Starcraft 2 Beta is taking way too much space!

[Maul]

I wasn't referring to your comments but if you're aiming them at mine then they are completely irrelevant. All I'm saying is that a 32GB game is ridiculous and would take up a large portion of the HD that would have a noticeable impact on a 500GB HD if you have MP3 and other things. If StarCraft 2 weren't the kind of game that you always keep installed then it would be a non-issue after all Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2 both take up almost 30GB in and of themselves and I see no problem with that. 'Nuff said

Though I'm quoting you Mr Lee I'm not necessarily directing at you. If there was a problem
()
here are the two logical solutions:


1. Get more space or manage your current solution better
2. Ask Blizzard to cut things from the game

[TheEconomist]

So, you're saying the logical solution for using a 500GB is to get more HDs that you won't use? You're not understanding. Let me reiterate what's happening. I specifically said a 500GB HD and I said what you said before you even came to this topic. Why are you acting like I disagree with you or didn't think of it? I have two 500GB in RAID right now. What I'm saying is that 32GB is nothing to sneeze at even on a 500GB. I never said it was hard to manage, get more space, or any of the things you did. All I'm saying is that 32GB is a ridiculous amount for a game even on 500GB.

I never said:

1) HDs were expensive or hard to get. (Everyone knows how to get HDs )
2) 32GB in and of itself was a lot of space. (I just said it's an amount to be considered for optimizing)
3) 500GB didn't give you enough space to have anything with a 32GB game.

All of these things are things that you thought I said and I can't figure out why because I've gone out of my way to show you that I never said these things. In fact, I said these things before you even came into this topic. It was my first post in here The ability to get more HDs is irrelevant because I said "on a 500GB" which is as crucial as "at this rate" which most people keep missing for some reason. What you're doing is looking at this from a "solve the problem" perspective which I already know how to do as I've already done it myself and hinted at it in my first post here. I'm looking at this from a "this is why Blizzard should fix this" perspective which is why you look to fixing the problem while I seek to speak why it needs to be fixed. I hope this finally clears this up.

[Maul]

But I don't believe Blizzard should fix the amount of space the game uses because there is nothing to fix. Games are becoming more sophisticated and require more space. The only way Blizzard could change the size the game requires is to cut features, which is not good in my eyes.

[Equiliari]

Well guys, i have tried deleting all the older versions. The game still works but older replays will not play. I have played like 10 games on it and no problems so far.

Im guessing you deleted a couple of "BaseXXXXX" folders in the "Version" folder.
You deleted all of them up to but not including "Base 15580"?

[newcomplex]

ME2 is less then twenty gigs, nor 30 : p

[TheEconomist]

But I don't believe Blizzard should fix the amount of space the game uses because there is nothing to fix. Games are becoming more sophisticated and require more space. The only way Blizzard could change the size the game requires is to cut features, which is not good in my eyes.

Ah ha! So there's the confusion. Glad we found it. The game takes so much space because there's 16+ plus different copies of the same 600MB-800MB core files in each version folder. All Blizzard has to do is find someway to only need one for each. The game files themselves only take up about 2GB. If they were all necessary content then I would glady desire 32GB+. Hell, I'd love some uncompressed video for 300GB+

@newcomplex: I said Mass Effect AAANNNDDD Mass Effect 2. For the games themselves, that's 13GB and 12GB according to my installation directories. That's full patched but with no DLC.

[Maul]

Ah ha! So there's the confusion. Glad we found it. The game takes so much space because there's 16+ plus different copies of the same 600MB-800MB core files in each version folder. All Blizzard has to do is find someway to only need one for each.

I think the core files are kept for the backward compatibility for replays, which should include all models/sounds/etc for the state of the game for each prior patch. This should be important for someone who archives every game they play. :P There certainly should be a way to optimise this to only use the data that's changed. I think it's a good compromise however, seeing if you watch a 1.11 BW game on the current release it either won't load or be bugged. I don't want this to happen in SC2.

The space used will only get larger too, I imagine, with all the singleplayer data, cinematics and whatever other goodies they're keeping from us.

[TheEconomist]

Old StarCraft: Brood War replays could be watched by switching executables. There's third party programs which automatically changes the .exe to the patch you need so it's easy to do this. Blizzard is just making a way to do it without changing executables so that the less computer literate people can do it automatically. Basically, there's no reason for the current StarCraft 2 method other than not having implemented another method yet. I'm sure they will though. They haven't done it yet because they have infinitely more important things to worry about right now.