July 20th, 2009

StarCraft II is seen as a Team Fortress

Dustin Browder, the Lead Game designer for StarCraft II reveals some interesting insights into the design process that IGN Au has recently made public. Browder declares that the process of creating is starting from the scratch, the team doesn’t mind about the things that belonged to the StarCraft I trying to insert new changes with whatever they may influence in the process of designing. These new approach is at the same time challenging because it brings upfront problems that need balanced in a totally exciting and varying manner.

He agrees with the fact that analyzing the gamers playing online with their own way of doing specific things was of a great help to the creators of the games making them realize how the modern RTS is defined and cast in the competitive gaming. The team is striving between what is good and what is bad and lately they have reached the point where they are aiming for the beta testing phase.

On a pre-beta version viewed by the designers team there were things to be changed, such as a Roach that wasn’t necessary meant to make tons of damage, maybe to name it a Zealot to take over its features, and you end up creating other characters which you haven’t thought about from the beginning. The purpose of these preliminary tests is to take you deep into the process revealing situations that you might have missed at the initial drawing, in this way enabling you to add or subtract features that change the set of the game.

The act of changing altered the way one Zerg feels, turning a Baneling into a much more adequate unit, for instance the changed Roach won’t be able now to step on him any more, Roach having Hydra to act together even though Hydra as a part of its own in that it can get a position in order to defense a base, and as such becoming a golden feature. The Roach in its turn has a combo that is very powerful and through this feature it can determine a strategy for the enemy player as well, defining this characteristic called the positional strategy, which can be very exciting for the fans of this game style.

StarCraft II is seen as a Team Fortress, as Dustin Browder likes to compare it to, and this because the game has class counters that allow you to establish what is the most important in your strategy: bringing the wrong weapon or how to use the weapons that a gamer has? But anyway RTS is still an RTS and the designers are aware of the fact that scouting is getting more and more powerful with stakes getting raised as well, that’s the reason why they start introducing units that do the killings in a balanced way of displaying the game.