Day 2.
My practice partners were pretty busy today but I got a couple PvZ's in, between ladder and custom games. The rest was practicing the build order execution and some specific timings against an easy AI, as well as some testing in Unit Tester Solo.
In a platinum ladder game on Shattered Temple, I scouted roaches during my initial push coinciding with the observer. I did not use hallucination to scout. I went for double-robo immortals off of two bases upon seeing roaches. My 3rd base felt delayed and I was unsure of when to take it. I was surprised how much money double robo immortal uses. My opponent made roaches and zerglings and went for hydralisks later. The immortal and stalker combination seemed very powerful with decent forcefields. However, after perusing the replay I discovered that my opponent simply didn't make more than 40 drones all game long. I won by superior macro, not necessarily by the strategy. Still, I was able to discover some aspects of my build in a live scenario.
Replay
In a custom game against a diamond Zerg friend, I again poked at the front once my observer was out with my army. I scouted spinecrawlers and zerglings, making me suspect mutalisks. I then used my observer to scout to confirm the spire. I rushed for a twilight council for blink, as well as armor upgrades, while massing stalkers. My 3rd base again felt late - I took it while close to maxed. My templar archives also felt late - I didn't get storm before the game ended. Against good macro, I don't know if I would have won. The zerg didn't drone enough and didn't harass with his army at all, and a single push was able to win the game with good force fields and an excellent chokepoint engagement area. A goal of my strategy is definitely to be adaptable to roaches, hydras, lings, mutas or banelings, depending on my scouting, and I feel like I did that in this game. Still, I want to get a 3rd base sooner and I want psionic storm earlier. I'll focus on these points in the next few games.
Replay
In Unit Tester Solo, I wanted to find out just how powerful equal-resource armies of immortals and zealots fare against roaches and hydralisks. Immortals in decent numbers are ridiculous against roaches, as I expected. Chargelots against unmicroed roaches are actually cost-effective, which surprised me. Immortals are not terrible against Hydralisks in combination with stalkers, but it's not something I would want to stick with in a long game against mass hydralisks. A surprising find was how good sentries were against hydralisks. Sentries are actually an important damage dealer against Hydralisks, in combination with other units, but they die quickly to hydras like everything else. 8 sentries can actually kill 5 hydralisks.
By far the coolest find, however, was the effectiveness of zealots against hydralisks. Unlike roaches, hydralisks can't micro against zealots, and charge is a solid upgrade in this fight. Zealots are incredibly cost-effective against hydralisks, as long as no roaches are present in the fight. I'd like to start experimenting with staying alive against a hydra rush by using sentries and rushing to charge on my zealots while teching to psionic storm. I'd like to use a comparison to Protoss vs Terran here: in PvT, Marauders are weak against zealots and strong against stalkers, and they are the tank of the bio army - they absorb the most damage. The marines are good against zealots, while having very little health. In PvZ, Roaches are the tank unit equivalent to the marauder, except they are strong against zealots and weak to stalkers. Hydralisks are strong against stalkers and (apparently) weak to zealots, and have very little health. Both marauders and roaches can micro against zealots. And unlike marines, hydralisks cost a significant investment. I'm very excited about the possibilities here. It is also difficult for the zerg to transition from hydralisks to mass mutalisks, and the Zerg will not have enough gas to field both units in large numbers. Overall, reacting to a hydra rush with fast chargelots seems like a cool idea that I need to test more. Naturally storm will be necessary when the zerg has too many hydralisks, and when roaches are on the field, because the zealots won't be able to reach the hydras before dying.
Saturday, March 12, 2011
Friday, March 11, 2011
The Development of a Build Order - Part 1
I have a strategy I want to develop in Starcraft 2. The opening builds and strategies that I usually employ are created by professional players far better at the game than I. However I got an idea for a strategy, and this time I have no strict and specific build order to follow. I have to develop and test and hone timings on my own to discover if the build I want to create will actually be viable. I may need to abandon this build if testing proves it won't work. But without testing, it isn't Starcraft, it's Theorycraft. The next few posts on this blog will document the development and testing of this build, with replays and possibly commentary videos included.
"So what's the damn build already?!"
This is a Protoss vs Zerg strategy for the Protoss. The typical Protoss style which I use to great success is the Blink Stalker + Sentry + Colossus death ball, with a 3rd base Dark Templar/Archon transition. Extremely safe and well-rounded strategy. It's good against just about everything the Zerg can throw at it and transitions well throughout the game. But is this the BEST strategy against everything Zerg can throw at the Protoss? I'd like to find out.
In a nutshell, what I would like to develop is a strategy involving Immortals and High Templar. Immortals are one of my favorite units and I feel like they are criminally underutilized. With 50 damage against armored targets and a hardened shield, Immortals are serious threats to any armored unit. Typically we only see these in large numbers against Terran mech - Tanks and Thors - but both Marauders and Roaches are armored as well. With the standard Protoss PvZ strategy, the answer to Roaches is Stalkers and Colossi, neither of which is particularly strong against the Roach. Combined together, however, they can do OK. I want to do better than OK! I want to wreck roaches entirely. And with the Immortal in larger numbers than we ever typically see, I believe that is possible.
So the Immortal will be the key to defeating mass roach, but what about anything else the Zerg throws our way? Zerglings and Hydralisks are light units with high DPS which circumvent the Immortal's hardened shield. In the standard Protoss strategy, the Colossus deals with these two threats. If the Colossus count is very low because the Zerg keeps making Corruptors, Hydralisks and Zerglings can be devastating to the remaining Stalker army. It can be hard for a Protoss to deal with a Zerg who overmakes Corruptors and then masses Hydralisks. Alternatively, many Zergs will play with Zerglings and Mutalisks, or even Zerglings and Banelings. There just isn't a strong answer to large masses of Zerglings using a standard Protoss strategy. There are only ways to do OK against these Zerg strategies and eke out an economic victory. That's not good enough for me. I want to crush my enemies!
That's where the High Templar comes into play. Psionic Storm will melt Zerglings almost instantly. They soften Mutalisks substantially, and are a critical way to keep the Mutalisk count low enough for blink stalkers to deal with them. Storm deals with Hydralisks because they can't micro out of the storm easily, and don't have a lot of health. What storm is weak against is armored targets - the Roach, the Brood Lord, and the Ultralisk.
It is my belief that the Immortal deals with armored targets better and the High Templar deals with light Zerg units better than the more general-purpose Stalker + Colossus army. Now that I have this strategic concept, I need to fashion a gameplan around it. What are my goals with this build?
1. A safe fast expansion
-I want to win a game of any length using this build. The units I need to make require a lot of gas. I'll want three bases reasonably quickly both to get the economy I need for the units I want, but also to stay even with the Zerg's economy.
2. Immortals in time to fight mid-game Roaches
-If we scout Roaches, we need to be able to create out Immortals in time. This means a reasonably fast Robotics Facility.
3. Ability to scout the Zerg's tech in time to determine my Templar timing.
-What the Zerg is doing determines whether I start to go mass Immortal or High Templar off of two bases, and when to start getting Templars. I need to scout what Zerg does soon after taking my natural expansion.
I now have a very basic set of goals that my build needs to meet. As a general framework, we're looking at some kind of reasonably fast expansion to open. I'm going to elect for a 3-gateway Sentry expand, which is a standard and very safe Protoss expansion build. I feel that forge fast-expanding is too map-dependent and too risky at this point in the development of my build.
Upon taking my natural expansion, I need to scout the Zerg's tech, or optionally to force the Zerg's tech. There are four ways to do this:
1. Hallucinated Phoenix
-For the reasonably small cost, we can research hallucination and send fake Phoenixes across the map all mid-game long. This is a versatile and long-term scouting solution, offering more uses later in the game.
2. Observer
-We could build an observer to scout the Zerg with. The problem I foresee is that this is a slower scout method and we want the observer to be with our army. We also may want to utilize the Robotics Facility for Immortals early and often.
3. Poking the Zerg army
-Poking at the Zerg army will force him to make units and show what units he's building. This is a strategy we ideally want to do all game long to control the Zerg's economy. The issue with this method is that the Zerg can hide tech, like Mutalisks or Hydras, until it is too late to spot.
4. Forcing Roaches with a Zealot + Sentry attack
-I like to think of this as the Huk method. Upon expanding, we want to attack with pure Zealots and Sentries and a proxy pylon. Against a Zerg making Zerglings or small numbers of roaches, this attack can actually win the game, but our ultimate goal is to force the Zerg to make large numbers of roaches. The timing will hit the Zerg before Mutalisks come out. The issue with this method is how risky it is. Forcefields have to be perfectly placed and the Zerg can blindly kill the Protoss by building a lot of units early.
I'll need to test all of these methods, but my goal is a tactic which will determine what the Zerg is doing and give me time to respond via 2-base Immortals or High Templars. What timings I need to learn to defend specific midgame Zerg attacks I will have to discover through testing. The next question is when and how I will take my third base. With the standard Protoss style, the key timing is when the first Colossus is produced, because it immediately gives the Protoss some amount of safety. Without Colossus, it seems like a key timing will be the completion of Storm research, perhaps the completion of forge upgrades, or the beginning of double-robo Immortal production. This is something I need to discover through testing.
So now I have a basic framework for a build order, based on the goals of my desired strategy. 3-gate Sentry expand, some method of scouting, a robotics facility, and then a response to scouting - either double-robo Immortal or High Templar and Storm. After one of these responses, at some point, we need to take a third base. Once taking a third base, we can complete our Immortal + High Templar gameplan. Potentially we can move onto stargates or Dark Templar. This is when we might get Archons out, as well. This is the build order I intend to figure out through testing and playing with practice partners. Stay tuned for the next post, detailing my testing and experiences developing and refining this build order further.
Any diamond-level Zerg player that wants to assist this process by acting as a practice partner should message me on Battle.net! My ID is "GomJabbar", my character code is "678".
"So what's the damn build already?!"
This is a Protoss vs Zerg strategy for the Protoss. The typical Protoss style which I use to great success is the Blink Stalker + Sentry + Colossus death ball, with a 3rd base Dark Templar/Archon transition. Extremely safe and well-rounded strategy. It's good against just about everything the Zerg can throw at it and transitions well throughout the game. But is this the BEST strategy against everything Zerg can throw at the Protoss? I'd like to find out.
In a nutshell, what I would like to develop is a strategy involving Immortals and High Templar. Immortals are one of my favorite units and I feel like they are criminally underutilized. With 50 damage against armored targets and a hardened shield, Immortals are serious threats to any armored unit. Typically we only see these in large numbers against Terran mech - Tanks and Thors - but both Marauders and Roaches are armored as well. With the standard Protoss PvZ strategy, the answer to Roaches is Stalkers and Colossi, neither of which is particularly strong against the Roach. Combined together, however, they can do OK. I want to do better than OK! I want to wreck roaches entirely. And with the Immortal in larger numbers than we ever typically see, I believe that is possible.
So the Immortal will be the key to defeating mass roach, but what about anything else the Zerg throws our way? Zerglings and Hydralisks are light units with high DPS which circumvent the Immortal's hardened shield. In the standard Protoss strategy, the Colossus deals with these two threats. If the Colossus count is very low because the Zerg keeps making Corruptors, Hydralisks and Zerglings can be devastating to the remaining Stalker army. It can be hard for a Protoss to deal with a Zerg who overmakes Corruptors and then masses Hydralisks. Alternatively, many Zergs will play with Zerglings and Mutalisks, or even Zerglings and Banelings. There just isn't a strong answer to large masses of Zerglings using a standard Protoss strategy. There are only ways to do OK against these Zerg strategies and eke out an economic victory. That's not good enough for me. I want to crush my enemies!
That's where the High Templar comes into play. Psionic Storm will melt Zerglings almost instantly. They soften Mutalisks substantially, and are a critical way to keep the Mutalisk count low enough for blink stalkers to deal with them. Storm deals with Hydralisks because they can't micro out of the storm easily, and don't have a lot of health. What storm is weak against is armored targets - the Roach, the Brood Lord, and the Ultralisk.
It is my belief that the Immortal deals with armored targets better and the High Templar deals with light Zerg units better than the more general-purpose Stalker + Colossus army. Now that I have this strategic concept, I need to fashion a gameplan around it. What are my goals with this build?
1. A safe fast expansion
-I want to win a game of any length using this build. The units I need to make require a lot of gas. I'll want three bases reasonably quickly both to get the economy I need for the units I want, but also to stay even with the Zerg's economy.
2. Immortals in time to fight mid-game Roaches
-If we scout Roaches, we need to be able to create out Immortals in time. This means a reasonably fast Robotics Facility.
3. Ability to scout the Zerg's tech in time to determine my Templar timing.
-What the Zerg is doing determines whether I start to go mass Immortal or High Templar off of two bases, and when to start getting Templars. I need to scout what Zerg does soon after taking my natural expansion.
I now have a very basic set of goals that my build needs to meet. As a general framework, we're looking at some kind of reasonably fast expansion to open. I'm going to elect for a 3-gateway Sentry expand, which is a standard and very safe Protoss expansion build. I feel that forge fast-expanding is too map-dependent and too risky at this point in the development of my build.
Upon taking my natural expansion, I need to scout the Zerg's tech, or optionally to force the Zerg's tech. There are four ways to do this:
1. Hallucinated Phoenix
-For the reasonably small cost, we can research hallucination and send fake Phoenixes across the map all mid-game long. This is a versatile and long-term scouting solution, offering more uses later in the game.
2. Observer
-We could build an observer to scout the Zerg with. The problem I foresee is that this is a slower scout method and we want the observer to be with our army. We also may want to utilize the Robotics Facility for Immortals early and often.
3. Poking the Zerg army
-Poking at the Zerg army will force him to make units and show what units he's building. This is a strategy we ideally want to do all game long to control the Zerg's economy. The issue with this method is that the Zerg can hide tech, like Mutalisks or Hydras, until it is too late to spot.
4. Forcing Roaches with a Zealot + Sentry attack
-I like to think of this as the Huk method. Upon expanding, we want to attack with pure Zealots and Sentries and a proxy pylon. Against a Zerg making Zerglings or small numbers of roaches, this attack can actually win the game, but our ultimate goal is to force the Zerg to make large numbers of roaches. The timing will hit the Zerg before Mutalisks come out. The issue with this method is how risky it is. Forcefields have to be perfectly placed and the Zerg can blindly kill the Protoss by building a lot of units early.
I'll need to test all of these methods, but my goal is a tactic which will determine what the Zerg is doing and give me time to respond via 2-base Immortals or High Templars. What timings I need to learn to defend specific midgame Zerg attacks I will have to discover through testing. The next question is when and how I will take my third base. With the standard Protoss style, the key timing is when the first Colossus is produced, because it immediately gives the Protoss some amount of safety. Without Colossus, it seems like a key timing will be the completion of Storm research, perhaps the completion of forge upgrades, or the beginning of double-robo Immortal production. This is something I need to discover through testing.
So now I have a basic framework for a build order, based on the goals of my desired strategy. 3-gate Sentry expand, some method of scouting, a robotics facility, and then a response to scouting - either double-robo Immortal or High Templar and Storm. After one of these responses, at some point, we need to take a third base. Once taking a third base, we can complete our Immortal + High Templar gameplan. Potentially we can move onto stargates or Dark Templar. This is when we might get Archons out, as well. This is the build order I intend to figure out through testing and playing with practice partners. Stay tuned for the next post, detailing my testing and experiences developing and refining this build order further.
Any diamond-level Zerg player that wants to assist this process by acting as a practice partner should message me on Battle.net! My ID is "GomJabbar", my character code is "678".
Sunday, January 2, 2011
The Evolution of Starcraft II
Ever since the beta, I've been rabidly following the Starcraft II pro scene. The game has been changing on an almost weekly basis, and not often due to patches. As new strategies are figured out, the strategic landscape of the game alters drastically. Here's a look back at the landscape for a perspective on the present and future of Starcraft II strategy.
Early in the beta, protoss play favored almost entirely four gate and three gate robo. Immortals were huge and Colossi were rare. Void ray rushes were very strong, and Terran would go for lots of early marines as a precaution. Expansions didn't really happen much. I don't recall ever seeing a fast expansion from any race but Zerg. Zerg had very few problems getting a fast hatchery up safely. Terrans basically always opened with a reaper or two against every race. Roaches were the primary (and sometimes only) unit in the Zerg army. Mutalisks were basically unseen. The game felt pretty balanced at the time, although mass roaches were very very strong.
Mid beta, we had the first big tournaments, the HDH and finally the Razor King of the Beta. As I recall, during or right before the HDH roaches were changed to 2 food, and roaches fell drastically out of favor. Mass hydralisks and baneling busts because very popular. Terrans were still opening with reapers and moving into helion or banshee harass in most matchups. TvT was in a lot of flux but tank-viking was not around yet. TvZ was almost always Terran doing a large one-base tank-marine push after lots of initial harassment. Protoss began using colossi, as White-Ra demonstrated their effectiveness in the HDH.
Late beta, in the Razor King of the Beta tournament, strategies were very similar, but Tester introduced us to a strategy IdrA still considers to be unfairly strong: double-pylon walling at the bottom of Zerg's ramp, with a cannon behind it. This opening is still used today, but will be weakened in the next patch (as of this writing). Tester also demonstrated his masterful forcefield use in the King of the Beta tournament, in combination with colossi which were quite popular. TvZ had not changed much, with opening harassment into a timing push off (typically) one base. TvP was considered in Terran's favor, with mass marauders being just too strong for many protoss to deal with. Tanks were also viable against Protoss at the time. ZvP, 2-gate zealot rushes were common, forcing early roaches. Muta-ling was also very popular due to the rarity of protoss air. Only Nony (Liquid'Tyler) was known for his phoenix harassment. Ultralisks, all through the beta, were considered useless and not used.
Early release, introduced to the world during Day[9]'s midnight launch party for the game itself, came Zerg's most hated strategy: 5-rax reaper. Terrans discovered that they could continue to make reapers and get a quick nitro pack while expanding, forcing roaches instead of drones and pressuring like crazy, and transitioning into a huge marauders push. Zergs struggled to figure out this opening, and after some time the very best Zergs could hold it off some of the time by rushing to spire, using extra spinecrawlers, or getting very fast speedlings and employing impressive micro. MorroW won the IEM tournament against IdrA with this strategy. But it took a mid-game patch to truly put an end to such a strong Terran opening. In TvP, mech was out of style, with mass marauders versus mass colossi being the norm. Banshees were still popular but helions weren't used as often.
Mid-release, the GSL began. With a patch, nitro pack required a factory to be built, and reapers essentially disappeared overnight. Even so, Terran harassment openings and timing pushes were widely considered overpowered against Zerg. IdrA pioneered the use of mutalisks in ZvT, with muta-ling-baneling showing its strength - provided Zerg could get past the early game. This is about when I first recall seeing forge-fast-expands from Protoss, and other fast expansions from the other races. Macro games became a little more commonplace. ZvP, roach-hydra versus stalker-colossi was the norm. Phoenixes shut down mutalisks, so muta-ling fell out of favor.
Most recently, we had GSL2 and GSL3. Foxer was the name of the game, demonstrating the power of raw marines and micro. No one knew marines could beat banelings with proper spreading and kiting. Thanks to this huge shift back toward marines, which had been seeing some disfavor, Terrans are again able to counter mutalisks by keeping them alive against banelings. Tank-marine or marine-thor are now the dominant Terran strategies, but macro Terrans are still the minority. In the finals of GSL2, Foxer again shook up the game by winning several games with marine-scv rushes, which became commonplace in GSL3 and on the ladder. Zergs are still having difficulty dealing with this attack. In PvZ, phoenix openings are becoming very strong, forcing hydralisks and transitioning into colossi. Zergs once again feel under the gun. In GSL3, oGsMC revolutionized PvT with brilliant forcefield micro, early stalker and zealot rushes, and the return of early void rays in professional play. Many people feel TvP favors the Protoss now. Macro games seem to be very common now, even with Terran players.
As we move into the future, we can look back and see what drove the changes to the game and to strategies. Patches were always a response to a change in gameplay brought about by the players themselves. The perceived balance of the game constantly changes due to these player discoveries, and in the absence of any patch. Already we're seeing more and more long and exciting games in every matchup, and we're bound to see more as strong early attacks are ironed out of the game, thanks to player discoveries like new micro techniques or better building placement (as Jinro showed us against Fox.Moon on Scrap Station). Starcraft 2 has only been out a few months, and I can't wait to see how the game develops next in 2011.
Early in the beta, protoss play favored almost entirely four gate and three gate robo. Immortals were huge and Colossi were rare. Void ray rushes were very strong, and Terran would go for lots of early marines as a precaution. Expansions didn't really happen much. I don't recall ever seeing a fast expansion from any race but Zerg. Zerg had very few problems getting a fast hatchery up safely. Terrans basically always opened with a reaper or two against every race. Roaches were the primary (and sometimes only) unit in the Zerg army. Mutalisks were basically unseen. The game felt pretty balanced at the time, although mass roaches were very very strong.
Mid beta, we had the first big tournaments, the HDH and finally the Razor King of the Beta. As I recall, during or right before the HDH roaches were changed to 2 food, and roaches fell drastically out of favor. Mass hydralisks and baneling busts because very popular. Terrans were still opening with reapers and moving into helion or banshee harass in most matchups. TvT was in a lot of flux but tank-viking was not around yet. TvZ was almost always Terran doing a large one-base tank-marine push after lots of initial harassment. Protoss began using colossi, as White-Ra demonstrated their effectiveness in the HDH.
Late beta, in the Razor King of the Beta tournament, strategies were very similar, but Tester introduced us to a strategy IdrA still considers to be unfairly strong: double-pylon walling at the bottom of Zerg's ramp, with a cannon behind it. This opening is still used today, but will be weakened in the next patch (as of this writing). Tester also demonstrated his masterful forcefield use in the King of the Beta tournament, in combination with colossi which were quite popular. TvZ had not changed much, with opening harassment into a timing push off (typically) one base. TvP was considered in Terran's favor, with mass marauders being just too strong for many protoss to deal with. Tanks were also viable against Protoss at the time. ZvP, 2-gate zealot rushes were common, forcing early roaches. Muta-ling was also very popular due to the rarity of protoss air. Only Nony (Liquid'Tyler) was known for his phoenix harassment. Ultralisks, all through the beta, were considered useless and not used.
Early release, introduced to the world during Day[9]'s midnight launch party for the game itself, came Zerg's most hated strategy: 5-rax reaper. Terrans discovered that they could continue to make reapers and get a quick nitro pack while expanding, forcing roaches instead of drones and pressuring like crazy, and transitioning into a huge marauders push. Zergs struggled to figure out this opening, and after some time the very best Zergs could hold it off some of the time by rushing to spire, using extra spinecrawlers, or getting very fast speedlings and employing impressive micro. MorroW won the IEM tournament against IdrA with this strategy. But it took a mid-game patch to truly put an end to such a strong Terran opening. In TvP, mech was out of style, with mass marauders versus mass colossi being the norm. Banshees were still popular but helions weren't used as often.
Mid-release, the GSL began. With a patch, nitro pack required a factory to be built, and reapers essentially disappeared overnight. Even so, Terran harassment openings and timing pushes were widely considered overpowered against Zerg. IdrA pioneered the use of mutalisks in ZvT, with muta-ling-baneling showing its strength - provided Zerg could get past the early game. This is about when I first recall seeing forge-fast-expands from Protoss, and other fast expansions from the other races. Macro games became a little more commonplace. ZvP, roach-hydra versus stalker-colossi was the norm. Phoenixes shut down mutalisks, so muta-ling fell out of favor.
Most recently, we had GSL2 and GSL3. Foxer was the name of the game, demonstrating the power of raw marines and micro. No one knew marines could beat banelings with proper spreading and kiting. Thanks to this huge shift back toward marines, which had been seeing some disfavor, Terrans are again able to counter mutalisks by keeping them alive against banelings. Tank-marine or marine-thor are now the dominant Terran strategies, but macro Terrans are still the minority. In the finals of GSL2, Foxer again shook up the game by winning several games with marine-scv rushes, which became commonplace in GSL3 and on the ladder. Zergs are still having difficulty dealing with this attack. In PvZ, phoenix openings are becoming very strong, forcing hydralisks and transitioning into colossi. Zergs once again feel under the gun. In GSL3, oGsMC revolutionized PvT with brilliant forcefield micro, early stalker and zealot rushes, and the return of early void rays in professional play. Many people feel TvP favors the Protoss now. Macro games seem to be very common now, even with Terran players.
As we move into the future, we can look back and see what drove the changes to the game and to strategies. Patches were always a response to a change in gameplay brought about by the players themselves. The perceived balance of the game constantly changes due to these player discoveries, and in the absence of any patch. Already we're seeing more and more long and exciting games in every matchup, and we're bound to see more as strong early attacks are ironed out of the game, thanks to player discoveries like new micro techniques or better building placement (as Jinro showed us against Fox.Moon on Scrap Station). Starcraft 2 has only been out a few months, and I can't wait to see how the game develops next in 2011.
Monday, July 5, 2010
Continue?
You can now find me writing for the retro-themed gaming blog Continue? and I have my first article up. Longer readers of my blog might recognize it. I'll be submitting new and old reviews and articles over there, with my focus on older PC games and on shmups. If you enjoy my blog chances are you'll enjoy Continue?, and it's a bit bigger than mine. Definitely check it out!
I will still be writing here for odds and ends, and for discussion of modern gaming, but expect fewer large features on older games to show up on here. And definitely continue to check out my youtube channel where you'll find my ongoing Let's Plays of MechWarrior 4 and Illusion of Gaia. I hope to start shooting some shmup reviews for Continue? soon, and they'll be posted to my youtube channel as well.
I will still be writing here for odds and ends, and for discussion of modern gaming, but expect fewer large features on older games to show up on here. And definitely continue to check out my youtube channel where you'll find my ongoing Let's Plays of MechWarrior 4 and Illusion of Gaia. I hope to start shooting some shmup reviews for Continue? soon, and they'll be posted to my youtube channel as well.
Monday, June 14, 2010
The future of gaming, according to Bobby Kotick of Activision
Surfing Kotaku today, I came across an interview with the Baron of Hell himself, Bobby Kotick, CEO of Activision. You can find the full interview here. Most of the interview was unremarkable attempts at damage control by Kotick, but one part really stood out.
We have seen this trend over the last few years already. The modern game climate is all about the experience. Graphics, atmosphere, perspective effects, a focus on first-person views, and stuff that looks exciting all seems more important than games that are actually exciting. Games are getting easy and simpler to play, because deep challenging gameplay isn't conducive to the experience. Dying takes you out of the immersion! The hero of the game is supposed to be a badass, so the player shouldn't ever fail, either. Gamers would get bored with really easy and simple gameplay, though, so they need something to keep them involved in the game somehow, and feeling a sense of accomplishment somehow. They're sure as hell not going to get it from good gameplay, so more and more developers are adding RPG elements to just about every game. RPG elements add a fake sense of accomplishment by popping up item and ability unlocks every once in a while, often for doing nothing but playing for a period of time.
Physical peripherals are in line with this trend, of course. But they're also an opportunity for Activision to make a lot more money.
"Social" gaming and multiplayer is also a clear trend over the last few years. I'm not opposed to it in principle, but the execution game developers have chosen leaves a lot to be desired. Most games nowadays have a singleplayer and multiplayer portion. They focus a lot on the social aspects of the multiplayer, and again the fake accomplishment of multiplayer unlocks and experience points and leveling up. The singleplayer ends up being really boring, for the reasons above. If a game is going to have singleplayer and multiplayer, although it's more costly and difficult, the best thing to do is make the gameplay in the single and multiplayer components actually different, or just don't bother with the singleplayer at all. For example, the upcoming Blizzard RTS Starcraft II will have a very competitive multiplayer with deep and complex gameplay, and a focus on balance and e-sports competition. The singleplayer will actually be quite different. It will have units and abilities that won't be in the multiplayer because they wouldn't be balanced for it. The singleplayer will be like a different RTS than the multiplayer, because that's the right thing to do for that game.
Social aspects of multiplayer is great. It's great to make friends online and play against the same people a lot. Of course, the best way to do this is to have persistent places for gamers to meet. Like a dedicated server. But developers hate those! They don't let you sell map packs and game modes, because they need to compete with modders who create that content for free. They also make piracy a bit nicer, because of pirate servers. So instead, because of consoles, developers can get rid of dedicated servers and just use peer-to-peer connections. You get matched up with a bunch of random people you've never met before, will never meet again, and won't remember. Then you just play games, hosted on one of the player's connections, leading to a ton of lag for everyone but that player. So, social multiplayer as consoles do it, which is how PC games are headed as well, is one of the worst ways to actually do it! Oh, and you can hook into twitter and facebook, because THAT makes the game itself better.
As the interview is winding down I point out to Kotick that he has achieved his goal, traveled down that road to a billion. So why not retire?
"I'm not really thinking about that," he says, after I point out he could use the time to play more games. "I have a big objective for the next ten years. You know the thing that's really exciting is that when you look at what's happened to our medium. We're finally now at a point where we have all the characteristics of mass market, mass media opportunities. And I think it's three things for me that are really driving how you make video games as appealing as TV."
The first is making video game characters real, something he feels still hasn't happened.
"You can't put dialogue in these characters in a way where it's believable," he says. "If we can get the facial animation to be compelling, the dialog to be believable, I think you can satisfy that emotional connection between the audience and the character that gives you the characteristic attributes of film and television."
The second is physical interface, like what Guitar Hero brought to gaming. Something that Kotick strongly believes has a lot more opportunities.
"Physically tying you as a player to what you see on the screen, I can tell you a hundred fantasies I've always had whether it's like conducting an orchestra or unleashing as a rock star, really having a driving experience, like with a helicopter flying experience that is real," he said. "So physical interface is really just scratching the surface of opportunity there."
Finally, tapping into the ever increasing importance of social interaction, whether that means Facebook and Twitter, multiplayer gaming or including voice and video in a game.
We have seen this trend over the last few years already. The modern game climate is all about the experience. Graphics, atmosphere, perspective effects, a focus on first-person views, and stuff that looks exciting all seems more important than games that are actually exciting. Games are getting easy and simpler to play, because deep challenging gameplay isn't conducive to the experience. Dying takes you out of the immersion! The hero of the game is supposed to be a badass, so the player shouldn't ever fail, either. Gamers would get bored with really easy and simple gameplay, though, so they need something to keep them involved in the game somehow, and feeling a sense of accomplishment somehow. They're sure as hell not going to get it from good gameplay, so more and more developers are adding RPG elements to just about every game. RPG elements add a fake sense of accomplishment by popping up item and ability unlocks every once in a while, often for doing nothing but playing for a period of time.
Physical peripherals are in line with this trend, of course. But they're also an opportunity for Activision to make a lot more money.
"Social" gaming and multiplayer is also a clear trend over the last few years. I'm not opposed to it in principle, but the execution game developers have chosen leaves a lot to be desired. Most games nowadays have a singleplayer and multiplayer portion. They focus a lot on the social aspects of the multiplayer, and again the fake accomplishment of multiplayer unlocks and experience points and leveling up. The singleplayer ends up being really boring, for the reasons above. If a game is going to have singleplayer and multiplayer, although it's more costly and difficult, the best thing to do is make the gameplay in the single and multiplayer components actually different, or just don't bother with the singleplayer at all. For example, the upcoming Blizzard RTS Starcraft II will have a very competitive multiplayer with deep and complex gameplay, and a focus on balance and e-sports competition. The singleplayer will actually be quite different. It will have units and abilities that won't be in the multiplayer because they wouldn't be balanced for it. The singleplayer will be like a different RTS than the multiplayer, because that's the right thing to do for that game.
Social aspects of multiplayer is great. It's great to make friends online and play against the same people a lot. Of course, the best way to do this is to have persistent places for gamers to meet. Like a dedicated server. But developers hate those! They don't let you sell map packs and game modes, because they need to compete with modders who create that content for free. They also make piracy a bit nicer, because of pirate servers. So instead, because of consoles, developers can get rid of dedicated servers and just use peer-to-peer connections. You get matched up with a bunch of random people you've never met before, will never meet again, and won't remember. Then you just play games, hosted on one of the player's connections, leading to a ton of lag for everyone but that player. So, social multiplayer as consoles do it, which is how PC games are headed as well, is one of the worst ways to actually do it! Oh, and you can hook into twitter and facebook, because THAT makes the game itself better.
Thursday, June 3, 2010
Let's Play: MechWarrior 4: Mercenaries
Because of the recent re-release of MechWarrior 4: Mercenaries by Mek Tek, I've been playing through it again, and really enjoying the changes and additions by Mek Tek. I also have a lot of fun recording commentary videos for games, so I decided to do a series of "Let's Play" videos of MW4:Mercs. I have 7 episodes up so far, with more to come. The pace of episodes is roughly 1 or 2 per day. However, I'm going on vacation next week and I won't be able to record until I get back.
You can find all of these and future videos at my Youtube channel:
http://www.youtube.com/user/kengou
You can find all of these and future videos at my Youtube channel:
http://www.youtube.com/user/kengou
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
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