I've been around on this site years before the beta for SC2 had even come out and have since the release of the game not logged on to this website. Being hyped for SC2 was an extraordinary memory for me, I remember all the hype, the speculation, the units and eventually the Battle Reports. Talking on the forums about strategies, units, trying to min-max everything, it was a whole lot of fun. SC2 was going to be the next big thing, I even saw Oversky's "switching to left hand to play SC2" video and threads such as: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=83501 from 2008. And ofcourse you had to play Broodwar with all the hotkey configurations for SC2. This was Blizzard's next big thing, it was a new RTS..! When the Beta hit the fan you could see there was HYPE. Not only did the SC2 Betas go for over $300, we had commentators jumping ship from Broodwar.. it was madness, everyone wanted a beta key. You did whatever you could and posted everywhere there was a contest to make sure your chances were maximized. I remember there was a time where SC2 was hacked and an AI version was released. Althogh at first you could only watch replays, it was well worth all the trouble you had to go through to install it. Just making boxes with your cursor was so exciting! Eventually the AI version was released, and boy was I happy. Although the opponents were ****ty and only had a few limited builds, I took my gaming very seriously. I had bought a brand new mouse and mousepad (I still have it today) to play the game. It was going to be a metal surface mousepad because you needed that extra glide. I had done tons of research in regards to claw gripping as opposed to pal gripping. I even bought new "mouse slides" (called Glidez) online to insure I had minimum friction while gaming. Eventually a guy named Seed here on the forums gave me his beta key, or at least, he was willing to share his account because he wasn't going to use it all that much. I used this opportunity to play the game day and night, or, well, whenever I could. As soon as I got of my job I rushed home to start a game up. Sometimes he wanted to play and would log in, and I was ready to switch as soon as he logged off. Being in different timezones helped me a lot. When I did eventually start to ladder I was going to play Terran, I had plenty of time to decide after all. I was going to adapt Boxer's playing style, I was going to grow and evolve with the game, being in the beta. And I did, I watched every replay, I tried as hard as I could to adapt all types of strategies in the game. I still remember the old layout of the sc2 beta, it was very simple, there was no masters league and a lot of features you find today were gone. Not to mention you could build barracks before supply depot, now that was the ****! And there was copper league! And you could mindcontrol for an infinite amount of time! And you played on small ****ty maps like steps of war! I could list a ton of more memories, but it really doesn't matter. Unless you were here with us, awaiting this amazing new game, there is no chance you'd understand the feelings that were surrounding all of us. Now, today, I have to say that this game, sadly never reached any highs. It could have been SO MUCH MORE. It's sad to see a game, which is good in many ways, feel so flawed in its core mechanics and gameplay. The fact that the sound design sounds nothing like BW did, that units clump up together, the overall monotone units (such as the collosus and maurader) makes SC2 difficult for me and many others to love. The first time I saw the ingame rendered cutscenes I was already disappointed. All in all, It's not a bad game, but it was just sad to see it fall apart this way. The community and following could have been huge. In my mind SC2 never beat Broodwar, it just came to be that SC2 was the new ship and the only ship we had to sail together. I've spent over 3000 hours (or more) in SC2 as of today, I have over 8000 games played and I've been in the top 250 in the beta (though only always high masters/diamond throughout the game in general). My goal was never to be a progamer, I wanted it, but my school and work never allowed for it and my mother would probably go crazy. For me that time was well worth it, but to this day I still feel empty inside. Everything we had built up here once, is just gone in the wind... and there's nothing much on the Horizon anymore, it seems I've grown old. Maybe Titan will be my next thing, the new "WoW".. To this day I don't believe SC2 can be fixed, unless the last expansion brings something extraordinary new to the game and changes tons of game mechanics (which will never happen). I now understand why WoW players complain about Cataclysm and Mists of Pandaria. I understand their hype and emotions when Vanilla came out, and I see why many still keep playing.. and for some reason I still hate this Ijjfidrie guy.
I share the same opinion, but I realized this long ago. I knew starcraft 2 from before beta and back then it was all I watched on youtube. When I saw those first few battle reports, it looked SO DAMN EXCITING! And then beta came, and casters like Husky, HDstarcraft and Day9 became popular. I remember watching lots and lots of commentaries while beta was going. And finally the release came and I started playing and damn it was fun! But unlike you I only have about 500 hours played, but those hours were so worth it. I also remember back when this forum was filled with new posts everyday, and i remember Ijjfidrie too! xD he was such a spammer!! but since HoTS came, Wings of Liberty have pretty much been abbandonned for good. So I just hope Legacy of the Void will make up for it!
