StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty Releasing in July

Damn it! quite a few games have had release dates announced just recently. The most notable ones are Rage, scheduled for next year, and Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II – for October. Not to mention the Black Wii; coming in May.

Another game that has just gotten a release date is that of StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty. Blizzard says that the game should be out all over the world on July 27, 2010, for PC and Mac. No console versions I’m afraid.

Mike Morhaime, CEO, cofounder of Blizzard Entertainment:

“We’ve been looking forward to revisiting the StarCraft universe for many years, and we’re excited that the time for that is almost here. Thanks to our beta testers, we’re making great progress on the final stages of development, and we’ll be ready to welcome players all over the world to StarCraft II and the new Battle.net in just a few months.”

This is has been said by many to just be a thumbsuck, as Blizzard has a reputation for not committing to release dates. StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty is the first in a planned trilogy of games, with a Zerg campaign, Heart of the Swarm, and a Protoss campaign, Legacy of the Void, arriving later on.

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Source: StarCraft II releasing on July 27 [VG247]

StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty Releasing in July

StarCraft II: Pricing Details, Collector’s Edition Goodies, Box Arts

There is now confirmation that a Collector’s Edition for StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty exists.

Items that it contains include StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty, a 176-page art book, a 'Thor' unit pet for World of WarCraft, the original StarCraft plus the Brood War expansion on a USB thumb drive shaped like Jim Raynor's dog tag, behind-the-scenes DVD, the official StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty soundtrack CD, StarCraft comic book issue #0, and exclusive Battle.net downloadable content.

This is said to be one of the best collectors editions ever, and for good reason. There’s a lot of good stuff there. The Collectors Edition goes for $99.99 and is no doubt a retail product only. The standard edition is $59.99. [1]

 

Wings of Liberty is the first in a trilogy in StarCraft II, with Zerg and Protoss campaigns to come later, after the game is released this year. So far StarCraft II is in closed beta, which just received a patch the other day, resulting in some game balancing.

It’s also been confirmed that unlike Command& Conquer 4: Tiberian Twilight, StarCraft II will be playable offline, and doesn’t require any of this always online, new DRM malarkey. You only need to activate it once with a Battle.net account. There won’t be any LAN play though [3].

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Source: [1] Shacknews - [2] Examiner [Box Arts] - [3] Fudzilla

StarCraft II: Pricing Details, Collector’s Edition Goodies, Box Arts

Blame WoW for Delayed Games Like StarCraft II

StarCraft II's development started back in 2003. There was a playable version of StarCraft II as far back as 2005. It's 2009 now, and some say that the game might only make it next year.

What took so long? What delayed the game so much?

World of WarCraft- part of Blizzard's other best-selling franchise.

And it may not be an isolated case. Back in 2008 in an interview with Jace Hall, 3D Realms' George Broussard jokingly said that DNF was delayed because of playing World of WarCraft. Oh well, if that's true, at least they paid for it in the end.

Sony Online Entertainment will shut down The Matrix Online for good this month- maybe Blizz should do that with WoW, or at least prevent developers working on an important project that should have been out years ago from playing it.

Blizzard claims that team members were designated to "work" on WoW, and StarCraft II consequently took a back seat, basically.

Source:

News: WOW held up StarCraft II for a year

Blame WoW for Delayed Games Like StarCraft II

Blizzard developing a new Redneck Rampage?

According to Kotaku, there are rumours going around that since Blizzard has the rights to the Redneck Rampage brand now. Apparently these rumours started at IncGamers, who checked up on some things and found that Blizzard is listed as the one under control. The plot gets thicker when you think that Activision and Blizzard merged last year. Apparently some Blizzard employees worked on the original games too.

The Atomic Oracle says that this isn’t very likely and is just a rumour. Blizzard is into the whole Warcraft, Starcaft, Diablo and the like. Blizzard is obviously more MMO than FPS. When was the last time Blizzard ever made an FPS anyway?

http://www.incgamers.com/News/15845/BlizzardWorkingonNewRedneckRampageShooter 

Blizzard developing a new Redneck Rampage?

Diablo 3 looking dazzling rather than dreary

This is something I’ve come across more than once, both on the web and off it, like when reading a gaming magazine. People are complaining about Diablo 3’s new art style. Not only are fans of the series unhappy, but even a former Flagship head honcho and original Diablo developer is not a fan either.

People claim that Diablo 3 is too bright and cheerful, while its predecessors were darker and more…grey. Fans are begging Blizzard to change the style and have even come up with a petition for it- and it is backed by thousands. Rumour has it that it got so bad that the art director, Brian Morrishoe, left the company, although some say this isn’t the real reason why he left.

Blizzard has even jokingly taken the piss with fans by posting screenshots of Diablo 3 that contain some rather bright and cheerful action scenes.

I’m actually looking forward to Diablo 3, and let’s face it, even with sucky art direction, it’s better than no Diablo 3 at all. Think about how long it’s been since Diablo 2 came out.

Are they going to change the art? Probably not.

Diablo 3 looking dazzling rather than dreary