It was a clear night, with two fool moons shining in the sky. The planet was nearly dead. No plant life or living organisms. Heavily guarded small base near mountain slope was waiting for an assault... But from the start everything went wrong.. Our mission was to guard precious artifact stollen from Protoss. We didn't know the details. And command didn't bother to fill us in. Our only task was to stop any Protoss attack. In briefing we were told, that we should encounter moderate Protoss attack, but someone at the command made a huge mistake... We we're attacked by Zerg... Totally unprepared for this kind of attack, we were almost wiped out. Even support from air didn't help.. Massive amounts of fast moving Zerglings evaded those slow firing Yamamoto cannons. And Wrights were eliminated by Mutalisks. It was a disaster. -- The screams... The chilling sounds from those creatures... They were to much for my team. We were loosing the battle. As if those dreaded Zerg weren't enough, we were taking friendly fire from our air support. Just what the hell they were doing ! - Cease fire, you're killing my men ! - I yelled through my radio. But I got no response. The battleship command didn't hear or was totally ignoring my transmissions... We were cornered. From a battalion of heavy armored marines, only few squads were still alive. The ammo was running low, but the zergling kept rushing in. Wave after wave, no matter how much we killed. And now we are here... Barricaded in a small base, trying to stop invading Zerg. - Lieutenant, are you still there? This is general Dukov speaking. We have a new mission for you. - Yeah, I'm here ! What mission god damn it, we are being massacred here ! - Just hold on. We are sending ammunition, medics and steam packs. Your new objective is to go to the near by Zerg base and destroy it from the inside. This will stop the waves of zergling and gives us time to evacuate scientists team and the artifact. - And what about my team ?! - You will be picked up after you destroy the base. Is everything clear? - Yes sir... - Get to the supplies we dropped and get moving marine ! After that a transporter will pick you up and take as near as possible to the base. I've gathered a squad of my best men and we started moving. We had to act fast. The remaining defensive power was not enough to hold the line for very long. If the Zerg get the artifact, we fail. As soon as we were dropped, we encountered moderate resistance. It seemed, the Zerg were to much interested in the artifact and not protecting so much base with their queen... We ran as fast as our heavy armor allowed. And soon in front of us huge spore infested hill arose. Just the look of it could infuse fear to any man. But not to my team. They were hardcore marines, who fought countless battles and their only goal was to listen to my orders, even if it takes them to death... We infiltrated the base and slowly started moving to the supposed to be core of the base. Our Ghosts suggested that exactly at that spot we should find defenseless queen, which is laying new eggs.. But once again.. They were wrong... Almost instantaneously all of my men were killed by the enemy, we have not expected. Newly hatched hydralisks attack us from the darkness of the nest. The only surviver left... Was me.. I knew it's the end, but I had to try complete the mission. And the only way to do it was... - God, how I hate these things ! - and took three shots of Stimpak. Suddenly time slowed down... Heart started beating like crazy. My mind faded away and only one thought keeped me moving forward. I took ammo from my fallen teammates and frenzied to the nearby queen. Increased strength, aim and reaction times, let me avoid hydralisk acid spits. And hydralisk after hydralisk I fought my way to the queen. When I saw her in all it's ugly glory, a nearby Zergling, which I missed, chopped away one of my legs. I fell on the ground and killed that bastard. But from the blood I lost and Stimpak's after effect my vision started to blur... From the tunnels nearby new Zerg emerged. I had only one chance of defeating the queen... Last breath... Last Stimpack.... Now or never... - AAAAAAAAAAA ! - I screamed while barely holding C-14 in full automatic mode, shooting all of my bullets to the queen's head... At the last few fires through my blurry vision, I saw the queen falling down and zerg running towards me... I closed my eyes and with my last breath I said to the radio: - Mission completed, gener... - Marine, confirm your last message? Is the queen dead? Marine ! No one was answering... - Ok, lets move the artifact, we do not have much time. - But sir, the marines ? - one of the battleship commanders asked. - What about them, commander? They were trained to die. There is no point in risking artifacts safety and trying to rescue dead meat. - Yes sir... THE END -- Someone will surely ask, what the hell is this? Well, first let me say sorry if the story sucks Or if I made huge mistakes regarding starcraft universe or english It's not my native tongue and it was long time I've played SC. But if someone kept reading to the end this story was a premise for a thought that kept me awake during few last nights... Today's gaming is more advanced than ever before. But for me, something is missing. I don't know maybe I'm getting older or something, but the newly released games doesn't give the satisfaction I truly desire. But don't get me wrong, I love gaming and starcraft too. Though I'm not hardcore player and really really suck in multi-player. Particularly because... Well I think this is the main reason I don't like today's games... And that reason is: I cannot feel the universe of the game. The most I enjoy about movies, games, manga, anime or anything that is from fantasy/sci-fi stuff, is the ability to teleport myself to the world created. The environment, characters, story, etc... I think you get it. But I should really get to the point of this post Firstly may I ask, what would be the best way to experience the universe of say... Starcraft? I say FPS (first player shooter). Please don't kill me yet... Some may call this blasphemy, but I see it in a different way. Imagine epic battles in the Starcraft universe. The experience you'd feel participating in those battles (see SC cinematic ). Now let me get clear on this. This would not be the one-dimensional shooters like there are out many. I would be Epic ! And how this can be done? Well, I see it like this: 1. Two teams. 2. A premise - mission, map (huge one) - call it like you want. 3. Huge amounts of real players. Say like 100-200. 4. Amazing graphics (current 3D engines, like Unreal 3) 5. Ability not to only move, jump, crouch turn and shoot, but to use obstacles and do special moves (not with insane keyboard combinations). (Gears of War) 6. Ability to control any StarCraft unit in it's real sizes... 7. No need for heavy unit balancing. I see everything this way: Two teams has access to carefully chosen specific units. If each team can have near 100 players, some of them become say Marines, some Tanks, Wrights.. Every map has predefined amount of available unit types (by the developer, for balancing). And here's why there is no need in unit balancing. Sure, one zergling can't stand against a Marine. But that's not the point. It's all in team's skill to use the provided units. For example, for random online battles, the game would choose randomly who is what. For serious competitions, players could choose exactly what they want to be (within map unit limitations). Just image, Counter-strike CM not 5x5, but 50x50 Sounds too messed up, huh? Maybe... It's really hard to express the thoughts that are in my head. But believe me, if I were marine in a field were there's rushing 50 zerglings and my ammo is running low, the adrenaline would surelly rise through the roof Or... Image the terran platforms you are in, or Zerg infested terrain... If everything would be executed perfectly, that game would be the best Starcraft universe experience ever. Ofcours, for this to become even remotely real, the best of the best developer should work insanely hard to realize such a thing. And there's a lot technical difficulties to solve. Like, how can network serve 200 players? But it's only technical stuff... The idea, that what is important. I think, this kind of FPS would rock. You would not only be foot soldier, but you can become a tank or maybe even a battleship, who could be up in the sky shooting the enemy. The main problem here would be map balancing, not the unit itself. Blizzard has balanced units quite good so far Oh yeah... No stupid AI's in the game too Just real players. Random battles with 200 player massacre, or maybe serious team matches in GPL? Yeah, I know. I dream to much Anyway, thanks everyone who read it to the end. It was fun sharing some of my thoughts I'd just have a wish to really play a game which would rise the adrenaline to the max and let experience the universe within the game I know there are attempts of making such games. UT3 one of them. They let use different vehicles, but everything there is so random... Just without any point. Everything is a weapon you can pick up and use it. In my idea, YOU are the weapon and alone you pretty much are dead. Teamwork, that;s what essential. Ok, Team Fortress is one of those games. And quite successful you know Oh BTW, looking forward to SC2. Not multi-player, but single-player and the story it has to offer Once again, I wish to experience the very interesting universe of StarCraft... P.S. I have tons of ideas how this game would be unique, and what could give the experience to the max, but Jesus, I already wrote to much No one will really read it the end.
You obviously put a lot of time into your post, and so I will reply thoroughly. Firstly, to answer you claim that it's ''the idea that is important'', I refer you to Levine --one of the world's great game designer's: "A great idea is meaningless. A great idea that leverages your existing technology, gets the team excited, is feasible to do on time and budget, is commericially competitive, and, last but not least, floats the boat of a major publisher... Now you have something." -- Ken Levine I understand that you are very enthusiastic about SC2, and that is to be encouraged. However, you also have to create mods or ums maps within the established limits of the engine and the multiplayer's technical capacity. Certainly, MAG (a game that will support 250 players online on a single battlefield) plans to challenge what we presently consider the limits. Sadly, 200 players on a single map is simply not a possibility for SC2 because it's an RTS: Blizzard will not support more than 12 players in multiplayer games. Now, couple that technical limitation with your desire to have massive battles, and you will realise that there's only one possibility: there would have to be AI warriors commanded by a player. I think you ought to seriously analyse your dislike for AI troops (which you expressed above). Why do you dislike AI enemies/allies? Certainly, they would not be as skilled as a talented player, however, I feel that it is important to consider the anarchy that would ensue if players controlled a single zergling; individually, they might be better than if they were controlled by the AI, however, as a collective they would not direct their efforts as cohesively or smoothly as an AI force. I will complete this post later: I must be off right now.
I was wondering about the fiction piece until I kept reading and found out that english isn't your first language. That considered, it was actually pretty well done. The main flaw comes as a few missing words or ones that were the wrong form. The story itself is somewhat common of the short genre, but it was unique in that the marine was able to finish his mission before biting the dust. On the idea of one-to-one control, I think Blizzard has already thought about this. As much as I can remember, StarCraft Ghost was going to feature something similar to it, but one of the reasons it was canceled was because of hardware limitations. Perhaps once the technology catches up to the idea, we'll see something like it. I'd play it.
Thx for the critics and appreciation. Started considering writing more on StarCraft universe... But before that, I should really get to know it much better. Any suggestions, where I can get all the official Blizzard fiction about StarCraft universe? Preferably shipping to EU?
