StarCraft II LoV and SCII in general

I've recently preordered Starcraft II Legacy of the Void. Not that I believe in SCII anymore but I bought it for some good multiplayer action with my friends.

SC and Broodwar campaigns were great. StarCraft II Wings of Liberty, was meh at the begining, but then the pace picks up and it had a pretty interesting last missions.

StarCraft II Heart of the Swarm was atrocious. I just couldn't stand it and didn't even finish the campaign. The story is lame(well it was lame in SC WoL but in HotS it became much worse). The gameplay screwed up the lore and transformed a sci-fi game into a fantasy-ish "Warcraft with guns" cheesefest. For me HotS brought new appreciaction for WoL.

My couple of complains and nitpicks about SC II

- The story is now cheesy and goofy (I watched the ending of HotS on YouTube it is the most cliche ending one can imagine, bad guy dies because he talks a lot)
- Space is now as colorful as a rainbow
- The lines between good and bad were blured (Good Zerg)
- Zerg are no longer monsters, they are humanoid cuddly creatures
- Protoss have belly button (WTF?)
- Both Protoss and Zerg have boobs (I'm sorry but Protoss and Zerg do not breastfeed and procreate the same way as humans) Protoss don't even have a mouth...
- Alexey Stukov is a Zerg. Well, it's not a SC problem, I just don't like the recent trend of making Russians as enemies in movies and games, I understand that this reflects the geopolitical situation, but still...

Let's see what LoV will bring us

I used to play the first game with the extension a lot back in the late 90s. I have great memories of playing this game on my old computer.

I've never touched the sequel and what you've posted doesn't encourage me to give it a try.

Carabas wrote:

I used to play the first game with the extension a lot back in the late 90s. I have great memories of playing this game on my old computer.

I've never touched the sequel and what you've posted doesn't encourage me to give it a try.

Tried LoV prologue, well, I already hate it. It is the same bullshit as HotS was. It is not a sci-fi anymore. It is just a Warcraft with guns. I guess, this is a modern age trend. Units and multiplayer are very good. GUI and controls are amazingly fluid.

Campaign, however is too childish. Characters are childish, their motives are childish, their behavior is childish.
All the conflicts in modern SC2 can be reduced to - You stay in me way, me smash you! Kerrigan smash!

It is a great multiplayer experience either with a friend or solo against AI(I'm not a fan of PvP), just stay away from the campaign. WoL campaign is great though. The epicness and cheesiness works great for Terrans. Wings of Liberty is about bad ass terrans, kicking ass in a cool way. And the missions were like a Michael Bay or  Zack Snyder(just not as deep though) movies, great, fun, epic, cheesy with a lot of explosions. Too bad this does not work neither for Zerg, nor for Protoss.

Finally... Zeratul have nipples...

I wish I could play the old Game but my CDs are scratched from too much use... I wonder how well it would run on a modern system. I'll have to look into that.

Carabas wrote:

I wish I could play the old Game but my CDs  are scratched from too much use... I wonder how well it would run on a modern system. I'll have to look into that.

That's why I always made images of any CD I had, cause I almost lost Planescape Torment this way.

Btw there is a mod called Mass Recall, which recreates SC1 campaigns on the SC2 engine.

My memories of SC are absolutely terrible, but wasn't Stukov a Zerg in the first game? I seem to remember a mission where you had to destroy some kind of psy device to screw up Zerg hordes and I remember Stukov changing voices to an Infested, much like Duran. I also remember killing him si how in blazes is that possible??

This mod could be perfect for me.

I need to look into This.

Skorponok wrote:

My memories of SC are absolutely terrible, but wasn't Stukov a Zerg in the first game? I seem to remember a mission where you had to destroy some kind of psy device to screw up Zerg hordes and I remember Stukov changing voices to an Infested, much like Duran. I also remember killing him si how in blazes is that possible??

He was, but his return was from nowhere and was made the hero, second only to Kerrigan herself. I just hate HotS all the way from the beginning to the middle(I didn't finish it)

Kerrigan in SC was never good, she pretended to be goody-goody in Broodwar, but backstubbed her allies when she had a chance. Even in the ending of the Broodwar she said, that she has no allies, because she is a Queen of Blades.

In SC2 she is a drama queen and hysterically jumps from good to bad.
The recent appearance in VoL was just that stupid, you are in my way Zeratul, I'll kill you mode, again.

I guess the writers tried very hard to make her look good, and even made a prophecy that revolves around her. I do not like the concept of necessary evil, she is a killer and monster, trying to make a prophecy around such a character is blurring the line between good and bad.

I have a slight feeling of Mortal Kombat IX like plot. When everything is an excuse to fight each other and that my friends is a porno movie kind of standard.

Wow. Reading that post, I am quite glad I passed on SC2.

They basically ignored their own lore and brought back a dead protagonist to make him a hero? So the Zerg can magically raise the dead? Bloody hell. Now, to be fair, I liked Stukov (he was more interesting than Duran), at least what little we saw in SC1, but now he is second to Kerrigan herself...? That makes no bloody sense.

And speaking of Kerrigan, from what you're saying, they've basically turned her into a bipolar? And a prophecy? Seriously? To a degree, I can relate to her desire of revenge against Mengsk for leaving her out to dry and basically sacrificing her to the Zerg but that gets taken care of in SC1 if my memory is correct. Spinning her as "necessary evil" is bollocks, like you say, she IS a backstabbing killer and monster.

I am not sure if I should keep steering clear of the game or if I should play it while cheating like nobody's buisness just to have a few laughs at the absurdity.

Skorponok wrote:

I am not sure if I should keep steering clear of the game or if I should play it while cheating like nobody's buisness just to have a few laughs at the absurdity.

You can watch all videos from the game, they are very well done(Blizzard style).

Skorponok wrote:

Wow. Reading that post, I am quite glad I passed on SC2.

The multiplayer gameplay is great and Wings of Liberty campaign is fun.
But you have to buy three games if you want to play all the campaigns.

I need to hunt down my old CDs! I've just read that the original keys can be redeemed on Battlenet. That sounds almost too good to be true. The only problem is finding where I've stored these CDs. With a little bit of luck this could work out nicely.

It worked! I was able to redeem my original StarCraft key and get the StarCraft Anthology added to my account.

EDIT: I've got a new key linked to my account but the downloader seems to be acting up. Well, patience is a virtue.

Carabas wrote:

It worked! I was able to redeem my original StarCraft key and get the StarCraft Anthology added to my account.

EDIT: I've got a new key linked to my account but the downloader seems to be acting up. Well, patience is a virtue.

I was interested in how it will turn out, I guess we can say it is a Victory.

What's your favourite SC race?

I haven't been able to download the game yet...

I like Terrans the most. What about you Ryu?

Had a look at the vids, and Blizz have crafted enough of an interesting clusterfuck to warrant getting the bloody game. If I can get it cheap then maybe.

Protoss FTW

Carabas wrote:

I haven't been able to download the game yet...  

I like Terrans the most. What about you Ryu?

I think Terrans are easier for me to use, but for some reason I like Protoss.

They are really cool and I like them but Terrans bring up some nice memories.

Carabas wrote:

They are really cool and I like them but Terrans bring up some nice memories.

Terran music sure brings some great memories. I like it the most.

Okay, I've finished Legacy of the Void campaign and I must say it is... pretty good.

Don't get me wrong there are flaws, but if we look at SC II as the whole it's not that big of a difference between the first installment of the series, which has the flaws of its own. Some things were done better in SC and others in SC II

The Legacy of the Void campaign has Prologue - which is kind of too childish and character actions does not make much sense. A main Campaign and an Epilogue.

I need to point out that the story was made for kids in mind, so it is not deep and super dark, like in Shadowrun, but to be fare it was not THAT dark and complicated in the original StarCraft.

I think Campaign is very good it for what it is. In a way it's similar to Wings of Liberty but is more polished and Protoss are indeed different from Terran. There are twists in the plot that surprized me, and to be surprized 5 times over 19 campaign missions + 3 in the Epilogue, for an experienced player is a lot. What I like about campaigns in SC II they are never repetetive and one could admit that this was true for the original SC, but in SC II campaigns are diverse.  One Campaign is like a great attraction with different rides, you have defence missions, offence missions, heroes missions, you are forced to use different tactics and different units, it just does not have a room to be repetetive. It is kinda too epic, I mean each speech of a main character is a motivational speech of epicness, He is too noble and too epic but now his actions actually make sense and the stakes are pretty high, so it can be forgiven.

The Epilogue is interesting and has a nice veriety to it, you play as all of the 3 races one by one, it is difficult to switch to Terrans and Zerg after you've played only for Protoss, but it what makes it a unique experience. The ending was very good and even happy ending does not seem forced, heck you've fought for two original games and three new games to get to it. It was not overly dramatic and there were no needless sacrifices out of the blue, just for the sake of drama(like in Mass Effect 3), yet some heroes were lost in battle and it looks natural. It ties all ends and finishes all plots, everything is explained and the story is wrapped up nicely. It even has a tiny part that is opened for interpretation. The Legacy of the Void is a great ending to Starcraft Saga that started with original StarCraft.

Some numbers, because we all love them.

StarCraft - 10/10 - cause I like it
StarCraft: Broodwar - 11/10 cause it was even better than the original in my opinion

StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty - 8/10 (I love Terran epicness)
StarCraft II: Heart of the Swarm 3/10 - I seriously do not like it

StarCraft II: Legacy of the Void
Prologue - 6/10 - actions of allmost all major heroes does not make any sense, but it's 4 small mission prlogue, so it's not a big deal anyway.
Campaign - 9/10 - good StarCraft experience, different missions with diverse goals. Many interesting things about different Protoss clans and traditions as well as a major change to them and to Protoss life as a whole.
Epilogue - 10/10 - A good ending to StarCraft, if there ever be a continuation it will be about different people and different era.

Nice review. Glad you've enjoyed the new campaign. I read that they are going to release extra content.

Carabas wrote:

Nice review. Glad you've enjoyed the new campaign. I read that they are going to release extra content.

I heard only about Ghost missions. There was a character in Wings of Liberty a ghost called Nova, there will be missions that are gonna revolve around her.

That's what I read about.

IIRC, wasn't there supposed to be a standalone game based on Nova? Starcraft Ghost if I remember correctly?

Skorponok wrote:

IIRC, wasn't there supposed to be a standalone game based on Nova? Starcraft Ghost if I remember correctly?

You are right, there was a game Starcraft: Ghost

But I I don't remember whether it was released or cancelled.

I'm pretty sure it was canceled.