Partly serious, partly playing devil's advocate to get some more elaborate responses out of the naysayers. You see, everyone complains that the story sucks, but then they go and attack individual plot points, which in this context is an entirely different matter unless you make it clear how this plot point is an example of your problems with the story as a whole. The closest we got was the misguided idea that Mengsk and Narud were Batman-level crazy-prepared supervillains that should have had better plans for the Zerg onslaught. Well they're not, Mengsk held the "I will rule this sector" speech in the first game!
And that video is painful to watch. I made it to the "basement scene" in part 2, then shut it off in disgust. Making jokes about kidnapping, physical abuse, misogyny and possibly rape does not belong in what calls itself a movie review!!! Also parts of it are horribly biased, a 4-person sample for characterisation is terrible, not to mention their replies: Pretty much anything said about C3PO could be applied to Jar-Jar (except being a robot), and the same goes for Obi-Wan (Ep.4) and Qui-Gon Jin.
You mean like this or this? Keep in mind I'm not saying the SCII story isn't rather straightforward, but that's a different concept than "cliché". "Overused" is very bad as a standalone criticism because it attacks the most popular option through nothing but its sheer quantity, rather than the actual content. Turn that around: Said option had to be "good" in some way to become popular in the first place. I do agree with your sentiment that the plot of SC/BW was more complex and convoluted, however this is not the type of complaint I meant to oppose.
And since you focus on plot twists: Why doesn't Raynor's "death" count? It's played straight in the story, the problem was the mass of leaks and people like us who "meta'd" it to death. As a personal anecdote, that actually backfired wonderfully during my first playthrough of WoL: I first sided with Hanson, who then was all good and not infested at all, then with Nova due to the constant hints at a traitor and because his accusations of Hanson were wrong. So the ending actually came as a surprise, because I already had "the traitor" killed. Of course that all came crashing down during the second playthrough when I realised it was a Schrödinger plot setup.
And since you focus on plot twists: Why doesn't Raynor's "death" count? It's played straight in the story, the problem was the mass of leaks and people like us who "meta'd" it to death. As a personal anecdote, that actually backfired wonderfully during my first playthrough of WoL: I first sided with Hanson, who then was all good and not infested at all, then with Nova due to the constant hints at a traitor and because his accusations of Hanson were wrong. So the ending actually came as a surprise, because I already had "the traitor" killed. Of course that all came crashing down during the second playthrough when I realised it was a Schrödinger plot setup.
You brought up another weak point of the campaign, the segmentation of the story. Both WoL and HotS suffered from it. The story are segmented and told independently by planets (HotS) or by quest giver (WoL). By giving us the freedom of choice, they had to make sure each story segments doesnt affect the others. Action in each segments carry no consequences, story in each segments doesnt mention the others, all until the final segments. This brings me out the immersion even though it is for gameplay reasons. HotS tried to be more linear, but then they still shoehorn the "choice" mechanics and it feels disjointed. For example, you can visit char right at the beginning or wait until after Zerus and you become the primal queen. Blizzard even put 2 separate prerendered cutscenes where Kerrigan is a ghost and a primal queen. However, dialogue did not change one bit. How Kerrigan changed in appearance since the last time Warfield saw her have no effects on his emotion as well as his reaction.
Can you please explain which part of my post you're referring to? I am not angry, I am not raging at you. It is entirely possible to have a reasonable, rational discussion even on the internet. This site is not 4chan, far from it in fact.
I agree, but I think HotS is a massive improvement. I think WoL was an experiment, it failed miserably, and Blizzard seems to have learned for the most part. I don't see why they had to add the choices in HotS, Zerus is obviously meant to occur after Char and Kaldir. Actually I don't see any story-based reason behind the Kaldir missions in the first place, it seems they were only thrown in so we could smash up some Protoss. The first two even seem badly justified on their own, unless we assume Protoss civilian colonists are even more idiotic and irrational than the military.
However, even without player choices you need a massive amount of gameplay and story seggregation. You always start with a preplaced base and none of the resources, units and tech you had at the end of the previous one, even if there's no justification at all. Has anyone not had a total of 5-7k minerals stacked up through all missions combined by the time they play Cutthroat? Imagine if you kept all surviving M&M forces between missions, I mean it's not like we leave hundreds of people to die on a lava-flooded and/or Zerg-infested deathworld every time...
Broodwar was slap full of cliches.... Actually all of blizzard games are, they base about 95% of all of their stories since wc2 on pop culture.
The african renegade, the redneck commander, The clint eastwood main good guy, The Badguy, you love to hate, but there is really little reason to hate him.
I meant cliche plot devices, not character stereotypes. This is in reference to "why do so many people complain about "cliché", "overused" or "unoriginal" plot devices?".
You mean like this or this? Keep in mind I'm not saying the SCII story isn't rather straightforward, but that's a different concept than "cliché". "Overused" is very bad as a standalone criticism because it attacks the most popular option through nothing but its sheer quantity, rather than the actual content. Turn that around: Said option had to be "good" in some way to become popular in the first place. I do agree with your sentiment that the plot of SC/BW was more complex and convoluted, however this is not the type of complaint I meant to oppose.
I'm starting to think we're debating semantics. When people are saying the plot is 'cliche', it's more likely that they mean the plot is predictable, not because cliches are being used. This is the basis of my argument, because like you said anything can be a trope so it shouldn't be a shock when something is presented as 'unoriginal'. It almost becomes a non issue.
The SC2 storyline is still very formulaic in that you know what certain outcomes will be simply because of foreshadowing. SC1 never had prophecies or clear cut goals, which left you wondering where the whole plot was heading. Even with Brood War, Kerrigan's goal was never to gain control of the swarm and become the ultimate badass, she started out simply wanting to retain her freedom after the death of the Overmind. Her bid for power came when her goals of survival and control became one and the same. This is also what made the plot twists feel more natural. The story wasn't being told to you as much as it was unfolding before you.
If SC2 were a new franchise on its own, it wouldn't have the same expectations as it does now. The problem is it follows in the footsteps of an elaborate space opera in the fashion of a soap opera.
Maybe I've forgotten some important details, but isn't Kerrigan the only character whose goals evolved at all? The Overmind always wanted to assimilate the Protoss and destroy anything non-Zerg. Mengsk always wanted to overthrow the Confederacy and since he never suggested or supported anyone else to lead the Terrans it was obvious where that was going. Raynor always wanted people to survive in this crapsack world and always had a "good guy" character. The Protoss didn't do much (just like in SCII), but generally tried to maintain the existing order and struggled to adapt to whatever was thrown at them. Then the UED came along with a very straightforward goal: conquer the Terrans, enslave the Zerg, and enslave or wipe out the Protoss, with the official justification of protecting Earth.
Remove the sheming of Kerrigan and suddenly you don't have all that much left, I can't really call the end of StarCraft a "plot twist" since the Protoss were set up as a warrior race from the beginning.
The foreshadowing I agree with, but I could just as easily call the UED invasion an ass-pulled excuse plot. Most of the uncertainty comes from the structure of the missions, in SC/BW we played a few missions, accomplished a minor goal, then switched to an entirely different faction, rinse and repeat. In SCII we play as 1 character at a time, and it's obvious the player faction will generally succeed. Again, maybe I forgot something, but when did the player faction suffer any major defeat in SC/BW? The closest one I can think of is Duran/Stukov, where Mengsk escaped certain capture (along with the death of Stukov, which didn't have any consequences in regard to the general plot)
I do feel the general structure of the story is essentially reversed: In SC/BW we had many simple, linear segments that summed up to a general chaos, in SCII we have many uncorrelated, chaotic events that flow into the linear Hybrid plotline. Of course since you know who will win an individual mission the latter structure leaves no "surprises"
And the expectations (and general popularity) probably are the main problem. In the days of SC/BW no one made any attempt at guessing the plot beforehand. We didn't have a worldwide open discussion long before the story was even released, so even minor twists came as surprises. I obviously can't turn back time, but I think if the original games were released as a sequel to an established community in our times most of the plot would get figured out immediately too.
I fully agree that the story of SCII cannot satisfy people looking for surprises, but at the same time it's very hard to write such a story in an established setting, as there is a massive amount of background knowledge and you're confined by previous sources. In SC/BW they could throw any curveball they wanted, but now they need a damn good reason to pull a serious contender out of the blue or put a "twist" in the story, we can't just randomly have infested Protoss nuking everything. BW basically set up a stalemate in which no faction had any goals beyond staying alive and/or mindlessly killing everyone else, the only sequel hook left were the Hybrids, which by design would make everyone else try to kill them and anyone weakened by their attack.
What what what?? That was what made the entire scene. Are you saying the writing was bad, or the delivery? We're talking about life-or-death here, staring death in the face one minute and rejoicing in the glory of salvation the next. The guy wouldn't be thinking about how overplayed a phrase like "We're gonna make it!" would sound. It's overplayed for a reason. Simple, effective, doesn't try to be clever. It works. At least on me it did.
EDIT: I mean yeah by itself it would've been dumb but not after what comes before "General! It's a miracle!" And besides, its a radio transmission to the general, that means status update. They're gonna make it!
Sorry for not responding forever lol.
But I felt it was all ok except his voice. It felt really cheesy and ruined the moment for me. My thought of this Marine as I heard his voice was "We're gunna make it home for ice cream!" It just sounded like some japanese cartoon where people are overly excited about everything. Don't get me wrong finding out you aren't going to die is great but even if he's a kid, he's a Marine. He should have said "General the Zerg are pulling back for now. We're loading up the wounded now what's your ETA? General? General Warfield do you read me?" or something. I feel he really jumped to conclusions though. How does he know the Zerg have decided to let them live? Honestly I'd figure they just found a better way to kill us by leaving for a second. It's not a big deal it's just something that ripped me out of a really deep moment in the cinematic.
I gotta say Stukov's voice suffered a bit as well in my opinion. His part in the story was perfect and his dialog really felt like Stukov but his actual voice was disappointing. He felt lazy if that makes any sense, like someone told him alright man do a Russian voice and just say this stuff. I wasn't looking for an exact copy of the original but I felt he should feel like he has the authority. Even with Kerrigan there. I really did like his lines though and his missions and all. One other thing that bugs me is if he remembers everything why is he working with Kerrigan? Sure Duran betrayed him and all but under Kerrigan's orders. Duran didn't do anything to the UED that Kerrigan didn't tell him to other than apparently capturing him from the Protoss and reinfesting him.
Actually Stukov's "tired" voice fits really well if you think about it. The man's been through hell (and worse for what we know of Narud), he has nothing left in this world except a home he can never return to and revenge he's too weak to take by himself. Of course he won't sound like the strong, proud vice admiral we lost to that shapeshifting scumbag.
As for why he worked with Kerrigan, do we know how many of Duran's actions were on Kerrigan's orders and how much was his own agenda? Or he somehow got the memo that Kerrigan and the Queen of Blades were different entities, which Raynor probably didn't.
Different topic: Can anyone come up with a decent reason why Mengsk had planned for the Moros prison ship to selfdestruct, yet this caused less structural damage than scuttling or salvaging in most space sims? Why didn't he stuff a couple dozen nukes into it or make the main reactor overload? (because, as we know by now, any form of central power source explodes spectacularly and kills anything in the vicinity after taking even just a few clips of gauss bullets)
Ok, I finished the campaign too. What disappointed me?
too easy
Played on hard difficulty, but it was maybe even easier than WoL's normal. Unit upgrades are op, Kerrigan is op. There were alot of realy hard (and thus interesting) missions in WoL. In HoTS there weren't.
too short
Missions are shirt, the longest ones are about 20-30 minutes long. No epic battles. Just get a fast swarm, push, win.
story is unbelievably primitive, like fantasy for 13 year old kids
Lots of kids play sc2, but it's not the reason to simplify the story for their inexperienced brain. Broken bridge as the key event isn't even pity. It's just nothing. No imagination involved. "You got wings, I don't like you any more"... "ok, I'll help you in final battle" - 5 year old level. And so on.
There are, for sure, things I liked, and the first of them is voice casting/acting.
And I don't get 2 things about the campaign:
1. Why Kerrigan started to punch Zeratul when he came? I thought they were friends.
2. Why didn't Raynor even try to do Kerrigan in the mouth. She still had human mouth. I think they both could like it.
O_o Kerrigan and Zeratul were never friends. She killed his Matriarch, and he hates her for it. He allows her to live because she's key to the survival of the universe against the Hybrids, but they're by no means on good terms. They even fought in WoL.
nothing. No imagination involved. "You got wings, I don't like you any more"... "ok, I'll help you in final battle" - 5 year old level. And so on.
I really hope this is a joke. Let me try and explain this, because a lot of people have been ripping on this part of the story. So it MUST be a common... confusion.
The person you love is abandoned on a hostile planet. The assumption would be that she is dead. You discover she is alive, but has been taken over by an alien infestation, and is now trying to take over the universe. That right there is toying with Raynor's mind.
After fighting through countless battles, against not only zerg, but also protoss AND terran, you manage to restore her to her human form. You FINALLY get her back. You get separated, AGAIN. She has to leave you. You get captured. And who saves you? Her! But it isn't her. She is fully infested, AGAIN. Does it not make sense for the initial reaction to be "We are done This is done". If not because you feel betrayed, but because you simply cannot safely keep an emotional investment in the matter. The initial shock would cause the decision.
After thinking for a while, you realize that she did what she did because she loves you, and was trying the entire time to rescue you. You realize that it wasn't the Queen of Blades, it was Kerrigan. So, you join forces to fight off a common enemy. The REAL enemy.
Is that the decision everyone would make? No. But does it make sense? Yes. What Raynor went through is unimaginably difficult. Think of how many people he has been betrayed by.
Yea, if Raynor was a capricious 14 years old, his "we're done" would be understandable. But we know Raynor for long, we know that this guy thinks first. When he realized, that Kerrigan fucked herself again, I would expect him to be confused, to try to clear the details up, to clarify if he still can turn her back to a human as he once did and so on. But instantly expressing insult is a kid behavior, it's not Raynorish at all. But ok, let's assume he was lobotomized and become a 14 y.o. kid. He wouldn't join Kerrigan then, kids don't have guts to excuse their own harshness.
And it's not a single episode of psycological unrealistic plot twist. It seem to be the simplified way blizz decided to run the story with. It's not like I disagree, it's a computer game after all, and for a good story ppl read fiction literature. But I expected stronger plot.
Agreed. It made sense that he was pissed because from his point of view she has just undone everything. On the Hyperion he notices her say she'll stay away from civilians even though it might make he lose the battle. That's what the whole scene was there for. It had only two purposes.
1. Show that Valerian is not like his father and would rather they lose the battle than too many civilians die.
2. So Raynor can see Kerrigan is no longer the queen bitch of the universe.
I disagree. You could argue that Raynor leaving the Sons of Korhal is the same situation. The woman he loves has just been thrown to the wolves and he's pissed. So he takes actor and expresses himself telling Mengsk off. If he hadn't reacted like that he could have planned his defection better saving many lives or killing Mengsk while he still trusts Raynor and ending it all. When love is involved people don't think. If he is truly acting like a 14 year old then it's just consistency with the character.
Putting aside SC2 for a second: I can safely say you have never truly been in love. Even the strongest of wills cannot maintain a balanced mind when there is love involved. Can you even IMAGINE what he must have been thinking? No, it would not be confusion. Can you picture Raynor doing this? "Hm. You are the commander of a mutant, killer race again, after I risked my life on multiple occasions to bring you back. Wow. I am confused." No, he is going to be PISSED.
There are PLENTY of negatives to focus on (Protoss always looking like a weak little bitch, and so on). But do not rip on one of the things they did very well, and that was portray the Kerrigan/Raynor relationship. It just irritates me.
The Protoss only look weak because we never faced them directly. During Safe Haven Selendis probably only brought minimal escorts as the colony itself was defenseless. On Kaldir they're explicitely stated to be colonists, but can still wreck you if you're not careful. All other fights are vs the Taldarim, where it's anyone's guess how they even got the new hardware in the first place.
The one time we do see the Protoss in full force is In Utter Darkness, where they kill off Hybrids in spades. And that's after they lost their main fleet.
Really now? If anything that's just obsessives and urge for control. Adults usually have the capacity of respecting or at least trying to understand each others decisions, children however most of the time can't see past their own point of view and just explode when something goes "wrong". That whole scene was random. At first I thought "Hm, Megnsk probably showed Raynor news reports about zerg continuing their massacre of millions of innocent people on terran industrial worlds which Kerrigan ordered broodmothers to attack, saddened that Kerrigan really is a monster, he tells her off". But the whole scene just gives a vibe that they're talking about her re-infestation and not her deed, with an obligatory BroodWar reference to please the "No BW references in WoL" crowd.
"I love you q.q"
"I don't love you, gg no re"
Jim just should have died cause ships hull had been breached and by the time Kerri opened his cell there should have been no air on the ship :D
@GhostNova91: Go
Sons of Korhal actually made sense. Jim and Kerri are friends, Megnsk out of blue kills Kerrigan cause she was doubting his tactics, it's clear now that if he doesn't get out right now - he's next. That was the only sane thing to do for a man like him who couldn't tolerate injustices.
@LitePollution9: Go
Partly serious, partly playing devil's advocate to get some more elaborate responses out of the naysayers. You see, everyone complains that the story sucks, but then they go and attack individual plot points, which in this context is an entirely different matter unless you make it clear how this plot point is an example of your problems with the story as a whole. The closest we got was the misguided idea that Mengsk and Narud were Batman-level crazy-prepared supervillains that should have had better plans for the Zerg onslaught. Well they're not, Mengsk held the "I will rule this sector" speech in the first game!
And that video is painful to watch. I made it to the "basement scene" in part 2, then shut it off in disgust. Making jokes about kidnapping, physical abuse, misogyny and possibly rape does not belong in what calls itself a movie review!!! Also parts of it are horribly biased, a 4-person sample for characterisation is terrible, not to mention their replies: Pretty much anything said about C3PO could be applied to Jar-Jar (except being a robot), and the same goes for Obi-Wan (Ep.4) and Qui-Gon Jin.
@Triceron: Go
You mean like this or this? Keep in mind I'm not saying the SCII story isn't rather straightforward, but that's a different concept than "cliché". "Overused" is very bad as a standalone criticism because it attacks the most popular option through nothing but its sheer quantity, rather than the actual content. Turn that around: Said option had to be "good" in some way to become popular in the first place. I do agree with your sentiment that the plot of SC/BW was more complex and convoluted, however this is not the type of complaint I meant to oppose.
And since you focus on plot twists: Why doesn't Raynor's "death" count? It's played straight in the story, the problem was the mass of leaks and people like us who "meta'd" it to death. As a personal anecdote, that actually backfired wonderfully during my first playthrough of WoL: I first sided with Hanson, who then was all good and not infested at all, then with Nova due to the constant hints at a traitor and because his accusations of Hanson were wrong. So the ending actually came as a surprise, because I already had "the traitor" killed. Of course that all came crashing down during the second playthrough when I realised it was a Schrödinger plot setup.
@Photoloss: Go
My good sir... I don't know if the internet is the right place for you...
@Photoloss: Go
This: http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c397/xlaurancex/Welcome-to-the-Internet.jpg
You brought up another weak point of the campaign, the segmentation of the story. Both WoL and HotS suffered from it. The story are segmented and told independently by planets (HotS) or by quest giver (WoL). By giving us the freedom of choice, they had to make sure each story segments doesnt affect the others. Action in each segments carry no consequences, story in each segments doesnt mention the others, all until the final segments. This brings me out the immersion even though it is for gameplay reasons. HotS tried to be more linear, but then they still shoehorn the "choice" mechanics and it feels disjointed. For example, you can visit char right at the beginning or wait until after Zerus and you become the primal queen. Blizzard even put 2 separate prerendered cutscenes where Kerrigan is a ghost and a primal queen. However, dialogue did not change one bit. How Kerrigan changed in appearance since the last time Warfield saw her have no effects on his emotion as well as his reaction.
@LitePollution9: Go
@electricprism: Go
Can you please explain which part of my post you're referring to? I am not angry, I am not raging at you. It is entirely possible to have a reasonable, rational discussion even on the internet. This site is not 4chan, far from it in fact.
@progammer: Go
I agree, but I think HotS is a massive improvement. I think WoL was an experiment, it failed miserably, and Blizzard seems to have learned for the most part. I don't see why they had to add the choices in HotS, Zerus is obviously meant to occur after Char and Kaldir. Actually I don't see any story-based reason behind the Kaldir missions in the first place, it seems they were only thrown in so we could smash up some Protoss. The first two even seem badly justified on their own, unless we assume Protoss civilian colonists are even more idiotic and irrational than the military.
However, even without player choices you need a massive amount of gameplay and story seggregation. You always start with a preplaced base and none of the resources, units and tech you had at the end of the previous one, even if there's no justification at all. Has anyone not had a total of 5-7k minerals stacked up through all missions combined by the time they play Cutthroat? Imagine if you kept all surviving M&M forces between missions, I mean it's not like we leave hundreds of people to die on a lava-flooded and/or Zerg-infested deathworld every time...
I meant cliche plot devices, not character stereotypes. This is in reference to "why do so many people complain about "cliché", "overused" or "unoriginal" plot devices?".
I'm starting to think we're debating semantics. When people are saying the plot is 'cliche', it's more likely that they mean the plot is predictable, not because cliches are being used. This is the basis of my argument, because like you said anything can be a trope so it shouldn't be a shock when something is presented as 'unoriginal'. It almost becomes a non issue.
The SC2 storyline is still very formulaic in that you know what certain outcomes will be simply because of foreshadowing. SC1 never had prophecies or clear cut goals, which left you wondering where the whole plot was heading. Even with Brood War, Kerrigan's goal was never to gain control of the swarm and become the ultimate badass, she started out simply wanting to retain her freedom after the death of the Overmind. Her bid for power came when her goals of survival and control became one and the same. This is also what made the plot twists feel more natural. The story wasn't being told to you as much as it was unfolding before you.
If SC2 were a new franchise on its own, it wouldn't have the same expectations as it does now. The problem is it follows in the footsteps of an elaborate space opera in the fashion of a soap opera.
@Triceron: Go
Maybe I've forgotten some important details, but isn't Kerrigan the only character whose goals evolved at all? The Overmind always wanted to assimilate the Protoss and destroy anything non-Zerg. Mengsk always wanted to overthrow the Confederacy and since he never suggested or supported anyone else to lead the Terrans it was obvious where that was going. Raynor always wanted people to survive in this crapsack world and always had a "good guy" character. The Protoss didn't do much (just like in SCII), but generally tried to maintain the existing order and struggled to adapt to whatever was thrown at them. Then the UED came along with a very straightforward goal: conquer the Terrans, enslave the Zerg, and enslave or wipe out the Protoss, with the official justification of protecting Earth.
Remove the sheming of Kerrigan and suddenly you don't have all that much left, I can't really call the end of StarCraft a "plot twist" since the Protoss were set up as a warrior race from the beginning.
The foreshadowing I agree with, but I could just as easily call the UED invasion an ass-pulled excuse plot. Most of the uncertainty comes from the structure of the missions, in SC/BW we played a few missions, accomplished a minor goal, then switched to an entirely different faction, rinse and repeat. In SCII we play as 1 character at a time, and it's obvious the player faction will generally succeed. Again, maybe I forgot something, but when did the player faction suffer any major defeat in SC/BW? The closest one I can think of is Duran/Stukov, where Mengsk escaped certain capture (along with the death of Stukov, which didn't have any consequences in regard to the general plot)
I do feel the general structure of the story is essentially reversed: In SC/BW we had many simple, linear segments that summed up to a general chaos, in SCII we have many uncorrelated, chaotic events that flow into the linear Hybrid plotline. Of course since you know who will win an individual mission the latter structure leaves no "surprises"
And the expectations (and general popularity) probably are the main problem. In the days of SC/BW no one made any attempt at guessing the plot beforehand. We didn't have a worldwide open discussion long before the story was even released, so even minor twists came as surprises. I obviously can't turn back time, but I think if the original games were released as a sequel to an established community in our times most of the plot would get figured out immediately too.
I fully agree that the story of SCII cannot satisfy people looking for surprises, but at the same time it's very hard to write such a story in an established setting, as there is a massive amount of background knowledge and you're confined by previous sources. In SC/BW they could throw any curveball they wanted, but now they need a damn good reason to pull a serious contender out of the blue or put a "twist" in the story, we can't just randomly have infested Protoss nuking everything. BW basically set up a stalemate in which no faction had any goals beyond staying alive and/or mindlessly killing everyone else, the only sequel hook left were the Hybrids, which by design would make everyone else try to kill them and anyone weakened by their attack.
Sorry for not responding forever lol.
But I felt it was all ok except his voice. It felt really cheesy and ruined the moment for me. My thought of this Marine as I heard his voice was "We're gunna make it home for ice cream!" It just sounded like some japanese cartoon where people are overly excited about everything. Don't get me wrong finding out you aren't going to die is great but even if he's a kid, he's a Marine. He should have said "General the Zerg are pulling back for now. We're loading up the wounded now what's your ETA? General? General Warfield do you read me?" or something. I feel he really jumped to conclusions though. How does he know the Zerg have decided to let them live? Honestly I'd figure they just found a better way to kill us by leaving for a second. It's not a big deal it's just something that ripped me out of a really deep moment in the cinematic.
I gotta say Stukov's voice suffered a bit as well in my opinion. His part in the story was perfect and his dialog really felt like Stukov but his actual voice was disappointing. He felt lazy if that makes any sense, like someone told him alright man do a Russian voice and just say this stuff. I wasn't looking for an exact copy of the original but I felt he should feel like he has the authority. Even with Kerrigan there. I really did like his lines though and his missions and all. One other thing that bugs me is if he remembers everything why is he working with Kerrigan? Sure Duran betrayed him and all but under Kerrigan's orders. Duran didn't do anything to the UED that Kerrigan didn't tell him to other than apparently capturing him from the Protoss and reinfesting him.
@GhostNova91: Go
Actually Stukov's "tired" voice fits really well if you think about it. The man's been through hell (and worse for what we know of Narud), he has nothing left in this world except a home he can never return to and revenge he's too weak to take by himself. Of course he won't sound like the strong, proud vice admiral we lost to that shapeshifting scumbag.
As for why he worked with Kerrigan, do we know how many of Duran's actions were on Kerrigan's orders and how much was his own agenda? Or he somehow got the memo that Kerrigan and the Queen of Blades were different entities, which Raynor probably didn't.
Different topic: Can anyone come up with a decent reason why Mengsk had planned for the Moros prison ship to selfdestruct, yet this caused less structural damage than scuttling or salvaging in most space sims? Why didn't he stuff a couple dozen nukes into it or make the main reactor overload? (because, as we know by now, any form of central power source explodes spectacularly and kills anything in the vicinity after taking even just a few clips of gauss bullets)
Ok, I finished the campaign too. What disappointed me?
Played on hard difficulty, but it was maybe even easier than WoL's normal. Unit upgrades are op, Kerrigan is op. There were alot of realy hard (and thus interesting) missions in WoL. In HoTS there weren't.
Missions are shirt, the longest ones are about 20-30 minutes long. No epic battles. Just get a fast swarm, push, win.
Lots of kids play sc2, but it's not the reason to simplify the story for their inexperienced brain. Broken bridge as the key event isn't even pity. It's just nothing. No imagination involved. "You got wings, I don't like you any more"... "ok, I'll help you in final battle" - 5 year old level. And so on.
There are, for sure, things I liked, and the first of them is voice casting/acting.
And I don't get 2 things about the campaign:
1. Why Kerrigan started to punch Zeratul when he came? I thought they were friends.
2. Why didn't Raynor even try to do Kerrigan in the mouth. She still had human mouth. I think they both could like it.
O_o Kerrigan and Zeratul were never friends. She killed his Matriarch, and he hates her for it. He allows her to live because she's key to the survival of the universe against the Hybrids, but they're by no means on good terms. They even fought in WoL.
I really hope this is a joke. Let me try and explain this, because a lot of people have been ripping on this part of the story. So it MUST be a common... confusion.
The person you love is abandoned on a hostile planet. The assumption would be that she is dead. You discover she is alive, but has been taken over by an alien infestation, and is now trying to take over the universe. That right there is toying with Raynor's mind.
After fighting through countless battles, against not only zerg, but also protoss AND terran, you manage to restore her to her human form. You FINALLY get her back. You get separated, AGAIN. She has to leave you. You get captured. And who saves you? Her! But it isn't her. She is fully infested, AGAIN. Does it not make sense for the initial reaction to be "We are done This is done". If not because you feel betrayed, but because you simply cannot safely keep an emotional investment in the matter. The initial shock would cause the decision.
After thinking for a while, you realize that she did what she did because she loves you, and was trying the entire time to rescue you. You realize that it wasn't the Queen of Blades, it was Kerrigan. So, you join forces to fight off a common enemy. The REAL enemy.
Is that the decision everyone would make? No. But does it make sense? Yes. What Raynor went through is unimaginably difficult. Think of how many people he has been betrayed by.
Great to be back and part of the community again!
@TacoManStan: Go
Yea, if Raynor was a capricious 14 years old, his "we're done" would be understandable. But we know Raynor for long, we know that this guy thinks first. When he realized, that Kerrigan fucked herself again, I would expect him to be confused, to try to clear the details up, to clarify if he still can turn her back to a human as he once did and so on. But instantly expressing insult is a kid behavior, it's not Raynorish at all. But ok, let's assume he was lobotomized and become a 14 y.o. kid. He wouldn't join Kerrigan then, kids don't have guts to excuse their own harshness.
And it's not a single episode of psycological unrealistic plot twist. It seem to be the simplified way blizz decided to run the story with. It's not like I disagree, it's a computer game after all, and for a good story ppl read fiction literature. But I expected stronger plot.
@TacoManStan: Go
Agreed. It made sense that he was pissed because from his point of view she has just undone everything. On the Hyperion he notices her say she'll stay away from civilians even though it might make he lose the battle. That's what the whole scene was there for. It had only two purposes.
1. Show that Valerian is not like his father and would rather they lose the battle than too many civilians die.
2. So Raynor can see Kerrigan is no longer the queen bitch of the universe.
Both were executed perfectly.
@Zolden: Go
I disagree. You could argue that Raynor leaving the Sons of Korhal is the same situation. The woman he loves has just been thrown to the wolves and he's pissed. So he takes actor and expresses himself telling Mengsk off. If he hadn't reacted like that he could have planned his defection better saving many lives or killing Mengsk while he still trusts Raynor and ending it all. When love is involved people don't think. If he is truly acting like a 14 year old then it's just consistency with the character.
@Zolden: Go
Putting aside SC2 for a second: I can safely say you have never truly been in love. Even the strongest of wills cannot maintain a balanced mind when there is love involved. Can you even IMAGINE what he must have been thinking? No, it would not be confusion. Can you picture Raynor doing this? "Hm. You are the commander of a mutant, killer race again, after I risked my life on multiple occasions to bring you back. Wow. I am confused." No, he is going to be PISSED.
There are PLENTY of negatives to focus on (Protoss always looking like a weak little bitch, and so on). But do not rip on one of the things they did very well, and that was portray the Kerrigan/Raynor relationship. It just irritates me.
Great to be back and part of the community again!
@TacoManStan: Go
The Protoss only look weak because we never faced them directly. During Safe Haven Selendis probably only brought minimal escorts as the colony itself was defenseless. On Kaldir they're explicitely stated to be colonists, but can still wreck you if you're not careful. All other fights are vs the Taldarim, where it's anyone's guess how they even got the new hardware in the first place.
The one time we do see the Protoss in full force is In Utter Darkness, where they kill off Hybrids in spades. And that's after they lost their main fleet.
@TacoManStan: Go
Really now? If anything that's just obsessives and urge for control. Adults usually have the capacity of respecting or at least trying to understand each others decisions, children however most of the time can't see past their own point of view and just explode when something goes "wrong". That whole scene was random. At first I thought "Hm, Megnsk probably showed Raynor news reports about zerg continuing their massacre of millions of innocent people on terran industrial worlds which Kerrigan ordered broodmothers to attack, saddened that Kerrigan really is a monster, he tells her off". But the whole scene just gives a vibe that they're talking about her re-infestation and not her deed, with an obligatory BroodWar reference to please the "No BW references in WoL" crowd.
"I love you q.q"
"I don't love you, gg no re"
Jim just should have died cause ships hull had been breached and by the time Kerri opened his cell there should have been no air on the ship :D
@GhostNova91: Go
Sons of Korhal actually made sense. Jim and Kerri are friends, Megnsk out of blue kills Kerrigan cause she was doubting his tactics, it's clear now that if he doesn't get out right now - he's next. That was the only sane thing to do for a man like him who couldn't tolerate injustices.
I figured that after going through about half the campaign I could take a look in here. One post in and I'm already spoilered.
Back into the abyss untill I fully finish this thing, it is.
@Mozared: Go
Jim Raynor is Narud.