The article is off base. Starcraft 2 is fun. The hardcore community accounts for a small portion of the sales, just like in anything. If you listen to the rabid fans you hurt the regular players.
This is the battle.net expierence to a normal player now:
* Login
* Optionally start a group with some friends (who can be conveniently imported from Facebook)
* Choose 1v1 2v2 3v3 or 4v4
* Wait for the match to start
* Play a game
* Repeat or Logout
It's quick, it's fun, and starcraft 2 is going to sell because blizzard is a golden goose until proven otherwise.
I think a lot of folks are quick to marginalize the hardcore community, which indeed accounts for a fairly small portion of sales.
However, why do you think SC2 has the amount of hype that it does? Why do you think that, ten years after release, the Starcraft Battle Chest is still #2 on Amazon's PC strategy sales rank (holy shit!) [1]
My guess is that the great majority of the word-of-mouth that keeps games like this afloat after the initial 6 months or so comes from hardcore players. This seems even more pertinent for SC2 in particular, since Blizzard plans on releasing it in three parts. If it can't hold people's attention for a couple years, they're going to be missing out on potential sales soon. They shouldn't throw away their loudest evangelists.
Addendum: Plus, remember that "hardcore" players of WC3 basically spawned off an entire genre (DotA) in their spare time -- it's not likely that anything of the sort would be produced on Battle.net 2.0 with the mapmaking restrictions outlined in the article above.
I agree. Hardcore players build maps, build websites, make clans, write reviews, organize competitions, write tactics guides, build mods, make funny youtube videos. They are the difference between a product you play for 30 hours before discarding and one you play nightly for three years constantly demanding that all your friends play with you.
I think the hype originates in the millions and millions of people who played sc1 and enjoyed it immensely. You don't need to be watching televised SC1 matches from Korea to be a fan of the game and willing to pay $60 for the next release.
Sometimes it's nice to auto join a match with someone at your skill level, play for 20 minutes and log off.
It's the same type of change that went into WoW with the double XP gain bar. For every hour you're logged off, you get an hour of playtime where you earn double xp.
I'm more worried that expectations are simply too high for them to meet this time.
I have no doubt that they'll see an initial rush of sales. That's just to be expected based on hype. The real question is whether it has any staying power or not. I'm leaning towards the "it can't possibly meet expectations" side, but I could be wrong.
What's important to point out here is that you not just "Play a Game". You are playing a game based on what probably is the most advanced matchmaking algorithms ever made. It seems that after the critical mass of about 30k players during beta, every single game was a long and thrilling match against a fully equal level opponent. When the beta started I got matched into copper league (the rock bottom) and when the beta was over I played in Diamond league (the top) and it was all made possible by simply hitting a play button and playing against the perfect opponent so that I learned something every game.
Comments
The article is off base. Starcraft 2 is fun. The hardcore community accounts for a small portion of the sales, just like in anything. If you listen to the rabid fans you hurt the regular players.
This is the battle.net expierence to a normal player now:
* Login
* Optionally start a group with some friends (who can be conveniently imported from Facebook)
* Choose 1v1 2v2 3v3 or 4v4
* Wait for the match to start
* Play a game
* Repeat or Logout
It's quick, it's fun, and starcraft 2 is going to sell because blizzard is a golden goose until proven otherwise.
I think a lot of folks are quick to marginalize the hardcore community, which indeed accounts for a fairly small portion of sales.
However, why do you think SC2 has the amount of hype that it does? Why do you think that, ten years after release, the Starcraft Battle Chest is still #2 on Amazon's PC strategy sales rank (holy shit!) [1]
My guess is that the great majority of the word-of-mouth that keeps games like this afloat after the initial 6 months or so comes from hardcore players. This seems even more pertinent for SC2 in particular, since Blizzard plans on releasing it in three parts. If it can't hold people's attention for a couple years, they're going to be missing out on potential sales soon. They shouldn't throw away their loudest evangelists.
[1] http://www.amazon.com/StarCraft-Battle-Chest-Pc/dp/B00001IVR...
Addendum: Plus, remember that "hardcore" players of WC3 basically spawned off an entire genre (DotA) in their spare time -- it's not likely that anything of the sort would be produced on Battle.net 2.0 with the mapmaking restrictions outlined in the article above.
I agree. Hardcore players build maps, build websites, make clans, write reviews, organize competitions, write tactics guides, build mods, make funny youtube videos. They are the difference between a product you play for 30 hours before discarding and one you play nightly for three years constantly demanding that all your friends play with you.
I think the hype originates in the millions and millions of people who played sc1 and enjoyed it immensely. You don't need to be watching televised SC1 matches from Korea to be a fan of the game and willing to pay $60 for the next release.
Sometimes it's nice to auto join a match with someone at your skill level, play for 20 minutes and log off.
It's the same type of change that went into WoW with the double XP gain bar. For every hour you're logged off, you get an hour of playtime where you earn double xp.
I'm more worried that expectations are simply too high for them to meet this time.
I have no doubt that they'll see an initial rush of sales. That's just to be expected based on hype. The real question is whether it has any staying power or not. I'm leaning towards the "it can't possibly meet expectations" side, but I could be wrong.
What's important to point out here is that you not just "Play a Game". You are playing a game based on what probably is the most advanced matchmaking algorithms ever made. It seems that after the critical mass of about 30k players during beta, every single game was a long and thrilling match against a fully equal level opponent. When the beta started I got matched into copper league (the rock bottom) and when the beta was over I played in Diamond league (the top) and it was all made possible by simply hitting a play button and playing against the perfect opponent so that I learned something every game.