StarCraft II to be Split into 3 Separate Games

[KoKo5oVaR]

If it's not 1 game at the price of 3... why not

[Sindwiller]

Learn to read people:

Blizzard added that the plans for the multiplayer component are unchanged by the splitting of the campaigns. However, some units will now be unique to the campaigns and will not be playable in multiplayer.

Wow, great. They're just copying Valve - the bad way. I hope that the single campaigns are long as fuck though. Blizz can go shove it up their asses otherwise.

[Mazy]

If it means that SC2 will come out faster then I'm fine with this.

It does sound pretty wonky tho, I mean they'll have to have all the races in there for the MP, done essentially in the first release, so all they're gonna be doing are extra single player missions

[2d-chris]

They might add some special units for the 2nd and 3rd game? But you can only use them in MP if you own them? I hope not but I'm sure most people will buy all 3, unless they suck, which is about as likely as james bond doing the washing-up in the new film.

[Thrik]

Just a bit weird. Will the engine/features/GUI/whatever change between them too? Or will they all be patched simultaneously as if all one release?

[Erratic]

They might add some special units for the 2nd and 3rd game? But you can only use them in MP if you own them? I hope not

My guess is they'll just split the userbase as with any expansion for a game. Only this time it has the potential to splinter the community into three groups instead of two like in the past.

I'm still not sure what to make of it, though. At first in seems like a money grab but on the other hand you end up getting more content and sooner, as the campaigns individually will be bigger than if they were shipped on one disc. Yet it feels kind of wrong to prolong the life of what was a simple retail game into something spread out over months and months. Or years.

[Taylor]

They might add some special units for the 2nd and 3rd game? But you can only use them in MP if you own them?

If you're refering to the "units will now be unique to the campaigns" comment, I imagine it's refering to stuff like the High Elves and Naga in Warcraft 3 - which only appear in the single player and don't really have any place in multiplayer.

[twiz]

They might add some special units for the 2nd and 3rd game? But you can only use them in MP if you own them?

If you're refering to the "units will now be unique to the campaigns" comment, I imagine it's refering to stuff like the High Elves and Naga in Warcraft 3 - which only appear in the single player and don't really have any place in multiplayer.

Or Kerrigan/infested kerrigan in starcraft 1

[Skjalg]

most likely the battle.net will combine all three games when they are all out so people with all 3 games can still play with one that only owns one.

So basically what you buy is just the single player games.

edit; i also believe that you will not be able to play as the xel'naga any time soon.

[Jetsetlemming]

They might add some special units for the 2nd and 3rd game? But you can only use them in MP if you own them?

If you're refering to the "units will now be unique to the campaigns" comment, I imagine it's refering to stuff like the High Elves and Naga in Warcraft 3 - which only appear in the single player and don't really have any place in multiplayer.

Or Kerrigan/infested kerrigan in starcraft 1

Kerrigan was just a named Ghost unit.

[2d-chris]

I didnt actually see the comment above me I was just speculating. I'd prefer to have everyone playing the same MP no matter what version you have, but then a part of me wants the 2nd and 3rd mission packs to include more than just SP story. Suppose new MP maps would be a good place to start, and if they do introduce a new units into MP give it to everyone as a simple MP patch.

[Taylor]

Completely agree with you there. And if people aren't interested in the single player they won't have any incentive to buy them outside of custom games...

Though, I’ve got a friend who is a major Starcraft 2 nut and it sounds like they’re doing some pretty conservative changes to it. The Black Hole ship seemed to be a good example: it used to be a one-only, end-game uber-unit that could destroy a screen irregardless to what was on it, but it's been reduced and reduced until it’s pretty much a normal unit. They seem very scared of messing up the balancing and new units could be a spanner in the works. I’m not saying it won’t happen, but I think we’ll have to wait and see.

[m8nkey]

I'm pretty indifferent to this news. If I like the first release and each release adds additional units and shit I'll probably buy the lot regardless of what they charge. If the preceding releases don't add additional multiplayer content I won't bother with them.

[Skjalg]

Completely agree with you there. And if people aren't interested in the single player they won't have any incentive to buy them outside of custom games...

Though, I’ve got a friend who is a major Starcraft 2 nut and it sounds like they’re doing some pretty conservative changes to it. The Black Hole ship seemed to be a good example: it used to be a one-only, end-game uber-unit that could destroy a screen irregardless to what was on it, but it's been reduced and reduced until it’s pretty much a normal unit. They seem very scared of messing up the balancing and new units could be a spanner in the works. I’m not saying it won’t happen, but I think we’ll have to wait and see.

Yes I agree its a good example to conservative things happening but I think you are drawing the wrong conclusions from it. I don't believe they made it into a "regular" unit because they were afraid of messing up the balance, I think they made it into a regular unit because it was actually messing it up. Blizzard has always tried to make sure that things are well balanced and when you are going to make a sequel to a game that is so successfully balanced then I understand completely that they will mostly just copy what is done in the first game. When you look at it that way, trying new things would actually be time consuming and worthless since you can't really make something perfect better.

[2d-chris]

The more like the original, the better for me and it seems most other people would be happy with just a visual update and a new Sp story, I get really fustrated with the recent trend to add super sized - end game units. I know why they include them, but I prefer fighting it out with normal units and taking the time to win properly. It's not like MP games of starcraft go on for ever, infact allot of matches are over in 20 mins or less.

I'm excited to see what new units they add, but i'd love it done in a Broodwar way, add but don't go silly and break the game.

Blizzard know what they are doing, I have complete faith in them to get SC2 out and really fun. I would say there is no developer out where who I trust more to release the game when it's really ready. (Ok maybe Valve and don't mention WoW launch as a bad example of releasing a game early, MMO's are different thing all together)