Get Ready to Pay $100, WoW Fans

With news reaching us that the StarCraft II Collector's Edition now comes with a WoW in-game pet, my prediction is this: a lot of people with more money than sense buying the game for $100, plucking the card with code for said pet out of the nice shiny box, and then throwing the rest in the trash.

My feelings for StarCraft II are well-known. But the pet included in the box is both a shameless hook to bait WoW players and a smack in the face to anyone who really cares anything about StarCraft without caring a whit about MMO-based garbage. What a ploy to gain sales. Notwithstanding that the base SCII package is $59.99, approximately $10 more than other PC titles and approximately $59.99 more than I intend to pay for anything coming from Blizzard.

Ah well. Frankly I just liked to have things to complain about. If you like StarCraft, go crazy buying three games each for $100. Maybe you can put someone at Blizzard over the edge to get their third Ferrari.

StarCraft II Delayed to 2010

No surprise at all, but StarCraft II has officially been delayed until 2010. I was skeptical that it would come out this year at all.

It's cool. I think I can wait a few more months before the game comes out and I complain that it's really only one third of a game and missing features anyway.

StarCraft II: Let's Ignore How People Play Our Games

I think Blizzard has some serious server myopic. Perhaps they've concentrated on World of Warcraft too long. Maybe someone got hit on the head. I dunno.

There has to be some explanation for why StarCraft II won't support LAN play. No LAN play? Well I guess I won't play it at my LANs, or at all! Blizzard, that's a terrible idea. Until we get 100Mbps fiber to our house, getting a dozen people together behind one cable ISP and playing on Battle.net just isn't gonna work out.

Does A Bear Crap In The Woods?

I think we all assumed that World of Warcraft held up development of StarCraft II. But in a recent article from Eurogamer, Blizzard's Vice President of Game Design confirmed that the work on World of Warcraft consumed the time and resources of StarCraft II.

I was surprised to read that there has been a playable version of StarCraft II for four years now. I did see a playable version at GenCon 2007, so it's not that much of a total mindblow. But they've been sitting on it for a while, taking their sweet time.

You can hardly blame Blizzard for it, though. They make upwards of a hundred and fifty million (or more) dollars every month on World of Warcraft just in subscription fees, not counting the games that are purchased and registered. I wonder why Blizzard bothers making any other games, let alone two sequels.

Starcraft II This Year?

I'm not holding my breath, but in an interview, a Blizzard developer says we may be graced with the second installment of StarCraft this year. I'll believe it when I see it. Blizzard is second only to Polyphony Digital when determining release dates. And maybe even better in quality of product, so I think I can let it slide this time.

StarCraft II... Trilogy?

In what could possibly be the largest waste of design and marketing ever, Blizzard is planning to release StarCraft II as a trilogy. I'm not sure if Blizzard pays attention to how people play their games. They go, "Eh, this thing has a single-player mode?" and then jump on BattleNet or a LAN game for multiplayer.

Blizzard, just stop. I don't know why you haven't learned your lesson from the blight that is World of Warcraft, but people pretty much just play your games for the multiplayer. All your pathetic attempts to build lore, characters, and unique worlds fall apart when the 14-year-olds get ahold of your game and crap all over it by playing online, pwning newbs or something. How many times do you have to read server logs that start "ROFLOMGWTFBBQ dude i jst got teh uber leet boot drop lololol11!!11onehundredeleven."

Hey, look, they don't care about your epic storylines. Please just release whatever of the Lich King with a credit card slot in it so the kids can get their mom to swipe and buy whatever they want. Then, take that money and jam the StarCraft II games in the same box, so the people who do care can enjoy them together.