Starcraft 2 vs. Starcraft 1 - Will It Split The Community Like Counter-Strike Did? Thoughts? I witnessed the CS schism first hand, and that game had a popularity that is probably equal to that of StarCrafts, so its logical to think the same may happen again.
The hypothesis needs more work, I think. I think some hardcore fans who love the old mechanics to death (and can't see anything wrong with them) and who hate the new mechanics won't switch. I also think they're a really small part of the community, however. There'll be a larger group who like watching the "classic" games and who might slowly switch over to watching StarCraft II games. Given the 11 year difference between the games, we're looking at something like a generational change. The old progamers will have a hard time becoming good at the new game* but there will be a new generation of progamers. StarCraft I is slowly running out of steam in South Korea, causing me to wonder if there'll be a large number of players coming out of that particular country. *And they'll probably BMW&C that they keep losing to newer players due to "dumbed down" mechanics.
Of course it will. There will always be people who prefer the original and others who want to get into the new game as quickly as possible. It happens with every sequel. Both are/will be epic though, so it won't matter.
I think people that like watching pro games (like me) would like something thats a bit less hard on the eyes. SC2 with SC1-grade play would be win to watch.
I used to play SC1 but i moved on to WC3 eventually. For diehards: Newsflash, even blizzard thinks the original game can be improved. Reminds me of granpa always going on about how old days everything was better. Fact is memory tends to paint everything rosy. Ask any young progamer in a couple of years and they wont even look at SC1.
CS 1.6 is better This isnt a case of thinking back to 16-bit days. SC is still played everyday, so people are not just romantisicing about it.
Ah yes but people do not look at SC the same way they used to. back in the day they looked it as "wow what a game with great graphics sound storyline etc". The whole package and programmed really well too. But these days we look to what came after SC and think to ourselves. SC has not gotten better over the years. It's the same old SC. And the other RTS games that came after it all around the world in most cases are as good or worse than SC. So all this new technology and it could not produce a RTS way better than SC. Well SC 2 will change that. But my point is we still look at SC as a great game now as we did back in the good old days. But just in a different light now.
As has been said before, a small fraction of stubborn SC 1 fans won't be playing SC 2, but most people will switch if not slowly. That does not mean that SC 1 will die out, like most awesome originals, the conversation will be as follows: "Hey, you wanna play SC2?" "Nah, I'm bored of that game, the thor sucks." "trudat, how about the original starcraft?" "Break it out man!" Unfortunately, once starcraft 2 comes out the effect of "splitting" will be exaggarated because there are many more people who will play SC 2 as their first starcraft. Shocking I know, but I've met tons of people who haven't played the original but are planning to get the second one. So don't freak out when at the end of week 1, the number of people playing each game are completely off balance.
