Anyone else check out the Amazon product reviews for SC2?

I was honestly expecting this... SC2 currently has a 3 star rating, with half being 5 star and the other half 1 star. There seem to be a good number of people who are really dissatisfied with the product Blizzard made. This makes me wonder if I should really throw down the $60 for this game...

I mean, I've been playing Blizzard games since SC1-WC3. I followed the development of SC2 since WWI 07. And I even played in the beta for SC2. But now that the game is finally out, I have this feeling of apathy towards actually getting it. After reading some of the reviews on Amazon, I really feel I will waste my money if I actually purchase the game. And also seeing as the campaign is split up and throwing down 60 more later down the road...

I really want to get it, but I feel I'm falling for a ploy if I do. That's sad :(

Why would you take a one star review seriously? They're either trolling or looking only at one key missing feature. There's only a few games that actually deserve a one star rating and StarCraft 2 is obviously not one of them.

These people are probably just upset about authenticiation (DRM games always get review bombed) or LAN.

Meh. SC2 clearly doesn't deserve a perfect score, either; that line of reasoning cuts both ways. (There are roughly an equal number of 5/5 and 1/5 ratings, so lets say that the trolls and fanboys cancel each other out.) And if you still think that the aggregate ratings have been unfairly skewed, consider that the none of the 5 top-rated (most "helpful") reviews gave the game better than a 3/5. It's surely not an exaggeration to say that many gamers have been markedly disappointed.

I think the 1 star reviewers are as Tychus said, trolls. They just want to hate the game to be cool because everyone else likes it. Same thing with Halo 3, there were people who just bashed on the game but never played it just because there was so much hype over it.

Talking from an "outside perspective" - meaning not my opinion, per se - I think that a lot of the negative might be stemming from disappointment in the campaign, where fan expectations were waaay too high to begin with. This is an expected result.

I was thinking about this yesterday after finishing the WoL campaign & story. I felt EXACTLY the same about the original vanilla SC when I played its campaign and storyline. First impression was : TOO SHORT!! The plot was always like this as far as first impressions go. HOWEVER, there is a redeeming factor / factors for the game.

In my personal opinion, the Terran perspective was BEAUTIFULLY created. The mission choices on the Hyperion are structured such that you can play through the campaign as quickly as possible with as few upgrades as can be helped to speed through with the highest challenge factor, OR you can play EVERY single mission and have the dilemma of siding with the righteous decisions or going down the darker paths. THis makes for GREAT replayability.

Overall, the campaign has the same first impression as the Vanilla SC, but ONLY because we haven't played the missions enough to know every nook and cranny like we do with the original campaign. One great example is the "zombie" map, and another is the Agria mission.

I feel the crux of the storyline revolved around the Protoss missions and their significance, while the main focus of the missions was to get Raynor and his crew up to par in upgrades and tech as you climb the ladder. Looking at it that way, everything else that springs up in the storyline is really the cherry on the top.

I think the voice acting was extremely well done, and one of my favorite parts in the game was the bar fight.

If I were to rate WoL today, I would give it a 4 out of 5 just because of a few minor shortcomings in the campaign that I think will work themselves out as I play the campaign all over again at different difficulty levels. At the same time, the real HERO of this game that accounts for half of those stars is the MULTIPLAYER.

Being as it is that 90% ppl who got the WoL game just played the campaign - even the Beta testers - I think that multiplayer is not being figured in the polls as it deserves. The REAL gem of the game is the mutiplayer. THIS is what's going to keep the game alive for years to come. So far, bnet is shaping up nicely to BECOME the best service as they're starting to add Cross-region play in the SEA region. This will be followed through the rest fo the world in due-time, and we should have a fully cross-region capable bnet2.0 by HoTS in a year or two when it comes out.

The multiplayer gameplay is sooo balanced and the races look really great; some maps' quality are hardly commendable, but you also have EXCELLENT maps like Metalopolis, Lost Temple, and Steppes of War. The community is making ports of the old balanced BW maps like Fighting Spirit and Destination to SC2, and this will create an even larger pool of great maps for mutiplayer.
Also, don't forget the absolutely great AMM ladder system.

All I want to say is the -ve reviews are really just people with unrealistic expectations being disappointed due to their own fault. The campaign is great if you play it with a sense of discovery. The story goes deeper than how it is told. This was true in SC1; it follows suit in SC2... Expect much better "twists" in the future with HoTS and LoV. The other thing is: with the ending of WoL, how is that going to affect how HoTS is going to develop? There is such room for imagination as to what could be possible, and how the 3 races are going to face the threat of the hybrids both internally and externally. I won't say what happens, but the result of the WoL is intriguing, although not surprising. As I said, from a perspective of discovery, the ending makes the most sense.

"Most helpful" is a joke. You can't be serious .. or are you?

StarCraft 2 could very deserve a 5. 5 doesn't mean perfect it just means the best at that genre and is competitive against other games as well. Only in non-critic circles are 10's or 5's considered perfect. Plus, you've got to consider the fact that StarCraft 2 will be worked on and patched for many years to come. StarCraft: Brood War got mostly 9.2's when it was first released. Clearly, it evolved and became something more.

Actually... I believe in the past, people were down-rating it during beta, to try and, for lack of a better term, boycott it. Primarily due to a lack of chat channels. That was way before it was announced they were gonna add them later.

All of SCL should just go on there and rate / inflate the results :D

Majority so of these poor ratings are from the "rebels" trying to make a point about one or two dysfunctional (or lack there of) features from the BETA version of Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty, not the overall final product.

This does not mean they should be easily dismissed, oh no, there are some features that are certainly dysfunctional. However, with patching, they will be revised and assessed within a relatively quick timeline. Thus these issues are of little relative concern to a professional standard.

In conclusion, OF COURSE you should get Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty. The investment of $60 is worth it.

1 star raters haven't played sc2, imho

I think people have mainly forgotten that RTS games tell main stories in a different way. This isn't a shooter or an action/adventure game. Even so, SC2 makes a massive leap in telling stories for an RTS, it has frikkin cut-scenes amazing ones too. Considering the genre, sc2 delivers and exceeds. If you read the decent/nerdy reviews everything is the same - best RTS in the industry, blizzard has once again changed the game.

As Xec said - multiplayer is also a BIG part of SC2. You think WoW owns the MMORPG industry because of story alone? No it's gameplay, features, etc. (which CONSTANTLY evolve). Sc2 has awesome ladder, and the custom maps are also high quality, fun, and changing. When DotA comes out for SC2 you'll have a whole new set of fans screaming 5/5 or best game evar!

3 is too low. I'd give it a 4/5, roughly equal to the 8.5/10 I gave it earlier.

You have to remember that there is a petetion and groups out there for the "LAN" group that told the world they would rate it 1 star in an attempt to send a message to Blizzard.

For that reason, unfortunately, it will backfire. Because suddenly when looking at the game rating with that knowledge, you can expect at least half, if not majority, of those people are people trying to "make a point" instead of actually judging the stars as needed. Try this in your observations, take this information and just cut the rank 1s by half. If you do that, you'll suddenly find a more realistic rating.. and even then, you can EASILY guess that 50% of those could be too little.

Personally I'd give it 4/5 right now. As time goes on and things are implemented in their content system you will see my review inch to 5. Overall, VERY enjoyable purchase/experience.

I'm not surprised. We all knew that there was going to be discontent with some of Blizzard's decisions, and discontent generates low reviews.
The higher the expectations, the lower the score it will get if they're not fulfilled, even if the game is very good (i didn't still played the SP campaign substantially to say anything about that).

probably trolls. You should get SC2, no question about it.
Some of the pro reviews have been great, no all of the pro reviews have been great and I don't think blizzard paid everyone of them (guardian, etc..).

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Originally Posted by Gifted

Try this in your observations, take this information and just cut the rank 1s by half. If you do that, you'll suddenly find a more realistic rating.. and even then, you can EASILY guess that 50% of those could be too little.

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And to account for fanboyism overinflation we can cut the rank 5s by half....

3/5 from me.

The game's a spam fest. Too much macro, too little micro. It's a flaw in game design that we need to build more than one rax. Drives me nuts that I need control groups for my production farms. Big step backwards for RTS.

If THQ did justice for DoW2, SC2 wouldn't hold a candle to it in this genre. But alas, I only have hope for a good RTS being developed by an indie company. These fat cats (Activision/THQ) don't know what they're doing.

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Originally Posted by nobdoor

The game's a spam fest. Too much macro, too little micro. It's a flaw in game design that we need to build more than one rax. Drives me nuts that I need control groups for my production farms. Big step backwards for RTS.

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I agree that macro is the single most important aspect of the game, but building more than 1 Barracks means that you need to decide when to get them and how many, or if you better invest that in units at that moment, or you better reinforce another branch of the tech tree.

What i think is totally unneeded, are the macro mechanics. They're just artificial UI limitations, really. But this was discussed a looong time ago in a looong thread.

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Originally Posted by nobdoor

3/5 from me.

The game's a spam fest. Too much macro, too little micro. It's a flaw in game design that we need to build more than one rax. Drives me nuts that I need control groups for my production farms. Big step backwards for RTS.

If THQ did justice for DoW2, SC2 wouldn't hold a candle to it in this genre. But alas, I only have hope for a good RTS being developed by an indie company. These fat cats (Activision/THQ) don't know what they're doing.

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Only those who are uninformed think that micro is moving the RTS genre forward. Micro is TACTICS and is therefore moving the genre of real-time STRATEGY backwards.

The only games that moved the genre forward recently were the original Supreme Commander and Sins of a Solar Empire. After that everybody decided that tactics are what's important to strategy, completely ignoring the fact that tactics are but a very, -very- small part of strategy. Logistics is three times as important to strategy as micro is.

Back on topic, I'm only playing it with a guest pass so I've been taking it slow. I have to say the campaign is both impressive and not. The random voices in the mission ("we're with you raynor!") are annoying and poorly voice-acted, but overall the missions have so far felt good.

DoW2 and SC2 are really the only campaigns I play in RTS games, and I have to say SC2 is better in this regard since it has way more macro than DoW2 does.

In multiplayer...haven't really done it yet outside of beta. Still too much emphasis on getting build orders down perfectly, but enjoyable for all that.

Internet reviews are a huge failure. Look anywhere they exist and it's the same thing. Far and away 5 or 1 star reviews from either deluded fans or unrealistic trolls. A few people give a relatively unbiased opinion but these people are in the vast minority.

I checked the GameSpot Launch Center comments and found a comment which said, "I will not buy this game because I like to play the single-player offline but you cannot do this". To which there was 11+ thumbs up.

Clearly, at least 12 people thought you couldn't play the campaign offline.

That proves that "Most helpful" and thumbs up comments are FAIL!

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Originally Posted by TychusFindlay

I checked the GameSpot Launch Center comments and found a comment which said, "I will not buy this game because I like to play the single-player offline but you cannot do this". To which there was 11+ thumbs up.

Clearly, at least 12 people thought you couldn't play the campaign offline.

That proves that "Most helpful" and thumbs up comments are FAIL!

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Yea... I still dont get how people dont know what is going on with that. It is actually really frustrating since a lot of people might see this and not buy the game, its practically slander.

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Originally Posted by nobdoor

3/5 from me.

The game's a spam fest. Too much macro, too little micro. It's a flaw in game design that we need to build more than one rax. Drives me nuts that I need control groups for my production farms. Big step backwards for RTS.

If THQ did justice for DoW2, SC2 wouldn't hold a candle to it in this genre. But alas, I only have hope for a good RTS being developed by an indie company. These fat cats (Activision/THQ) don't know what they're doing.

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Too much macro and too little micro? Flaw in game design that you need more than one rax? Seriously? If you only need to build 1 unit producing structure it becomes even more of a spamfest.

Honestly, I have heard several different takes on why people think the game is bad and none of them make sense and they all oppose each other.
One person said that harassment and small battles are too important
You say that it is too focused on macro
I hear more still that are starting to say that positioning and micro is too important (roaches, tanks, and FF positioning, in addition to choke/ramp locations)

If you ask me, if multiple people have conflicting ideas such as that, it shows that the game is remarkably well balanced in terms of how you can go about achieving victory.

PS: I cant wait until this review embargo is gone, I kinda want to see what the reviewers are going to say about the game. I didnt even know that a company could do it for a game release before it was accidentally slipped in a now deleted tomshardware article about SC2.

Metacritics already has some reviews
http://www.metacritic.com/games/platforms/pc/starcraft2

but Imo..not enough to have objective view on it..

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Originally Posted by SinsWage

Internet reviews are a huge failure. Look anywhere they exist and it's the same thing. Far and away 5 or 1 star reviews from either deluded fans or unrealistic trolls. A few people give a relatively unbiased opinion but these people are in the vast minority.

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That sums up internet reviews, ratings, 'like/dislike' etc.

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Originally Posted by ArcherofAiur

And to account for fanboyism overinflation we can cut the rank 5s by half....

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Actually, there isn't major MOVEMENTS to spam 5s on a product. Remember those threads you helped contribute to in team liquid that has votes to put a 1 star rating? Those will be the proof in this case. Look at the reviews that were written about the game itself. Many of which were written early on July 27th and quote the same 5 core concepts that are put in the argument of the thread that you contributed to rather well to get 1 star ratings :) Hell, maybe a third of them still suggest that chat rooms won't be implemented... why would that turn a game of this value into a 1 star?

The funny part is, the "fanbois" would have put 5 stars whether you do 1 star or not. The logic doesn't compute. MAYBE the only thing that is different is that the knowledge of the "1s" is out there and more "fanbois" will come vote on a product they appreciate (by definition of them being fanbois) so all that's happening is more people are logging into amazon and clicking a button they would otherwise ignore. In other words, more fanbois will vote their HONEST answer, because many other people who bought the game and will play the game are LYING about their answer. The irony of this is that many of those people who voted 1 will probably play the game significantly more in their life than many of those "fanbois".

If you are going to vote 1, that means you don't want to touch the game again.. it's shit, it's not worth your eyesight and the memory of it will possibly reduce your ability to produce children by mere rejection of your system to the thoughts of the game. Are we even suggesting it could be in the same scope as *coughs* E.T? (For the clueless, I suggest you watch this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2DTjLG3usQo)

If you are going to play the game, but features are missing but you'll play the game anyways, you vote 4-2. But people who vote 1 but bought the game and play multiplayer are hypocrites. This will be the case for a major part of those number 1 votes which are SPECIFICALLY FROM the thread you know about at teamliquid. Let me clarify... people who are passionate like us about the game to spend time visiting the largest StarCraft related website in the world... are voting one on a game that I think we all can agree most likely purchased and are playing the game right now. Not everyone of them, some are passionate enough about "missing features" that they'll hold back on the game. Others are waiting until the price goes down. And even so, they shouldn't be making reviews on it anyway in that case.

Your logic in this case is unfortunately very skewed.

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Archer if you reply to this post, please answer the following three questions:
1. Have you purchased the game?
2. What would you HONESTLY give it for a star rating out of 5?
3. Did you vote on the Amazon listing? If so, how many stars did you give it?

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(This isn't to bash you, I just don't want to ASSUME the answers to those questions if this goes forward to a back and forth discussion, FYI: yes, 4, 4)

Well, I have other reasons for not wanting to buy that are of no interest to you.

My reasons have nothing to do with the game quality itself which I cannot rate directly anyway.

I did read a lot of the negative reviews on Amazon, and I suggest you ignore them. As for the game being only partly finished, consider that the original StarCraft came out March 31, 1998. Brood War came out November 1998. So players "had to buy twice" in just one year. But they paid an expansion price for Brood War.

With SC2, there will two expansions coming and I think I have heard they will be priced as expansions which means less than $60 anyway. I myself do not think that the pricing of SC2 nor the planned two expansions are in any way ripping off players.

My two cents being taken for about what it's worth, bottom line is just do what you want! What do you care what anyone else thinks?

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Originally Posted by Gifted

Actually, there isn't major MOVEMENTS to spam 5s on a product.

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Actually thats not at all what I said. I said that if your going to arbitrarily start tweaking the polls to suit your perception of how you think people voted you can start by deflating the 5's do to fanboy inflation.

And dont try to intimidate me into answering a certain way with colored text ;)



Also, for the record ET, did less to hurt gaming than some of SC2's decisions. I dont recall ET every threatening my online privacy :rolleyes:

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Originally Posted by TheRabidDeer

Yea... I still dont get how people dont know what is going on with that. It is actually really frustrating since a lot of people might see this and not buy the game, its practically slander.


Too much macro and too little micro? Flaw in game design that you need more than one rax? Seriously? If you only need to build 1 unit producing structure it becomes even more of a spamfest.

Honestly, I have heard several different takes on why people think the game is bad and none of them make sense and they all oppose each other.
One person said that harassment and small battles are too important
You say that it is too focused on macro
I hear more still that are starting to say that positioning and micro is too important (roaches, tanks, and FF positioning, in addition to choke/ramp locations)

If you ask me, if multiple people have conflicting ideas such as that, it shows that the game is remarkably well balanced in terms of how you can go about achieving victory.

PS: I cant wait until this review embargo is gone, I kinda want to see what the reviewers are going to say about the game. I didnt even know that a company could do it for a game release before it was accidentally slipped in a now deleted tomshardware article about SC2.

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Hahaha wow. To much macro and to little micro? Those peoples conflicting ideas just shows much those people lack skills at. To much macro and to little micro is that person just being bad a micro. There is always to much micro for me. I'm never fast enough. The one line about harassment and small battles are to powerful... that person is just a tech noob. They suck in small battles, and fail to be able to defend again a one unit attack in their mineral field.

It does show how Star craft is balanced in a lot of ways, and how it has a lot of things going for it. It also show all the noobs and what they suck at. :P

I've only been able to play about 2/3 the way through, but I think I can relate my complaint about the campaign.

It starts and remains a little slow for about a quarter of the way through, but with time and patience I discovered that it was like most of the british novels I've read, building a firm foundation atop which to construct a strong and nuanced story. A little overe halfway through I notice a little bit of this and a little bit of that, and in an instant saw the direction things were going in and couldn't help from laughing at the beauty I perceived in the plot.

My complaint is with the protoss missions, and how out of place they felt. Amid the terran rebellion and plots, it seemed too dissonant; too many fantastical elements thrown in there. Though they are obviously planned to provide a stepping stone into the future installments, they felt haphazard and dissonant, when considering the rest of the campaign. Even so, it is still firmly linked to the terran chapter, and the future of StarCraft.

I was also going to say something that others have said before: there doesnt seem to be enough micro only because I suck. And you gotta be patient with starcraft, it takes time to develop the necessary skill to make it a truly wonderful game.

And I never understood the whole thing about people complaining about online/offline play. I loaded my updates, then went straight offline to play campaign. o.O

I'd give it an 84%.

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Why would you take a one star review seriously? They're either trolling or looking only at one key missing feature.

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Thread winner, right here....Have to realize (As those of us here realized 3 years ago) that there is a lot of, "but I wanted SC 1.5" nonsense still out there waiting to be discovered.


.

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Originally Posted by ArcherofAiur

Also, for the record ET, did less to hurt gaming than some of SC2's decisions. I dont recall ET every threatening my online privacy :rolleyes:

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Oh how the mighty poster has fallen.

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Originally Posted by TychusFindlay

Oh how the mighty poster has fallen.

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Blame the victim.

I have a question: what the hell are you guys talking about?

I have a question: must you always be hostile?

I have a statement: Why the **** did you say that? It doesn't contribute to anything constructive its like one having an image of himself made on this forum where he present himself as a major member while looking down on many other forumites being completely different on other forums or in real life.




Now to answer the op, for the love of god is 60bucks your only option? Yes its worth it but by god find other options I got my for around 22 bucks just checking at a price comparison site (pricerunner)


But you also have to ask your self how much am I expecting? What do I want most, a good multiplayer a good single player, story, micro, macro etc.

Don't only ask the question is it worth it, ask also if you should spend it on other games like company of heroes (check for mods to really make it shine), dow2 or something like that.

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Originally Posted by ArcherofAiur

Actually thats not at all what I said. I said that if your going to arbitrarily start tweaking the polls to suit your perception of how you think people voted you can start by deflating the 5's do to fanboy inflation.

And dont try to intimidate me into answering a certain way with colored text ;)



Also, for the record ET, did less to hurt gaming than some of SC2's decisions. I dont recall ET every threatening my online privacy :rolleyes:

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It's not intimidation, you just have an amazing ability to miss a key question to be answered.. I highlighted it so it wouldn't be overlooked. Your reply is case in point, as even when you see a question directed at you, you found a way to avoid it completely.

Could you answer the questions please? I'm rather curious in a non-malicious way.

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Originally Posted by Gifted

Could you answer the questions please?

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Nnnoooo

No problem then, thanks for the reply. I'm move forward on the assumption that you've painted for yourself over time then.

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Originally Posted by Gifted

No problem then, thanks for the reply. I'm move forward on the assumption that you've painted for yourself over time then.

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Gifted, your ad hominem questions contribute nothing to the discussion of Starcraft 2s value. You can assume all you want about me but its probably better to stay on topic.

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Originally Posted by ArcherofAiur

Gifted, your ad hominem questions contribute nothing to the discussion of Starcraft 2s value. You can assume all you want about me but its probably better to stay on topic.

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You do realize that him asking a few questions about you are not ad hominem, right?

Ad hominem only applies when it is the only evidence used.

If I say, "You are retarded, so you are wrong." That is an ad hominem.
If I say, "You are wrong because of fact A, but you are retarded after all" is not ad hominem.

Remember, these are logical fallacies.

Honestly, the questions do contribute to the discussion of SC2's value as they inquire about the value of SC2 to you as an individual and is entirely on topic. Further, it helps clarify your position.

I really hate people that try to hide behind alleged fallacies acting high and mighty instead of being straight up. I mean come on, is it really that hard?