StarCraft II: A Look Back

[The_Blade]

A further question for you: how do you feel the need to make the game viable as an e-sport may have affected development and how does this fit your analysis? For instance, gameplay balance is tantamount to this purpose, thus any unit that could not be reasonably balanced had to go or be reworked significantly, i.e. the Lurker and the form 1 mothership. This also speaks to some of the creativity in unit design. Or could we consider this purpose served as perhaps a residual or side effect?

I would like to contribute with my own thoughts, regarding e-sports and the original StarCraft legacy.

Perhaps what created the most pressure within Blizzard was the need to match StarCraft's gameplay and balance. Both where known in the gaming industry as inches from perfection, polished with time.

Moreover, a fraction of the elder StarCraft players forgot the ten years it took the game to reach this level of perfection. What the fans also expected from blizzard, was a game similar to StarCraft, but not StarCraft v.2. Therefore the legacy left by StarCraft itself was really strong on the hearts of its fans, thus also vigilant on the development of its offspring. The game was adressed as Blizzard "sleeping titan" upon anouncement for these reasons, and the fanbase awoke with the titan.

I do believe these factors created the greatest tension within Blizzard. Eventually, I remember Dustin Browder speaking of this tension through several interviews; and IIRC he even stated that at some point Blizzard wanted to halt project development before the announcement in 2007.

You make some fine points, including about Blizzard's negatives. I doubt that Blizzard's alpha 2008 decision played a big negative role in game design, however. Blizzard doesn't follow the same design strategies as most other companies. I don't think their alpha means the same thing as another company's alpha, though their beta seems to be very similar. Of course, it could be that battle.net's beta came about quite a bit after the game design beta. But I don't think that was the real issue.

I have to agree with Kimera on his statement. You stated that the discussion of the terms Alpha and Beta have been discussed over time, and this is because they have changed with time. Therefore, I don't believe there is a global meaning of what an Alpha build should represent, but I fall for the idea that it is given meaning through the needs of every gaming company.

For example, alpha stages of the original StarCraft development had an inferior engine, but allowed some gameplay to take place.

[Nicol Bolas]

You stated that the discussion of the terms Alpha and Beta have been discussed over time, and this is because they have changed with time. Therefore, I don't believe there is a global meaning of what an Alpha build should represent, but I fall for the idea that it is given meaning through the needs of every gaming company.

I think that represents something of a misunderstanding of what I was trying to say.

I wasn't saying that Blizzard necessarily calls these phases Alpha, Beta, or whatever. That's why I spelled out the definition of the terms as I was using them. At some point, based on the time until you want to release, you must stop experimenting with the game. Whether Blizzard formally called it "Alpha" or whether it was just an internal understanding that "Oh, we only have 6 months to ship. Time to stop adding new units," is irrelevant. It simply must happen at some point; the developers must actively restrain themselves from making certain levels of changes when you get close to shipping the game.

What matters is the effect of perpetually having 6 months or so to ship is for a project, when it actually takes you 16 months to ship. Spending so long in a state where you cannot make changes with dramatic long-term impacts.

[The_Blade]

Now I see your point clearly. Yet, how do you know that Blizzard wanted to release the game during 2008. A decent amount of people thought StarCraft 2 would be released from a time period between 2008 and 2009; while a few expected Blizzard to release 3 years after the anouncement, like other games in the past. Even during late 2009 the developers claimed Zerg was still in development.

[Nicol Bolas]

Yet, how do you know that Blizzard wanted to release the game during 2008.

First, I'm fairly certain they said something along those lines in 2008. I may be mistaken, but I'm pretty sure they said that 2008 was their original goal for at least the beta if not the actual release.

But more importantly second, I outlined the evidence for this in the post. Corruptors and Roaches were still in the game in late 2008, despite them clearly not working. Whereas units from 2007 that weren't working (say, Soul Hunters and Predators) were cut. One of these is indicative of an Alpha-stage of development, the other is indicative of pre-Alpha development.

Even during late 2009 the developers claimed Zerg was still in development.

If by "in development," you mean a pre-alpha mindset, there's no evidence of pre-alpha-level changes being made. While it is certainly possible that Blizzard was in a pre-alpha mindset, yet didn't make pre-alpha-level changes, the Corruptor issue (a unit that just doesn't work) strongly suggests that this isn't the case. If they were in a pre-alpha mindset, wouldn't it make more sense for them to scrap the Corruptor entirely and make something else?

Or to put it another way, this analysis is attempting to go beyond what Blizzard claims and use their actions to deduce what they were actually thinking.

[Caliban113]

Love this stuff! - Good job!

[Josue]

Love this stuff! - Good job!

Yeah, nice job Nicol!

Or to put it another way, this analysis is attempting to go beyond what Blizzard claims and use their actions to deduce what they were actually thinking.

Hmm... who knows about Blizzard, but I bet some of us were even afraid of this becoming vaporware as it happened to SC Ghost, even with all the "we're shipping soon"
(and you know when they say "when it's done"...

Blizzard's Exact Mathematical Definition of Soon™: {soon|1 month<soon<∞}

(just to quote it from somewhere else)
)
but thank God, Blizzard finally shipped SC2 (If I recall correctly, they blamed BattleNet 2.0 for the delay?) and now we're eagerly waiting for the frist expansion.... that reminds me, even though I had completely read your article I don't remember you mentioning the change of plans when they decided it will be a trilogy... or maybe I'm wrong?

[Eligor]

Great article and a very interesting analysis of the game's development and shortcomings. I think you're spot on about the issues in Blizzard's approach to developing new units and mechanics, as well as about the Zerg ending up much less interesting than originally planned.

[Pandonetho]

Holy crap that's so long it might as well be a dissertation.

[mythology]

Nicol Bolas, looks like you just typed down memory lane.

i hate how people would refer to roaches as tanks. tanks was the fans point of view and it just stuck. based on this fan point of view you say the roach fails? i agree, but i disagree about that being blizzard's intent.

something to stand up to the banes that plague the zerg race. i think that was blizzards real intent and why they wouldn't let go of the roach. also blizzard may of had some trouble with the roach and hydra sharing the spotlight, but in the end they pulled it off.

here is a picture of the other protoss star relic, when blizz turned it into the stasis orb they left the model unchanged merely switching it from an air unit to a ground unit as seen in the next picture. then came the next evolution we all know which looks like a protoss scorpion to me. they decided to go with the boney fish design until it became the sentry we all know n love.

[mythology]

i know it's a double post but the image posting limit was 5. i just need to post 2 more pictures.

for images of the predator that don't exist, here are 2 of them.