Gaming, Nondescript

Blog 763: If I Wrote… Starcraft II

Ahhh, Starcraft II is an interesting beast. I’ve never had any concern over eSports or online multiplayer, but I have huge respect for what SC2 did with its singleplayer campaigns — tossing the hyper-balanced melee factions out the window and expanding them with bonus units, configuration options and special abilities.

The things is… the meta-plot, of the Dark Voice returning to obliterate all life in the Koprulu Sector (The galaxy? The universe? It’s actually never really made clear that his ambitions are more than localised) is a bit of a mess. Like, Blizzard, you got away with that in Warcraft III because Archimonde was a literal demon — you can’t pull the same trick twice, and definitely not in such a different setting (at least not without groundwork that simply isn’t present).

Having said that, I think there are some good stories in the mix here, so maybe it’s time to do some reworking…

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Gaming

Blog 651: Whispers of O’Blivion

Legacy of the Void will apparently be released on the 10th of November. Get hype?

Well, the hype train started with this strange prologue campaign that was released just a few days ago. Is it the promised land of a Rexxar-style Zeratul RPG?

I think you know the answer to that, but read on anyway. (There are spoilers for everything SC2 so far, if you care.)

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Gaming

Blog 543: Heart of the Blog

So Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty was a fabulous non-starter, a bit of a “damp squib” as they say in the business. They promised a thirty-mission epic story, and instead we got a slightly-above-standard fifteenish-mission main story with a huge pile of fairly disposable side quests. It’s pretty and plays fairly well, but seems somehow unsatisfying.

Even so, I’ve been suckered into purchasing the expansion pack Heart of the Swarm because I hate to leave a narrative unfinished (no matter how questionable its quality may be). So let’s see where this takes us…

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