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toblix

Starcraft

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If you like thorough, technical blogs about game development, I just found this, detailing the development of the original Starcraft.

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Apparently it was a hot mess at Blizzard! Fun to read about the nuts and bolts of that game. I wonder how they're doing currently. They are, after all, still in the business of designing a game three times over before shipping it.

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Apparently it was a hot mess at Blizzard! Fun to read about the nuts and bolts of that game. I wonder how they're doing currently. They are, after all, still in the business of designing a game three times over before shipping it.

Ironically they seem to have ironed everything out only to make consistently worse games. It's amazing to see higher budget games that take much longer to make, without much of the problems of newness and innovation that came before, by ostensibly the same company ending up consistently worse.

But they are, which is just strange. Diablo 3 just isn't fun for me. Starcraft 2 slicked back veneer isn't as fun in some ways the original Starcraft either. And all the little sidebits, like voiceacting and music and writing and etc. are definitively worse!

I suppose this is an example of a game being more dependent on its designers than how much money or time a team spends on it as an indicative of its eventual quality. Because, as far as I understand it, the designers aren't the same for SC2 or Diablo 3. Which in turn really makes me wish game designers would get their due in the gaming industry instead of being sluffed off to the side for the most part and all the concentration being on the game's title or the "company" making it.

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Thanks for the link, it was a good read. If you got any other good technical blogs like this one, I would be interested.

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But they are, which is just strange. Diablo 3 just isn't fun for me. Starcraft 2 slicked back veneer isn't as fun in some ways the original Starcraft either. And all the little sidebits, like voiceacting and music and writing and etc. are definitively worse!

I suppose this is an example of a game being more dependent on its designers than how much money or time a team spends on it as an indicative of its eventual quality. Because, as far as I understand it, the designers aren't the same for SC2 or Diablo 3. Which in turn really makes me wish game designers would get their due in the gaming industry instead of being sluffed off to the side for the most part and all the concentration being on the game's title or the "company" making it.

I'd kind of agree, with auto mine being added to HotS, which completely messes up if you do a perfect split, along with the circumference of a scan. I'm kind of surprised the tiny red nuke dot isn't the size of the Sun.

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As far as I know the auto mine is there for slower-connection people, who don't load into the game as quickly for technical reasons. I like both the scan outline and the harvester count stuff, I think they're good UI improvements because they don't affect the highest level of play but do make the game more accessible by giving better feedback.

I think SC2 is an improvement over SC1 in a lot of ways. Don't forget guys, SC1 had terrible balance until BW came out, and balance and difficulty are the only pros SC1 has over SC2. Difficulty there's an argument for, but balance will come in time and it's already in a pretty good spot.

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As far as I know the auto mine is there for slower-connection people, who don't load into the game as quickly for technical reasons. I like both the scan outline and the harvester count stuff, I think they're good UI improvements because they don't affect the highest level of play but do make the game more accessible by giving better feedback.

I think SC2 is an improvement over SC1 in a lot of ways. Don't forget guys, SC1 had terrible balance until BW came out, and balance and difficulty are the only pros SC1 has over SC2. Difficulty there's an argument for, but balance will come in time and it's already in a pretty good spot.

Nope, if you get a perfect split then the auto mine fucks it up.

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Sure, but the reason it's there as far as I've heard is because when you have a slower internet connection than your opponent your game starts slightly later, and with automine both players start at the same time. That's a fine change to me because it doesn't affect the game at any skill level, everyone down to bronze knows to send workers to the minerals, so the only thing it affects is the connection issue.

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Sure, but the reason it's there as far as I've heard is because when you have a slower internet connection than your opponent your game starts slightly later, and with automine both players start at the same time. That's a fine change to me because it doesn't affect the game at any skill level, everyone down to bronze knows to send workers to the minerals, so the only thing it affects is the connection issue.

Actually it does. Once you have each mineral patch occupied by one worker you want to rally to specific patches. This is minute but it affects the game. Overall the best report I've seen is http://www.teamliquid.net/blogs/viewblog.php?id=366495. Blizzard needs to FIX the lag over using a BS fix like the miner auto path. They made it worse for plenty of players with 1.5 and are making the game even less appealing to BW elitists.

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Oh I didn't realize it affected the game in that way, I just assumed it took care of the first 6 workers by sending them on their way.

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I think this is pretty much a good summary of why I will never appreciate Starcraft beyond a superficial level (and also why I will never be good at it). A game whose community finds themselves in an uproar about not being able to manage their resource gatherers on a microscopic scale. I guess that's their thing. But it sure ain't mine, at least not in a real-time environment. I love it in turn-based games, though.

This adds nothing to anything, but I thought I'd share this sudden revelation anyway.

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Unfortunately I think that's a statement that applies to most people. There just aren't many who play traditional-style games competitively, and this goes all the way back to chess, go, etc.

Which is a real shame because I feel that difficult and complex real-time games, particularly involving multitasking and an element of critical analysis of information, are an extremely powerful tool in improving one's mental abilities.

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That's not quite what I meant.

I don't think micromanaging resource gatherers adds anything compelling to the game. I think everything you're talking about can be accomplished without losing the game in the first five-to-ten minutes because you don't have the mouse-and-keyboard-skills to maneuver your units appropriately. Starcraft is much more interesting to me once the game gets going and people start scouting and skirmishing and battling and winning or losing. But I never reach that point as a player because I can't get the clicks on the crystals fast enough. I'm simplifying it immensely for the sake of argument, but that basically applies to most of the shit in the game, for me, up until there's actual conflict. I hate early-game Starcraft. I hate it so much that it literally keeps me from playing a game I think I would otherwise enjoy.

I suppose it's similar to how some people think denying in Dota adds nothing good to the game, while I think it makes the game a ton more interesting.

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I don't think that argument quite applies to this specific change, but I'll take it as a broad observation of starcraft and run from there.

The multitasking-oriented difficulty of starcraft is fascinating to me as a competitive gamer because it's really the first game I've played that has demanded so much from players in so many different areas. There can be 10 players in the gold league that are there for completely different reasons in terms of skill. This guy knows the timings of most early-game attacks and defenses and often wins in the first 10 minutes, this one has great speed and accuracy and nails every mechanic but doesn't have a clue what to do in terms of unit composition or control, this one knows how to tactically move an army and when to split up, this one is incredibly good with the fundamental defensive timings of unit composition transitions, etc.

The fact that you're forced to manage literally everything on the field is what enables this high, or I guess more accurately wide skill ceiling. There are concessions I'm willing to make for the game to be more newb-friendly, to improve a new player's first experience with the game, and blizzard's done a great job so far with the transition to sc2. The transparent ladders and rankings, changes to basic functionality (workers can be rallied to minerals), they're even introducing more changes in HotS that all look good to me from that angle. They're improving the league system so that your rank number is a much more meaningful and direct way of tracking progress, they're introducing all these changes to the feedback a player gets from the UI (scan range shown, worker count displays).

I think they've done a fantastic job making it more accessible while keeping as much skill as possible, but the line I don't want crossed is when it starts getting significantly easier or simpler. The difficulty is intrinsic to the multitasking and the forced micro and macro management. If that's not for you that's fine, but I'd recommend you try again with a more open point of view, especially if you enjoy denying in Lords Managements, they're essentially the same thing; increasing the level of micro management.

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If that's not for you that's fine, but I'd recommend you try again with a more open point of view, especially if you enjoy denying in Lords Managements, they're essentially the same thing; increasing the level of micro management.

Only on the surface's surface. When I'm denying, I'm still only controlling one unit, unless I've had the terrible misfortune to random into a micro-centric hero like Chen. There's no multitasking, and, moreover, it's direct competition with the enemy, instead of indirect like microing your workers in the first minute of the game. Besides, the depth that comes from denying is completely different from the depth that comes from controlling seventy thousand workers at fifteen hundred different bases.

I don't think that argument quite applies to this specific change, but I'll take it as a broad observation of starcraft and run from there.

It might not. I was more reacting to the complaints regarding the changes.

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Actually, what annoys me about SC are the utterly insignificant tasks that you must perform in order to win. It's not that I wasn't any good at them, I got mining down to optimizing exactly which patch of minerals each new probe would go to when made in order to maximize things just that much more. 5 minerals difference max for each one, but in the early game there isn't much else to do so I did it.

But eventually I quit, because I simply became sick of all the little minutia I had to be paying attention too. I'd learned most of it; but at the same time I didn't find it interesting. I was just sick of being able to lose, or even win games because of the smallest little task that I didn't complete (or did). These things weren't actual decisions, instead they were things like remembering to constantly scout new areas with my observers, or to constantly micro-manage each battle that was going on, or etc. Things that were important to do, but didn't need any actual consideration. No brain power except keeping a huge checklist of things in your own mind and slamming keys on your keyboard as fast as possible.

I just wanted to get back to the strategy, but my brain was under constant assault to remember all these trivial tasks that wouldn't take care of themselves. Enough that by the end less that 10% of the games I was playing ended up being about actual strategy. A lot of the time I was winning because someone missed scouting where I was coming from, or had one really good rush and it failed, or etc. Point is, I'd end the game knowing 90+ percent of the time knowing exactly why I'd won or lost because of one exact moment, and the rest of the game would end up being rote memorization, no actual consideration of strategy or tactics or anything.

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Yeah, that's what kind of burned me out when I played Warcraft III semi-competitively almost a decade ago. I had the perfect build order for quick-teching to flying units, which either was performed perfectly, leading to a win, or imperfectly, leading to a loss. If I was really firing on all cylinders, I might get lucky and have some time around second dawn to creep, but chances are I'd be watching my ally scout, in order to decide whether I'd research Storm Hammers and then Reinforced Leather or vice versa.

It's fun to perform such an advanced series of tasks to perfection, like playing an instrument in concert, but I think it takes a very specific type of personality to thrive off that and not get bogged down by the interference of external factors or the importance of memorization/muscle memory.

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It's true that the difficulty of mechanics involved throws some people off, I think that's even something Chris talked about during the Idle Thumbs casts when SC2 was coming out, something about the absurdity of having to build units and workers and place pylons mid-battle rather than being able to focus completely on the fight. The level of mechanics demanded by the game is an advantage to it in my opinion but I can understand the frustration for sure, especially the harshness of having to lose 50% of your games in a competitive 1v1 situation.

The thing is I feel like people that quit from frustration or haven't played at a high level don't see the dynamism present in most matchups, and end up thinking of the game as a strictly mechanics-based endeavor. There's a tactical field that's really fun to play around in once you get into the mid and endgame, consisting of harassment from warp prisms, phoenix, drops, run-bys, cloaked harass. That also is very demanding of your speed and multitasking, but it is often dynamic and interesting.

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The thing is I feel like people that quit from frustration or haven't played at a high level don't see the dynamism present in most matchups, and end up thinking of the game as a strictly mechanics-based endeavor. There's a tactical field that's really fun to play around in once you get into the mid and endgame, consisting of harassment from warp prisms, phoenix, drops, run-bys, cloaked harass. That also is very demanding of your speed and multitasking, but it is often dynamic and interesting.

The problem is you have to perfect the mechanics to a certain degree before you can ever reach the level where tactics matter. I don't not play the game because I'm frustrated at my lack of skill. I not play the game because I don't thing the mechanics are interesting. But I certainly don't begrudge anyone who does like it. Like I said with my first post, the only reason I entered the conversation is because I came to the sudden realization of exactly why I dislike Starcraft. The Stuff I Like is buried beneath a bunch of Stuff I Don't Like.

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It's a fair criticism to say the things you like are underneath the things you don't, but I think it's incorrect to say that the entire face of the game is mechanics. It's true that mechanics play the heaviest role, but having been a big fan of esports and having watched huge number of professional and amateur games, I can say that there is a wide slate of tactical play that isn't related to mechanics.

For example, controlling your army is not particularly APM-intensive in most cases, it's largely a matter of knowing when to spread pre-engagement and how to move during the engagement. That's a realm of tactical skill that's not super affected by mechanical ability. Also, committing a counter-attack mid-battle is not very APM-intensive, it requires usually no more than 2-3 clicks, but it does require the ability to think clearly and multitask in the moment of conflict.

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It's a fair criticism to say the things you like are underneath the things you don't, but I think it's incorrect to say that the entire face of the game is mechanics. It's true that mechanics play the heaviest role, but having been a big fan of esports and having watched huge number of professional and amateur games, I can say that there is a wide slate of tactical play that isn't related to mechanics.

For example, controlling your army is not particularly APM-intensive in most cases, it's largely a matter of knowing when to spread pre-engagement and how to move during the engagement. That's a realm of tactical skill that's not super affected by mechanical ability. Also, committing a counter-attack mid-battle is not very APM-intensive, it requires usually no more than 2-3 clicks, but it does require the ability to think clearly and multitask in the moment of conflict.

You have to build an army before you have one to control. Building the army is mechanics. Controlling the army is strategy. Literally every game of Starcraft 2 that I've played, I lost because the other player had an army five times the size of mine because he knew the mechanics in and out and was able to build shit way faster than me. Not because he out-thought me. And this is at the lowest level of the lowest level of the ladder, where, logically, I should be facing people of similar levels to me.

And I also know that I could reach a point where I could probably get into the gold level or even higher, but I don't want to.

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Frustration with mechanics is one of the more frequent responses I've heard as the reason someone quit, along with 1v1 being too stressful. I'd be curious to hear Nick and Chris weigh in, I know they used to play intensely at one time and then quit suddenly.

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Well, it's not frustration so much as hatred. I have no interest in learning the mechanics. I know I could; I just don't want to. But, like I said somewhere earlier, I don't begrudge the game for its choice of design. I'm just sad that the stuff I like is buried beneath the stuff I hate.

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