looking for the disruptor, according to Kerrigan. If he didn't find it, but it was on Tarsonis all along for the UED to get it, how come Tassadar's burning of Tarsonis at the end of the first Terran missions (there was green text saying he burned it, I think) didn't destroy the disruptor.

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Now, that would be interesting, if the emitter disrupted the disruptor :p. Except the disruptor has been disabled by that point. Okay, maybe the emitter causes some lingering effects to wear off so Kerrigan can control them, but for me that's reaching the realm of "we're not gonna explain how it works; that way it can work however we need it to at the time."

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I'm not too worried about that sort of thing. That's a gameplay quirk, where suspension of disbelief is stretched so that the level can be played the way the developers want. Since this doesn't have much impact on plot or make characters look stupid, it's alright by me.

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True. I'll chalk it up to more "DuGalle being incompetent".

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Well, keep in mind that he's an invader on Char, and doesn't have an established base of operations there like he would on a Terran world. He can't run off all willy-nilly against everything threatening him.