I used to think blizzard was one of the worst game companies for crushing dreams, but they've got nothing on funcom and sony. makes blizzard look like saints.
Blizzard's pulling of Warcraft I and II tests GOG's new Preservation Program
81–90 of 193 posts
Re: Blizzard's pulling of Warcraft I and II tests GOG's new Preservation Program
#82Earlier quoted context omitted.
Nope, it started waaay before that. * The sexual misconduct most likely happened way before it came out publicly as all the sleezebags stayed until it was public * real id debacle * Diablo 3 * shutting down blizzard north, despite working on d3 * spending 10 years on trying to make starcraft 2, when the rts genre was in a major slump * x years on the project titan, only to get cancelled * spent years trying to create…
I kind of forgot but it's true that Starcraft 2 used to be a joke in itself somewhat similar to Duke Nukem Forever at its time.
I thought Starcraft 2 was fine, even if it isn't Brood War. Not really a fair comparison with Duke Nukem Forever. Diablo 3 on the other hand...
Re: Blizzard's pulling of Warcraft I and II tests GOG's new Preservation Program
#83Well I bought WC2 already and have the files. That's the best part of GOG, you can just make your own backup. I think with hard copies going away, the ability to make backups of what you buy should be protected by law, at least for software that is no longer supported (of course one side effect is that all games become services, but there have been single player games recently that prove it's still a good business mo…
For a very long time “hard copies” were just a physical precache of the download. What you actually paid for was the online store code inside the box. I’ve stopped buying boxes after the second one like this.
The software I bought on CD/DVD was never like that unless you mean needing to contact some activation server. As far as I know, things like the Switch game cartridges are also real (presumably with a similar asterisk). The only annoying things are these installers nowadays you download for e.g. Chrome or, a bit longer ago, Flash, not so much the things sold as copy to own (resellable)
I wouldn't discourage people from buying owned copies, especially when they can find an option free of DRM
Re: Blizzard's pulling of Warcraft I and II tests GOG's new Preservation Program
#84Earlier quoted context omitted.
I kind of forgot but it's true that Starcraft 2 used to be a joke in itself somewhat similar to Duke Nukem Forever at its time.
I thought Starcraft 2 was fine, even if it isn't Brood War. Not really a fair comparison with Duke Nukem Forever. Diablo 3 on the other hand...
The issue is effectively that Blizzard released Starcraft 2 during a time where RTS was seen as a forgotten genre entirely, the best you had was the Company of Heroes & Dawn of War.
If they had released it 5 years earlier it might have allowed the genre to stick to the huge cultural legacy it had, at least in Korea.
Let alone the fact that the story of Starcraft 2 was... white-washed entirely compared to the OG & Brood Wars.
Re: Blizzard's pulling of Warcraft I and II tests GOG's new Preservation Program
#85Classics are for casual gamers who enjoy fixed settings. Redesigns are subscription models that revive a working brand and keep players happy with a constant flood of new features.
I understand Blizzard wants to decide what story to tell about its IP. On the other hand, many gaming veterans still want to feel and grasp the before of a remake rather than the after alone.
GOG hit a sweet spot for me. It simply fulfills my early adulthood dream: "One day, I will play all my good old games on CD again. See you fellas!"
GOG is Netflix for my earliest games. But this is not the reason, I buy games there.
Why did I buy a W2 at GOG over a year ago? It was not nostalgia but a closed-game approach.
All new "cloud" games are subscriptions in disguise. I liked the fact that game mechanics in W2 were mostly figured out, and you had to max out under fixed conditions: working on skills, not play-testing new civs.
That's the main difference between tradition and pure entertainment. All major forms of sport have a fixed rule set, with some minor tweaking here and there to leverage these.
I don't have the time nor will to grasp these changes. Age of Empires: Conquerors lost its appeal to me, because as a casual player, I cannot keep up with all the new addons. Years ago, when there were hardly any addons, I still benefited from my former RM 2000+ rating earned around 2000 at the MS ZONE and could play quite competitively online without any pro-gamer training all the time. Not anymore.
Imagine Basketball being modified significantly every season. This is what Formula 1 does now, with a lot of drama and storylines way beyond the sport, and I lost interest.
Re: Blizzard's pulling of Warcraft I and II tests GOG's new Preservation Program
#86Blizzard seem to be burning a lot of bridges and goodwill they've built up over the years. It's incredible what GoG is trying to do, for a profit of course but all the same. The idea of not being able to purchase older titles in a legitimate way only encourages piracy, yet if it will squeeze an extra few pennies out for shareholders, it seems like the right move. The games industry really seems to be turning into the…
How does pulling old games from stores squeeze an extra few pennies out?
Re: Blizzard's pulling of Warcraft I and II tests GOG's new Preservation Program
#87Earlier quoted context omitted.
I kind of forgot but it's true that Starcraft 2 used to be a joke in itself somewhat similar to Duke Nukem Forever at its time.
I thought Starcraft 2 was fine, even if it isn't Brood War. Not really a fair comparison with Duke Nukem Forever. Diablo 3 on the other hand...
SC2 plays pretty great but the plot really went off the rails. Brood War was already worse than base SC plot wise but at least it was still rather dark. SC2's plot feels like garbage fanfic.
Re: Blizzard's pulling of Warcraft I and II tests GOG's new Preservation Program
#88Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The idea of not being able to purchase older titles in a legitimate way only encourages piracy The solution is to dramatically decrease the length of copyright, so that old games (or other software) can be obtained legally (and modified) even if the original maker no longer sells it.
Or just pirate it like we did for the last 30+ years… Copyright is broken and has failed it’s purpose - I have no hope that we can fix it in my lifetime.
It's not like we have to choose between the two.
Re: Blizzard's pulling of Warcraft I and II tests GOG's new Preservation Program
#89Earlier quoted context omitted.
> But shortly after release, Chinese players found a poster hanging in the apartment that serves as the games’ setting that said “Xi Jinping Winnie-the-Pooh moron”. > Almost 10,000 negative reviews soon flooded the game’s review page. The developer, Red Candle Games, posted an apology saying it was “purely an accident” that the poster was left in the game. 10,000 negative reviews is wild for something so banal. I can…
There are over a billion chinese people. 10,000 negative reviews means that ~0.001% of them felt strongly enough to leave a bad review in protest.
How many of those reviewers actually owned the game?
Re: Blizzard's pulling of Warcraft I and II tests GOG's new Preservation Program
#90Earlier quoted context omitted.
Blizzard started down the path to failure when they merged with Activision, though I'm not sure they would have lasted much longer outside of that. It's apparent to me the only way "make quality stuff" survives as a strategy long term is to stay private like Valve. Public ownership ruins companies. They grow into inefficient messes and lose any edge they had while alienating their customers in the interest of short t…
Nope, it started waaay before that. * The sexual misconduct most likely happened way before it came out publicly as all the sleezebags stayed until it was public * real id debacle * Diablo 3 * shutting down blizzard north, despite working on d3 * spending 10 years on trying to make starcraft 2, when the rts genre was in a major slump * x years on the project titan, only to get cancelled * spent years trying to create…
> Spending 10 years on trying to make starcraft 2, when the rts genre was in a major slump
Was worth it though. SC2 was the last of the old, great Blizzard