[Finale Spoiler] Finale discussion

[flabortast]

The Tal'darim were not the only Protoss you fight. You can choose to engage Selendis which are the Protoss Raynor are actually pals with. Though Selendis acted less hostile towards Raynor and more "Good Show" and congratulating Raynor for his defense.

[unentschieden]

Then why not have Selendis be the competition for the Artifacts? Or at least have the Taldarim get more characterisation instead of just "It´s ok to take their stuff, they are dicks". That would have been much more interesting from a Story perspective.

[Omeganian]

The possibilities I see:

1) A good Kerrigan tries to bring the Swarm under her control for the uses of humanity, using the remaining link.

2) The deinfestation is temporary, and after reverting back, Kerrigan tries to bring back under her control the Swarm (Cerebrates produced by the overlords are an option).

3) Starts off as 1, later reverts to (or is revealed to be) 2.

[broodmywarcraft]

Ahoy,

I'm new to the forum and have been following various discussions on what people made of the WoL ending. I've been reading through this one, but I can't keep track of every detail, so excuse me if I say things that everyone else has moved on from.

What brought me to the forums was an interest in whether many other players had been as disappointed with the ending of WoL as I was. I think we've all universally agreed that the gameplay was excellent. While I was playing, I didn't at first care too much for the lack of story progression. However, once about halfway through (knowing that there were 26 missions), I started wondering when anything was going to happen. Then, suddenly the revolution took second place after Raynor makes his deal with Valerian (unlikely boarding, indeed...) and then we're on Char. To be honest, my expectation was that the artifact wasn't going to do what Valerian said, only knock the Zerg sideways. I didn't think Kerrigan would be de-infested. I thought that was too lame to be possible but the idea fit in as a way of getting mopey-drunk-former-lover-Raynor to join Valerian's plan. But then... well, we saw the ending, and have opinions about it.

Now, my opinions are going to come from a slightly different angle. Well, I hope so, because if I didn't think I could bring something new, I wouldn't bother posting. First up, I don't think Blizzard stories are massively original. But games have the advantage of active participation, so you can rehash a basic story well and make a great game. Descent: Freespace springs to mind. You're in a stalemate was against an alien race, then another dazzlingly more powerful one appears from nowhere, so you have to band together with your old enemies. Not massively original, but the execution made it a great experience to me. So I won't criticize Blizzard on any front for a lack of creative overall settings.

Secondly, I don't support the claim that the SC universe has suddenly become more fantasy-based than it was before. In particular, a Xel'naga artifact that cripples the Zerg is not new. Did no-one play the Protoss campaign in BW? Because I'm pretty sure that ended by activating a Xel'naga temple using crystals, and the temple's power wiped the Zerg off Shakuras.

SC1 worked well for a few reasons for me, even if it wasn't necessarily a brilliant story. The first is that the characters fleshed out (to various degrees) during the story. I think this has already been discussed quite a lot, so unless I'm called upon to do so, I won't start quoting what I base that opinion on.

Why didn't that happen in WoL? Pretty simple: less happens. I don't think it's any more complicated than that. Characters develop more through events than conversations, IMO. I think there's broad agreement that the mission design was fun but almost completely filled with fillers that didn't advance the story much at all.

The second reason I think SC1 felt more epic was because it was immersive. How so? Well, more happened during the missions, even while I still had control. Kerrigan being taken from underneath me wasn't a cutsequence: I watched the Zerg burst out while I still had control of the units. I made the right-clicks that saw Fenix die. In addition, my actions carried immediate consequence into the next mission. If one was bringing a hero to an installation entrance, the next was exploring inside, and discovering things (something like the secret mission in WoL, to be fair). If in one mission I battle with expedient allies against a greater foe, then in the next I was betraying those allies in the aftermath.

The various elements of WoL that "un-immersed" us have also been discussed, so I'm not re-hashing that debate. I'll just say I felt distinctly more immersed in SC1. I kept playing WoL because I wanted to see what happened next, but that was driven by my 12-year wait from an epic I enjoyed. Yes, some of the lines in WoL were cringeworthy, but I agree that many of us would have overlooked that in light of a more immersive story. (Although "Some things are just worth fighting for" as well as Zeratul's Yoda-lines had me raising an eyebrow at the writing...) Point is there were lousy lines in SC1 too.

So that's two places where SC1 and BW succeeded and WoL has failed. There are also a few ways in which WoL made strange deviations.

Firstly, the alterations to the character's were completely unwarranted. A less controversial example is Mengsk. He's a cunning little rat in SC and BW but his depiction in WoL is very different. Raynor has very much washed out compared to the guy I last saw a decade ago when he swore he'd kill Kerrigan. I was pretty sure he was over her at that point. Guess not. But arguably the most disappointing was Kerrigan. The "Queen B!+$@ of the Universe" was not frightening at all. I should need to be told a level 12 psychic has been detected: the events in the game up to that point should make me aware of how powerful, deceptive, and ruthless she is.

Secondly, the writers seemed to be looking for material in stories that have been concluded. Guys, the Overmind should be dead. Not twitching four years later. Nor, indeed, should Tassadar be coming back. The last set of writers made an awesome and tragic character. Don't try to get in on that. There had better be a very good explanation ("for another time", indeed) but I suspect that there won't be. The reason I want a good explanation is that it undermines what we did at the end of SC1.

An extension of this was the neglect of events from SC1 and BW. Raynor has a long history with the protoss: he helped Fenix break Tassadar out near the end of SC1, aided in the death of the first Overmind and held the line on Aiur while the Warp Gate to Shakuras was shut down. I don't think he'd so easily drop those memories to make a quick buck for an obscure group of scientists. Also, Zeratul knows about the hybrids, and has done for four years. Many have said that we need to consider new players in the series, but I don't see how that's exclusive with acknowledging what's already gone. All it has to be is a line like "I have seen these abominations before".

Finally in this thread of deviations from SC1 I have a minor point. I'm pretty sure moving around the galaxy wasn't that easy in SC1 and BW. Campaigns were fought only on a few planets. How many planets did we see in SC1? Mar Sara, Antiga Prime, the orbital platforms around Tarsonis (e.g. New Gettysburg), Char, Aiur? Maybe one or two more. How many more did we get in BW? Shakuras, Korhal? I guess although I never imagined it taking realistic times (decades, centuries) to travel between worlds, I did imagine it was more difficult (though less so for the protoss with their understanding of warp). I felt like many of the new worlds were invented because designers had a cool idea for a mission setting (Supernova, The Devil's Playground, etc), rather than because they felt it was important to the universe to invent a hundred new worlds.

What I've tried to avoid is my own re-writing of the story. It's Blizzard's OP, so I can't complain how they choose to write it. But with three days thought I think I could have come up with some better basic ideas. If you want ways I think it could've/should've gone and created opportunities for much more material, you can ask, but I don't think that's the point.

The greatest flaw in the campaign is simply that very little happened. If there had been more events relevant to either the revolution or the new war with the Zerg, even if executed in the possibly flawed choose-your-next-mission system, there would've been ample opportunity for development and conclusion of characters and stories. And believe it or not, one can still write a story with conclusions to certain arcs without closing down the options for the expansions.

tl;dr

Good things in SC and BW that WoL ignored
- more happened, so there was more development of characters
- the players was more immersed, because actions carried immediate consequence and more happened in the missions themselves

Deviations WoL made from SC and BW
- the characters changed somewhat, in ways that were unnecessary and appeared to betray the events of SC and BW
- new material undermined concluded arcs in the previous games
- less NB, the planet-hopping is new: missions strung together would've made for more immersive gameplay (and perhaps more consistent with previous games)

The basic problem?
- Very little happened that wasn't predictable or completely unexplored/inconclusive
- What did happen was suddenly tacked on the end

The flawed story is only so obvious because we didn't feel like we were a part of it.

JK

PS: Whoa, that's a lot of text...

I approve of this post

[newcomplex]

Ahoy,

I'm new to the forum and have been following various discussions on what people made of the WoL ending. I've been reading through this one, but I can't keep track of every detail, so excuse me if I say things that everyone else has moved on from.

What brought me to the forums was an interest in whether many other players had been as disappointed with the ending of WoL as I was. I think we've all universally agreed that the gameplay was excellent. While I was playing, I didn't at first care too much for the lack of story progression. However, once about halfway through (knowing that there were 26 missions), I started wondering when anything was going to happen. Then, suddenly the revolution took second place after Raynor makes his deal with Valerian (unlikely boarding, indeed...) and then we're on Char. To be honest, my expectation was that the artifact wasn't going to do what Valerian said, only knock the Zerg sideways. I didn't think Kerrigan would be de-infested. I thought that was too lame to be possible but the idea fit in as a way of getting mopey-drunk-former-lover-Raynor to join Valerian's plan. But then... well, we saw the ending, and have opinions about it.

Now, my opinions are going to come from a slightly different angle. Well, I hope so, because if I didn't think I could bring something new, I wouldn't bother posting. First up, I don't think Blizzard stories are massively original. But games have the advantage of active participation, so you can rehash a basic story well and make a great game. Descent: Freespace springs to mind. You're in a stalemate was against an alien race, then another dazzlingly more powerful one appears from nowhere, so you have to band together with your old enemies. Not massively original, but the execution made it a great experience to me. So I won't criticize Blizzard on any front for a lack of creative overall settings.

Secondly, I don't support the claim that the SC universe has suddenly become more fantasy-based than it was before. In particular, a Xel'naga artifact that cripples the Zerg is not new. Did no-one play the Protoss campaign in BW? Because I'm pretty sure that ended by activating a Xel'naga temple using crystals, and the temple's power wiped the Zerg off Shakuras.

SC1 worked well for a few reasons for me, even if it wasn't necessarily a brilliant story. The first is that the characters fleshed out (to various degrees) during the story. I think this has already been discussed quite a lot, so unless I'm called upon to do so, I won't start quoting what I base that opinion on.

Why didn't that happen in WoL? Pretty simple: less happens. I don't think it's any more complicated than that. Characters develop more through events than conversations, IMO. I think there's broad agreement that the mission design was fun but almost completely filled with fillers that didn't advance the story much at all.

The second reason I think SC1 felt more epic was because it was immersive. How so? Well, more happened during the missions, even while I still had control. Kerrigan being taken from underneath me wasn't a cutsequence: I watched the Zerg burst out while I still had control of the units. I made the right-clicks that saw Fenix die. In addition, my actions carried immediate consequence into the next mission. If one was bringing a hero to an installation entrance, the next was exploring inside, and discovering things (something like the secret mission in WoL, to be fair). If in one mission I battle with expedient allies against a greater foe, then in the next I was betraying those allies in the aftermath.

The various elements of WoL that "un-immersed" us have also been discussed, so I'm not re-hashing that debate. I'll just say I felt distinctly more immersed in SC1. I kept playing WoL because I wanted to see what happened next, but that was driven by my 12-year wait from an epic I enjoyed. Yes, some of the lines in WoL were cringeworthy, but I agree that many of us would have overlooked that in light of a more immersive story. (Although "Some things are just worth fighting for" as well as Zeratul's Yoda-lines had me raising an eyebrow at the writing...) Point is there were lousy lines in SC1 too.

So that's two places where SC1 and BW succeeded and WoL has failed. There are also a few ways in which WoL made strange deviations.

Firstly, the alterations to the character's were completely unwarranted. A less controversial example is Mengsk. He's a cunning little rat in SC and BW but his depiction in WoL is very different. Raynor has very much washed out compared to the guy I last saw a decade ago when he swore he'd kill Kerrigan. I was pretty sure he was over her at that point. Guess not. But arguably the most disappointing was Kerrigan. The "Queen B!+$@ of the Universe" was not frightening at all. I should need to be told a level 12 psychic has been detected: the events in the game up to that point should make me aware of how powerful, deceptive, and ruthless she is.

Secondly, the writers seemed to be looking for material in stories that have been concluded. Guys, the Overmind should be dead. Not twitching four years later. Nor, indeed, should Tassadar be coming back. The last set of writers made an awesome and tragic character. Don't try to get in on that. There had better be a very good explanation ("for another time", indeed) but I suspect that there won't be. The reason I want a good explanation is that it undermines what we did at the end of SC1.

An extension of this was the neglect of events from SC1 and BW. Raynor has a long history with the protoss: he helped Fenix break Tassadar out near the end of SC1, aided in the death of the first Overmind and held the line on Aiur while the Warp Gate to Shakuras was shut down. I don't think he'd so easily drop those memories to make a quick buck for an obscure group of scientists. Also, Zeratul knows about the hybrids, and has done for four years. Many have said that we need to consider new players in the series, but I don't see how that's exclusive with acknowledging what's already gone. All it has to be is a line like "I have seen these abominations before".

Finally in this thread of deviations from SC1 I have a minor point. I'm pretty sure moving around the galaxy wasn't that easy in SC1 and BW. Campaigns were fought only on a few planets. How many planets did we see in SC1? Mar Sara, Antiga Prime, the orbital platforms around Tarsonis (e.g. New Gettysburg), Char, Aiur? Maybe one or two more. How many more did we get in BW? Shakuras, Korhal? I guess although I never imagined it taking realistic times (decades, centuries) to travel between worlds, I did imagine it was more difficult (though less so for the protoss with their understanding of warp). I felt like many of the new worlds were invented because designers had a cool idea for a mission setting (Supernova, The Devil's Playground, etc), rather than because they felt it was important to the universe to invent a hundred new worlds.

What I've tried to avoid is my own re-writing of the story. It's Blizzard's OP, so I can't complain how they choose to write it. But with three days thought I think I could have come up with some better basic ideas. If you want ways I think it could've/should've gone and created opportunities for much more material, you can ask, but I don't think that's the point.

The greatest flaw in the campaign is simply that very little happened. If there had been more events relevant to either the revolution or the new war with the Zerg, even if executed in the possibly flawed choose-your-next-mission system, there would've been ample opportunity for development and conclusion of characters and stories. And believe it or not, one can still write a story with conclusions to certain arcs without closing down the options for the expansions.

tl;dr

Good things in SC and BW that WoL ignored
- more happened, so there was more development of characters
- the players was more immersed, because actions carried immediate consequence and more happened in the missions themselves

Deviations WoL made from SC and BW
- the characters changed somewhat, in ways that were unnecessary and appeared to betray the events of SC and BW
- new material undermined concluded arcs in the previous games
- less NB, the planet-hopping is new: missions strung together would've made for more immersive gameplay (and perhaps more consistent with previous games)

The basic problem?
- Very little happened that wasn't predictable or completely unexplored/inconclusive
- What did happen was suddenly tacked on the end

The flawed story is only so obvious because we didn't feel like we were a part of it.

JK

PS: Whoa, that's a lot of text...

This is an amazing first post, blizzard needs to read this feedback t-t.

Please give it to them .

[Nicol Bolas]

Um, broodmywarcraft, newcomplex:

However much you may appreciate the post in question, it is not necessary to repost the whole thing just to add one line. Or two lines.

Again, WHY does she do that when, by your own admission, at least until the end of of BW, she is human in mind and motivations (though evil) and doesn´t care for the Zerg other than how they support her "human" goals?

That's a good question. The kind of question Blizzard should spend time exploring in HotS.

All I'm saying is what needs to happen in HotS for it to not suck. What needs to happen to make that reasonable is up to them. WoL ended in a bad place for the overall storyline. And this is the only way I can see it for them to climb out of the hole they've dug for themselves.

Incidentally, the cinematic in WoL of this scene was absolutely brilliant IMO. If I had to convey the events of that mission to a newcomer to the universe, I couldn't do better than that.

Really? Honestly, I would have preferred something that showed more character. Kerrigan was Mengsk's #2; she was a leader of men. Yet this cinematic shows her down there, alone.

I would have preferred it if she were trying to keep a small formation of Marines alive to await pickup. You could keep the old dialog, but add new dialog between her and her grunts.

After all, what exactly was she expecting? Even if Mengsk wanted to send a DropShip, she'd have been killed long before one arrived. That's another reason to have other Marines there.

I'm thinking something like the opening to the series Firefly, where you've got Mal Renyolds trying to keep everyone together and fighting, running from place to place kicking ass. And then... Mengsk doesn't send anyone. And you see Mutalisks in the distance, bombing the place.

And in the end, Kerrigan would be alone and out of ammo, surrounded by Zerglings. She'd pull out a badass knife and the last you see of her is her leaping at them.

Kerrigan should have gone down swinging. Not pussed out by dropping her gun and just standing there.

1) A good Kerrigan tries to bring the Swarm under her control for the uses of humanity, using the remaining link.

2) The deinfestation is temporary, and after reverting back, Kerrigan tries to bring back under her control the Swarm (Cerebrates produced by the overlords are an option).

3) Starts off as 1, later reverts to (or is revealed to be) 2.

See, that's why I prefer my idea better: all of these options suck.

Doing #1 strips the Zerg of anything cool and interesting, making them once again the pawn of some human. It also works against what the Overmind wanted to accomplish.

Doing #2 makes all of WoL worthless. Having her deinfestation simply not take makes WoL 29 missions of nothing happening.

Doing #3 is just as bad as #2.

The only way this makes sense is to make Kerrigan choose to be Zerg. That wouldn't undo WoL, because Kerrigan would be actively making a choice of her own free will. And it would allow the Zerg to be Zerg again, rather than just human pets.

[pure.Wasted]

Really? Honestly, I would have preferred something that showed more character. Kerrigan was Mengsk's #2; she was a leader of men. Yet this cinematic shows her down there, alone.

I would have preferred it if she were trying to keep a small formation of Marines alive to await pickup. You could keep the old dialog, but add new dialog between her and her grunts.

After all, what exactly was she expecting? Even if Mengsk wanted to send a DropShip, she'd have been killed long before one arrived. That's another reason to have other Marines there.

I'm thinking something like the opening to the series Firefly, where you've got Mal Renyolds trying to keep everyone together and fighting, running from place to place kicking ass. And then... Mengsk doesn't send anyone. And you see Mutalisks in the distance, bombing the place.

And in the end, Kerrigan would be alone and out of ammo, surrounded by Zerglings. She'd pull out a badass knife and the last you see of her is her leaping at them.

I'm not so hot on the "go down swinging" thing, but seeing other grunts in the cinematic is something I've thought about and hoped they would add (despite the fact that the first thing we saw of the cinematic was the complete storyboard). She wasn't alone, and showing her that way is ... not taking advantage of yet another opportunity.

As you said, new dialogue (on the ground) mixed with old (transmission) would have worked brilliantly to both capture one of SC1's most iconic moments and to inject new life and depth to the scene.

[unentschieden]

She has to be alone because the point is that she is being abandoned. She doesn´t fight back because she is supposed to be helpless in that situation but no one comes to help.

[Dalamar]

She has to be alone because the point is that she is being abandoned. She doesn´t fight back because she is supposed to be helpless in that situation but no one comes to help.

Agreed, from an emotional perspective the scene is much stronger showing her alone and giving up, when all reasonable hope is lost. Yes, it would have been more realistic, had there been a group of marines around, but it wouldn't have been as effective in conveying abandonment and helplessness.

Think of it as poetic license.

[JellyKing]

Um, broodmywarcraft, newcomplex:

However much you may appreciate the post in question, it is not necessary to repost the whole thing just to add one line.

Definitely one place we do agree. :P

I would have preferred it if she were trying to keep a small formation of Marines alive to await pickup. You could keep the old dialog, but add new dialog between her and her grunts.

That's a good point. Certainly my defenses in that mission did not involve Kerrigan alone. My understanding of the cinematic was that the remaining troops were more spread out, but now that I think of it, there's absolutely no indication of other human presence at all. No gunfire in the background, no corpses, nothing.

Kerrigan should have gone down swinging. Not pussed out by dropping her gun and just standing there.

I liked the upward look while she's overrun. The way I saw it, her expression turns to one of anger as she looks up towards Mengsk. To me, that look is a glimpse of the hatred and distrust of everyone around her that began to consume her as QoB.

It's easy to offer praise when the creators' ideas fit in with one's own and, conversely, critical when it doesn't. It's why I don't want to criticize WoL just because the story Blizzard presented isn't the one I imagined but rather because it's poorly told and felt inconsistent with the story we knew. Still, I don't think Kerrigan's resignation to her fate is massively inconsistent or out-of-character.

Anyway, I'm (we're?) getting sidetracked by one cinematic.

JK