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Many moons ago, when I was a lad, my father showed me a game. Unlike many games he showed me, myst and its ilk, this game let me exterminate all those pesky humans. Or I could kill the sickly green Orcs. Warcraft 2 soon became my favorite game. I would play it any chance I got, I was too young to understand balance, or sorry to be honest, but it didn't matter. I had fun and it was "a good day to die" so to speak.
Then he brought me warcraft, but in space. At my young age could things get any better?! Zerg was my jam. Unfortunately life didn't afford me as many chances to play as I got older. Wings of Liberty came out and I snapped it up. I didn't play often, and when I did I would find myself getting killed by ultras while I was still on hatch tech. (I really suck, even if this is an exaggeration) I would play when I could but again it wasn't often.
I went off to start my adult life, and stepped away from the game for 3 years. I came back to the game and suddenly WoL is no longer up to date. I buy the expansion, giddy with excitement, an expansion based around my favorite race. I killed the campaign in a day, I loved the changes, SH was weird but cool. Hellbats sucked, but killing them did feel fun. I got to gold once or twice, but honestly I liked the lower leagues, I got to play with people like me, people who didn't play often, new players, players that weren't gifted mechanically.
Legacy was announced and I was so excited. I bored my friends taking about it. It was like seeing an old friend and having them tell you about how their life has unfolded. I waited and waited for beta access... and didn't get it in time. So I played my friend's (still not sure how he got it, he rarely plays) and suddenly I'm not excited anymore.
12 worker start its FAST, macros come fast. Everything was fast, I always needed a little time to.. build, scout and plan. That time is no longer afforded to me. When I do manage to get ahead of the 8 ball I struggle to keep up with all the abilities now at my disposal. I struggle to defend, attack, and macro all at the same time. I'm no longer having fun with the game. I haven't played in months, and have devoted what little free time I have to Heroes (much as I suspect Blizzard has done in recent months) I might not be good at Heroes but it is flat out fun, I can get friends to play it.
I think Blizzard, for as much as they say otherwise, has completely forgotten to help the casual SC player. The floor has become in my humble opinion unattainable in a way that is challenging and fun. It is just... stressful and challenging in an unrewarding way.
I do not think I an going to spend money to play the campaign, YouTube will show me all the plot points, in a much more relaxed way.
Sorry for the long and mildly pointless post, felt like venting that one of my favorite childhood memories is no longer fun. Kinda sad.
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Well,everyone sees it different. I am a casual player and I love LOTV. I love the economy,I love the new units and I even love the Protoss as my enemy ( Zerg here ).
They have not forgotten about the casual player.They made a game with a high learning curve,that was never of the table. You decided to play Heroes,that is fine :D Alot of Casuals as you call them will keep on playing and having fun with the game.
GL HF
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my favorite child good memories is no longer fun BW is still fun.
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So.. you continue to play the game casually and accept the fact that you're bad at it. I mean what do you want, you have to invest time in something to be good at it. I remember a guy from gaming industry saying that games these days are turning in to feel-good slot machines.
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On October 11 2015 05:10 REyeM wrote: So.. you continue to play the game casually and accept the fact that you're bad at it. I mean what do you want, you have to invest time in something to be good at it. I remember a guy from gaming industry saying that games these days are turning in to feel-good slot machines. Even if you are bad at something it can still be fun. I am pretty bad in BW but I still enjoy playing the campaign.
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On October 11 2015 05:12 RoomOfMush wrote:Show nested quote +On October 11 2015 05:10 REyeM wrote: So.. you continue to play the game casually and accept the fact that you're bad at it. I mean what do you want, you have to invest time in something to be good at it. I remember a guy from gaming industry saying that games these days are turning in to feel-good slot machines. Even if you are bad at something it can still be fun. I am pretty bad in BW but I still enjoy playing the campaign.
Well I mean, I'm in the same position as OP and yes I log in from time to time, lose, and feel bad about it. I totally get what he is saying, but StarCraft (RTS games in general) are really difficult and people playing them aren't usually "casual" about them.
@OP:
Just because you can't afford to invest time anymore, I believe that the game shouldn't* change it's infrastructure completely. And Blizzard has implemented lot of other game modes for the casual crowd in the last couple of years. (Challenges, custom games, arcade, co-op mode, archon mode etc.) if you feel campaign doesn't have good replay value.
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I'm bad at HotS but I have fun. LOTV just pushes the pace too fast. I just can't imagine people picking this game up without having played the first two and wanting to get deeper into SC. Again I don't have any idea what to change, or if it needs it. I even said it's mostly venting.
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I'm not sure how to quote on my phone so @reyem I agree I don't think it has to change. Blizzard is going for esports which is ok with me. I can't see people buying this game for arcade. I buy a game for the game, not for a consolation prize. Money/time are tight, so I would rather spend my money on games that I feel have a better balance between challenging and fun. I was just venting. My computer won't pay warcraft and I am not sure why.
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I'm 30 years old, I have a job involving 50h+ work weeks and a 3-year-old zergling running around my house calling "Daddy!", which leaves me one to two evenings a week to actually play a bit...so I might count as a casual player.
And my personal experience is that after 20+ games in beta, I pretty much adjusted to LotV pacing to the point that I can barely stand the downtime at the beginning of HotS games. I make terrible, terrible mistakes and I neither am nor ever will be anywhere close to making use of all those new micro-mobaish tricks that the game now offers. And you know what? I still like it. I can even live with the new economy which forces expansions - for the first time in my SC "career" I'm trying to focus on expanding instead of going for quick aggresive timings and all-ins.
So, to sum it up , a casual can still survive and have lots of fun. Just don't forget that every casual who still likes laddering has the same problems that you are experiencing.
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You specifically said you enjoyed WoL/HotS low league play with people like you. That's something that's not quite available in the beta but should improve in a month. You also suggested you enjoyed the single player campaigns. Now, I'm not advocating that you should buy LotV. I too am unhappy with the direction some aspects of the game are (or aren't) going in. However, everything I see here points to things being more fun for you with the actual game instead of beta.
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On October 11 2015 04:57 HaRuHi wrote:BW is still fun.
If you like your eyes bleeding that is.
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I do not like the rushed early game of LotV, but after playing D3, their new Moba and Hearthstone I find it pretty funny that you think Blizz forgot about the casual gamer :p Next game from them I half expect it to play itself whilst the player dribbles over their keyboard.
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Canada11355 Posts
On October 11 2015 06:21 shid0x wrote:Show nested quote +On October 11 2015 04:57 HaRuHi wrote:my favorite child good memories is no longer fun BW is still fun. If you like your eyes bleeding that is. Broodwar still looks better than a lot of pixel-art games that have come out in the last 5 years.
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On October 11 2015 04:29 Udalango1 wrote: Many moons ago, when I was a lad, my father showed me a game. Unlike many games he showed me, myst and its ilk, this game let me exterminate all those pesky humans. Or I could kill the sickly green Orcs. Warcraft 2 soon became my favorite game. I would play it any chance I got, I was too young to understand balance, or sorry to be honest, but it didn't matter. I had fun and it was "a good day to die" so to speak.
Then he brought me warcraft, but in space. At my young age could things get any better?! Zerg was my jam. Unfortunately life didn't afford be as many chances to play as I got older. Winds of liberty came out and I snapped it up. I didn't play often, and when I did I would find myself getting killed by ultras while I was still on hatch tech. (I really suck, even if this is an exaggeration) I would play when I could but again it wasn't often.
I went off to start my adult life, and stepped away from the game for 3 years. I came back to the game and suddenly WoL is no longer up to date. I buy the expansion, giddy with excitement, an expansion based around my favorite race. I killed the campaign in a day, I loved the changes, SH was weird but cool. Hellbats sucked, but buy did killing them feel fun. I got to gold once or twice, but honestly I liked the lower leagues, I got to play with people like me. People who didn't play often, new players, players that weren't gifted mechanically.
Legacy was announced and I was so excited, I bored my friends taking about it. It was like seeing an old friend and having them tell you about how their life has unfolded. I waited and waited for beta access....and didn't get it in time. So I played my friends (still not sure how he got it, he rarely plays) and suddenly I'm not excited anymore.
12 worker start its FAST, macros come fast. Everything was fast, I always needed a little time to.....build, scout and plan. That time is no longer afforded to me. When I do manage to get ahead of the 8 ball I struggle to keep up with all the abilities now at my disposal. I struggle to defend, attack, and macro all at the same time. I'm no longer having fun with the game. I haven't played in months, and have devoted what little free time I have to Heros (much as I suspect Blizzard has done in recent months) I might not be good at hero's but it is flat out fun, I can get friends to play it.
I think Blizzard, for as much as they say otherwise, has completely forgotten to help the casual Sc player. The floor has become in my humble opinion unattainable in a way that is challenging and fun. It is just......stressful and challenging in an unrewarding way.
I do not think I an going to spend money to play the campaign, YouTube will show me all the plot points, in a much more relaxed way.
Sorry for the long and mildly pointless post, felt like venting that one of my favorite child good memories is no longer fun. Kinda sad
While I can agree with some design issues that the game has, I think you are concentrating on "how well you are playing" a bit too much.
I do complain about the state of SC2 a lot, but when it comes down to it, SC2's matchmaking is good enough that you will find players just as bad (or good) as you to play with.
And trust me, I know from experience. Stopped playing for years and came back to LotV beta, started with no knowledge of current builds or plans or anything. I was extremely surprised to find that in a game that been out as long as SC2 has, and with as few players in the beta atm, there are still players of every skill level out there.
Again, from how it sounds the way you describe it, the thing that is ruining your fun is you feel like you are not able to keep up and playing too poorly. Thinking about your performance is a sure way to kill your fun in a game like this. In SC2, even most of the time when you are winning, it "feels" like you are behind. Don't let it fool you! Try to think less of how well you are playing, and focus more on how you LIKE to play.
Play the game how you like to play. If you don't like the new abilities, don't use them, come up with a strategy using alternatives. If you don't like to macro, defend, and attack all at once, build a strategy based around just 1 or 2 of those things. Go with more of an aggressive all-in style if you prefer attacking. Go with a more passive style if you like to defend. Unless you are in the top ranks, you don't really need to worry about the "meta" or anything like that. Just do what you like to do, and matchmaking will place you with people who are just as successful as you.
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I had fun being bad at the other SC games, and to a lesser extent the warcraft games. Horde for the win. But LOTV is overly fast/too harass focused. Im not sure how to play different when everything is "cheese". Its constant pressure, constant need to expand, constant need for attention everywhere. Idk, maybe that is it. But it honestly just is way too stressful for a game in my taste.
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On October 11 2015 07:50 Udalango1 wrote: I had fun being bad at the other Sc games, and to a lesser extent the warcraft games. Horde for the win. But LOTV is overly fast/too harass focused. Im not sure how to play different when everything is "cheese". Its constant pressure, constant need to expand, constant need for attention every where. Idk maybe that is it. But it honestly just is way to stressful for a game in my tastes
Well any early game issues, or issues with how it feels like "cheese", are pretty much alleviated once you figure out an opener that fits your style best.
When it comes to constant need to expand, timing of ur first expansion (sometimes second expansion) will be part of your opener as well. You can treat future expansions same as you do in WoL/HotS - just find a semi-safe time for them (after fending off an attack, or as your own attack departs).
Attacks, too, become another thing that will become natural once you decide an opener that fits your style. And once you got the timing you like to attack at down, that will make it easy to know when to expand.
Relative to HotS, yes early game is a bit faster before, so openers will feel different, but midgame onward feels pretty similar. Yes some units have new abilities, but if you do not like that you can not focus on those in your strategy. And yes you will expand a lil more often, but the times to expand will work themselves in to your playstyle in time.
As long as you were not one of those WoL/HotS players who did absolutely nothing but cheese every game, I do not think LotV is different enough that you would not be able to have fun. It def has a lil bit of a learning curve to adapt to the changes, but it does not really feel too different past early game. The feeling I get 10-15 mins in to a LotV game is not very differnt from the feeling I got 20-30 mins in to a HotS game.
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I have a young family at home, my days of PC gaming are far behind me but I still play SC2, I still watch the contests when I can. I backed Elite Dangerous knowing that I'll probably never get near it, I've had a dabble but that game is progressing without me. My time is the problem, not the games. I think that in half the time you typed this post you could have went on ladder and lost three games, yup losses, but you would still have played. SC2 is fun, you just have to put time into it. Sorry to be so blunt but SC2 is a pretty good game at the moment and when I have time it is fun, you don't need to win to have fun.
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the 1 button whole army button is for casuals. the semi-controlled AI ally helps casuals.
the different levels of AIs helps casuals. the versus AI "automatch ladder" helps casuals. the campaign has 100 extra units that can't be in a competitive game so casuals can have fun screwing around with them.
i play with a group of casuals with me being the best player by far. we get together once or twice a week at a LAN Cafe and anywhere from 4 to 10 show up.
we play 1v1s and 2v2s. when i play a 1v1 against a weaker player they get a CPU AI ally. The worse they aer .. the better the AI Ally.
with 2v2s we make the teams up so that a really strong player is matched iwth a really weak player so the teams even out. If a team has 2 weaker players we give them 1 or 2 AI Allies.
its silly, stupid fun and we expect it to continue with LotV.
Occasionally, i try to seriously play HotS or LotV and i can't get higher than Diamond in HotS. But, the most fun is with this in person group play.. with trash talk going back and forth etc etc etc.
imo, 1v1 "automatch ladder" will never be as fun as these in person group play sessions no matter what Blizzard does with the game.
over all, the group of casuals i play with think Blizzard is doing a great job.
On October 11 2015 09:08 Pinion_ wrote: I have a young family at home, my days of PC gaming are far behind me but I still play SC2, I still watch the contests when I can. I backed Elite Dangerous knowing that I'll probably never get near it, I've had a dabble but that game is progressing without me. My time is the problem, not the games. I think that in half the time you typed this post you could have went on ladder and lost three games, yup losses, but you would still have played. SC2 is fun, you just have to put time into it. Sorry to be so blunt but SC2 is a pretty good game at the moment and when I have time it is fun, you don't need to win to have fun. good perspective.
i'm pretty sure i get rolled by lots of 14 year olds when i hit my plateau on the 1v1 ladder and go no futher. i stopped getting mad about that stuff after having to pay my first month of rent and clean my own bathroom all by myself.
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Man doesn't play games anymore and complains about hard game being hard.
You loved warcraft and broodwar and those games were less casual than SC2
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