Starcraft 2 - when will we get a crack?

[Suicidal]

Why does the background on Kotick's photo look like hellfire? Is it a shop'ed image or something or was it unintentional?

It's not just this photo, it's the very first one you find on Google images.

 

[L'ennui]

Don't you bums have jobs to afford video games legally or what?

Have you never heard of "voting with your wallet"? I will not "vote" for Blizzard-Activision.

I giggle because in this context, voting with your wallet would be buying another game you'd prefer, not pirating one you're looking forward to. What you meant was, "Have you ever heard of we don't pay for games anymore, but instead of just shutting up about it we feel some vague sense of entitlement and moral justification?"

I get your point, and I do buy games that I consider worth it (so I am "voting with my wallet"). This is simply not one of them, for a plethora of game and non-game related reasons. If there was a SC2 alternative which would make the game more interesting for me AND did not come with so much corporate sodomy, I'd buy it, sure. Now find me that game.

As it is, the only reason I'm even acknowledgning SC2's existence is because I played the first one and want to see what they will do with the storyline. Maybe I could just watch the cinematics on youtube, but there are in-game twists and story developments that I would surely miss.

Good games are shit because people make money with them. You heard it first on the codex!

I don't subscribe to that viewpoint, please dont imply that I do. There's nothing wrong with a game making money. In fact, if it's really a good game, I'm all FOR it making money. There is a space for nuance, however, between a game making money because it is good and a game making money because it is a franchise merchandise being shamelessly milked for all it's worth, while as a game it offers very little in the way of novelty. Buying Starcraft 2 three times would definitely be encourageing the latter over the former, in my opinion, and that's not how I want my meager contribution to shape the gaming industry. I've played the beta, and while my impression has been that SC2 is not a bad game, I don't think it's worth that much.

If you were a SC1 and BW fanatic, then of course I can see how you'd want to play on battle.net and everything, but I mostly stuck to the single player so that point is moot for me.

 

[Grunker]

How the fuck did they spend $100 million?

Advertising, restarting the game development.

Actually, Blizzard claims that advertisement and marketing is not included in the 100 gazillion.

 

[Kraszu]

How the fuck did they spend $100 million?

Yeah exactly how could Sins of Solar empire cost sub 1mln$, and SC2 100mln$?

 

[L'ennui]

How the fuck did they spend $100 million?

Yeah exactly how could Sins of Solar empire cost sub 1mln$, and SC2 100mln$?

Indeed... maybe Actiblizzion figures that the mindless thralls we are will think that any game with THAT budget must automatically be the best and biggest thing to ever hit the markets. I'm pretty sure they must have overinflated that figure somehow... and if not... wow, way to throw money out the window. I mean, it's not as though SC2 is the next step towards virtual reality or anything... it's a plain, straightforward game from a technical point of view (which is not a flaw in any way).

 

[ScottishMartialArts]

How the fuck did they spend $100 million?

Yeah exactly how could Sins of Solar empire cost sub 1mln$, and SC2 100mln$?

I've mentioned this in a couple threads now, but the game was in development for 7 years. That's roughly 15 million per year, which is about average for AAA titles these days.

 

[BethesdaLove]

Voting with your wallet is as moronic as voting in general.
Only makes you feel good about yourself.

 

[Destroid]

Except by voting with your wallet you save $50.

 

[Micmu]

I'm voting with my wallet by not giving a shit for their piece of shit altogether. Pirating? What for...

ME > YOU ALL

 

[relootz]

How the fuck did they spend $100 million?

Advertising, restarting the game development.

Actually, Blizzard claims that advertisement and marketing is not included in the 100 gazillion.

100 million only on game development??? They must have been working on this game since 99 and restarted 5 times for that. They surely must be joking.

 

[Wirdschowerdn]

I guess the cutscenes had a lot to do with the high dev costs.

 

[Micmu]

They are not joking, they are boasting, btw.
Clearly, a $100 mil. generic RTS must be so awesome and beyond everything you ever imagined. Especially when it comes in three modules for a price of a new game each and no LAN support.

 

[Awor Szurkrarz]

As it is, the only reason I'm even acknowledgning SC2's existence is because I played the first one and want to see what they will do with the storyline. Maybe I could just watch the cinematics on youtube, but there are in-game twists and story developments that I would surely miss.

How about buying the official SC2 novel for 10 bucks instead and not having to bother with gameplay?

 

[Groof]

They developed SC2 - then cut it into 3 parts and now start selling them as separate games (they acknowledged that all 3 are finished - see tacticular cancer).

This one time there was this guy did something like that with a cow. He had like slaughtered all of the cow, but then he cut it into parts and started selling them as separate pieces of meat. Poor people complained.

 

[Destroid]

If my game cost $100 million I would probably want some milk too.

 

[ScottishMartialArts]

It's been confirmed in an interview that the two other Starcraft 2 games will be priced as expansion packs. Not sure why everyone is so upset that there will be expansion packs.

Oh and this page describes the single player campaign gameplay in quite a bit of detail. Actually sounds quite interesting and different from standard RTS campaigns.

 

[L'ennui]

As it is, the only reason I'm even acknowledgning SC2's existence is because I played the first one and want to see what they will do with the storyline. Maybe I could just watch the cinematics on youtube, but there are in-game twists and story developments that I would surely miss.

How about buying the official SC2 novel for 10 bucks instead and not having to bother with gameplay?

Hmm. Didn't know they were making a novel out of it. I might actually do that and watch the cinematics on the tube, thanks for the heads up!

EDIT after reading SMA's post: And if ever they *do* manage to make the sp experience something worth my time, then sure, I might give it a whirl.

 

[Kraszu]

It's been confirmed in an interview that the two other Starcraft 2 games will be priced as expansion packs.

I had not seen it in any interview, and on they site in FAQ it say that:

http://eu.starcraft2.com/faq.xml

"Are these three separate games? How much will all of these games cost?

The StarCraft II Trilogy will consist of the base StarCraft II game and two expansion sets. Pricing on these games hasn't been determined at this early stage; however, we've always charged an appropriate price for the content the player receives, and we will continue to release high-quality games that offer great value."

And that is what they had said in interviews that I was reading.

 

[ScottishMartialArts]

8) Will they be priced as expansions?

They'll be priced appropriately to the content. Right now, the plans are to do something along the lines of a full single player campaign and some additional features to the multi-player side. It'll obviously use the same engine; so that, to me, is an expansion price point. If we decided to put in 3 new races and a bunch of new technology and features, maybe that would be a stand-alone product. But right now, we're looking at much more of an expansion-like feature set.

Source: http://www.starcraft-source.com/article ... ew/?id=261

 

[thesheeep]

Who cares. If it is good then I willingly pay.

Not really hard to understand. FFS.

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

Speaking of the beta crack, I got in to the beta just recently and downloaded/patched it. What's the state of the beta crack nowadays? Last time I used it I had to download individual maps with user made AI and use a launcher that didn't let me configure number of players/races/teams. Is there a better crack out now that uses the official AI and lets you adjust the teams and players?

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

Just looked it up myself, beta crack lets you do all that now, excellent. I might not even fuck with pirating the full game then and keep the smaller install of the last version of the beta to play against bots once in a blue moon instead.

 

[kingcomrade]

Don't you bums have jobs to afford video games legally or what?

Have you never heard of "voting with your wallet"? I will not "vote" for Blizzard-Activision.

But I do want to see if SC2's storyline is good. Call me a thief if you want to, we're all thieves anyways in some way or another (and the videogame industry has no moral highground on this whatsoever).

Oh man, this is the exactly the kind of self-justification I love from pirates. I'M DOING THE RIGHT THING GUYS

 

[LazyD]

From what I heard from a few people on some priv trackers is that the crack is already made. The cracker isn't releasing it until the game is released. Not sure why a cracker would do that but w/e.

It's probably not true anyways.

 

[BethesdaLove]

Scene crack for a game earns you 10 scene points for that month.
P2P crack earns you the jew lawyers open hunting season.