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D3 adventure mode is a great podcast game, for me, but that's probably actually a criticism compared to what the game is probably trying to do
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Aug 6, 2020 23:30
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Ainsley McTree posted:D3 adventure mode is a great podcast game, for me, but that's probably actually a criticism compared to what the game is probably trying to do
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Aug 6, 2020 23:32
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Sodomy Hussein posted:SC2 co-op basically saved the game as a casual thing that most people really play that often. It's a wonder it took them so long to come up with it when people have been running low-stakes comp stomps in Starcraft since 1997. Cooperative is free of the APM emphasis and build order optimization stuff that doesn't interest most people. Gameplay wise yeah, but story wise holy poo poo was a mess. I still like to replay SC1's story from time to time, those zoom chat dialogues before each mission are really well written and acted. The soap opera writing of SC2 is ... offensive. The campaign is also cool but far short of all the things Blizzard had started to tout before release, and ended up cutting it back to just basically warcraft3 plus some unit choices. World War Mammories posted:karazhan was a fun raid and i will die on this hill Maybe better to say Blizzard post Burning Crusade? WoW was pretty great when it was just Blizzard's polished Everquest. But its success and scale are what lead to the downfall of quality at Blizzard, and also getting Activision'd. WoW is what killed them. To quote Bane, "Victory has defeated you!"
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Aug 6, 2020 23:48
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Zaphod42 posted:Maybe better to say Blizzard post Burning Crusade? Wrath and MoP though.
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Aug 6, 2020 23:54
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Groovelord Neato posted:SC2 multiplayer was fine but it was way worse than Brood War. i'm not a card game guy so can't comment. Diablo 3 was easily my biggest video game sequel disappointment ever. SC2 is better than brood war in some ways and not quite as good in many others. I'm hesitant to call it "worse" because they are different games. I do think BW is the better game in a pure sense, like Chess or poker are better games than 99% of video games, but SC2 was a really good game and I want to give the team behind it a lot of credit for what they did right there. There were definitely signs of "what the hell are you doing" like the state of chat/customs/out of game ui/spectating/literally everything that wasn't being in a game of sc2. That seems to plague modern blizzard titles. While SC2 was their first title it was true for every title they released after suffered in the same way. There was also the "3 full price games" business model that killed hype and bled massives amounts of player. And the iron grip on esports combined with constant flip flopping and no consistency there that also killed the streaming hype for their game completely over a 1-2 year period. D3 they eventually fixed into being a good ARPG if you like good flow combat or gear progression. Lots of really bad core systems, but the fix was to add a million ways to ignore, mitigate, and bypass those systems. The game is fun and has a great pace to it now. Just don't view it as the successor to Diablo 2. HotS suffered from greedy monetization, being on the SC2 engine which crippled it significantly and made it get 0 adoption in areas with poor internet infrastructure because any amount of packet loss meant you'd get dropped and be unable to reconnect, being 5 years late to the moba market a minimum, and really bad pr/hype around it in general. The design of the game and how it played is/was pretty great. They just botched everything else about it, and then when it finally found its footing they killed all interest in it because it will never be the next WoW/overwatch/fortnite and their developers could theoretically make more money on other projects. I don't really know how to evaluate that era of blizzard games other than they were still doing okay for the most part. It's more that the rest of the industry pulled ahead of them in "games as a service" which is where Blizzard was a market leader from the 90s through the late '00s/early '10s. When the rest of the industry started ramping up their continued support of titles Blizzard somehow ramped theirs down or came up with pipelines designed to print money rather than incrementally improve the game. What Blizzard is doing now likely makes more money in the short term and in a far more predictable way than what they used to do, and it's very difficult to scale old blizzard's methods and minds to the size of the company they are today. so uhhh support small-medium studios or single game studios instead of big ones because that's where the truly brilliant games tend to be Khorne fucked around with this message at 00:43 on Aug 7, 2020 |
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Aug 7, 2020 00:02
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Its also important to note just how many years it took them to release the full SC2 story, (and how much it all cost players), as well as how long it took D3 to get fixed (and how much it all cost players) So even if those are kinda good games now... still rocky times.
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Aug 7, 2020 00:24
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Khorne posted:Hearthstone was great when it came out! And was never really awful. They just kinda... did the same thing over and over instead of evolving the game. It was real baffling. They also had a lot of missteps and not so interesting sets, and they made a big change that made the game cost significantly more to play near the end of 2017. Fairly sure people told me they made things a lot better now because they're facing serious competition, but I've already moved on. Stuff like the Demon Hunter or the returning player decks were a good thing for people who didn't want to drop a bunch of money too, though they did standard thing where the new hotness was massively overpowered on release.
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Aug 7, 2020 00:36
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Zaphod42 posted:Its also important to note just how many years it took them to release the full SC2 story, (and how much it all cost players), as well as how long it took D3 to get fixed (and how much it all cost players) Eh, each arc was a self contained story. And let's be real, nobody was playing the campaign for the story. Especially after hots end cinematic got leaked.
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Aug 7, 2020 01:15
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The SC2 and Diablo 3 stories are loving embarrassing wrecks. The Diablo 3 bitching thread got gassed by a stupid former mod who didn't understand a post even though it was the best thread in this sub.
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Aug 7, 2020 01:28
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My take on current Blizzard is that their games, plain and simple, are just no longer fun (but maybe that's because I'm 34 now with even less time and desire to game...). I personally get no joy from them anymore, there's no "meaningful" or "rewarding" feeling you get in any of them anymore (congrats you won! It was actually a 50/50% chance BTW, but still, congrats!), they're always very shallow compared their competitors, basically takes no brain power to pilot and just plays themselves, essentially a pretty cookie-clicker type game, and now they need to push their lovely loot box + daily login bonus + watch meaningless bars fill up, just to get people with problems "hooked" and to keep coming back, basically they can't even make games anymore that people want to actually keep playing without this lovely system in place. I doubt many that are still playing HotS would still be playing right now if it had no EXP bars to fill, no daily quests for gold or first win of the day bonus EXP, loot box rewards, etc. I know because I was in this boat for a very long time, my friends long since quit that game, so I was just playing solo, doing dailies, leveling and poo poo, until I finally got sick of getting that poo poo quest that told me that no "you have you play 3 support classes" or "two Overwatch characters" instead of that "assassin you feel like playing" in your limited game time you set aside today to do those 3 loving quests you had waiting... So I uninstalled that poo poo and went cold-turkey, and now looking back and literally no desire to touch anything made by Blizzard with a similar system in place, which will probably be nothing for now on. I'm also much much happier now, because in the little time I do have to play stuff I can actually try new games out for once instead of yet another set of poo poo daily quests. I'll take an average new experience single player game over anything "online" by Blizzard with some treadmill attached any time for now on. Currently I only just have Diablo 2 and 3 installed, and might even uninstall D3 just so I can rid myself of their lovely Battle.net client completely, but at least these two games don't nag my brain to keep logging back in daily... Honestly gently caress Blizzard, such a poo poo company now, not only in how they try and get people hooked into their cookie-clickers, but how they bend to China, "free speech", and all the other poo poo you hear about, you should seriously not support them if you can, and it's honestly quite sad to see people defend them from criticism, like wake the gently caress up. --- gently caress! I should probably just end it there but now I feel like ranting about this poo poo, gently caress! People need to start treating companies like they would treat you - as a means to an end. Businesses are money printing machines and machines don't have emotions. Companies like Blizzard use your emotional attachment to the company to sell shoddy products, as do EA with Bioware, Bethesda, etc. If they thought that they couldn't extract a penny from you anymore, they wouldn't do business with you. They don't care if you are loyal to them or not. They want money. And you want a game. A good game. You should have zero loyalty to any company out there. They make a good product, you can buy it. But getting attached to a company is the wrong thing to do. I don't give a gently caress if its Blizzard, Valve, etc. Treat them as they treat you. It's not personal, it's business. Blizzard have shown here that they are happy to cash in on good will for money. And what would supporting this behavior do? Nothing good for anyone - just the tossers at the top having a fatter wallet. --- Okay I'm done...
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Aug 7, 2020 03:28
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I think the whole SC1 vs SC2 story is a bit overblown. Both of them are the equivalent of Saturday morning cartoons. They’re both just big dumb explosion fun, like the (first) Transformers movie, and I’m fine with that.
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Aug 7, 2020 03:33
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Even if you accept they're both terrible (I don't think I do) there's just so much LESS of SC1/Brood War, compared to the highly produced and extraordinarily talky SC2 campaigns. So if you think they both suck, at least SC1 gets out of the way faster! Personally I find SC2's dialogue intolerable whereas SC1 is actually pretty punchy. It's got some great exchanges.
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Aug 7, 2020 03:53
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I uninstalled battlenet, etc, but watching professional SC2 is still one of my favorite pastimes.
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Aug 7, 2020 03:54
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LotV was legitimately a really fun sci fi b-movie story... until the epilogue. Also all of Alarak's lines were gold.
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Aug 7, 2020 04:47
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FoolyCharged posted:Eh, each arc was a self contained story. And let's be real, nobody was playing the campaign for the story. Especially after hots end cinematic got leaked. I was playing for the story. loving painfully too, since the Hots and void campaigns played like trash. WoL was the only playable campaign. And the story started loving trash and got worse. That lovely trilogy broke me out of Blizzard games.
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Aug 7, 2020 06:13
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Alarak did nothing wrong
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Aug 7, 2020 06:21
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FoolyCharged posted:Eh, each arc was a self contained story. And let's be real, nobody was playing the campaign for the story. Especially after hots end cinematic got leaked. "nobody was playing it for that" is a weird way to confirm criticism, but yes, that's a strange way of agreeing with what I just said. chaosapiant posted:I think the whole SC1 vs SC2 story is a bit overblown. Both of them are the equivalent of Saturday morning cartoons. They’re both just big dumb explosion fun, like the (first) Transformers movie, and I’m fine with that. Nah I can't disagree with this enough. SC1 may have cheesy moments but the story is serious and its told in an interesting and intriguing way with efficient storytelling. SC2 is just.... extremely cringey. No part of it is interesting and exciting. Its all either bland or just really awful cringey middle school fanfic level writing. I literally played SC1 yesterday and still found myself extremely interested in the dialogue cutscene intros to missions. SC2 was awful the first time I watched it, much less now. Zaphod42 fucked around with this message at 06:38 on Aug 7, 2020 |
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Aug 7, 2020 06:35
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chaosapiant posted:I think the whole SC1 vs SC2 story is a bit overblown. Both of them are the equivalent of Saturday morning cartoons. They’re both just big dumb explosion fun, like the (first) Transformers movie, and I’m fine with that. Nah.
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Aug 7, 2020 13:49
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One Starcraft featured a Starship Troopers like propaganda thing. The other Starcraft featured a man wearing huge power armor with an inexplicable southern accent carrying a barefoot, unconscious woman.
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Aug 7, 2020 14:49
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jokes posted:One Starcraft featured a Starship Troopers like propaganda thing. The other Starcraft featured a man wearing huge power armor with an inexplicable southern accent carrying a barefoot, unconscious woman. https://imgur.com/OS2ZEww Is that where the opening of the artosis broodwar stream is from?
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Aug 7, 2020 15:03
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jokes posted:The other Starcraft featured a man wearing huge power armor with an inexplicable southern accent The literal opening cutscene of sc1 features a satellite with the Confederate flag on it. The humans in the games are redneck exiles who drink beer that had been sitting in coolant for a nuke.
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Aug 7, 2020 15:10
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FoolyCharged posted:The humans in the games are redneck exiles who drink beer that had been sitting in coolant for a nuke. Minus the racism/xenophobia, this is my ideal for the future of humanity.
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Aug 7, 2020 15:32
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Every post-Warcraft 3 Blizzard game suffers from too much writing. Their stories are fine in dribs and drabs, but no one in the company has the chops to write a plot that serves as more than a framing device of "this is why these groups are fighting." I blame WOW lore nerds.
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Aug 7, 2020 15:41
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Also they're obsessed with retconning poo poo for the worse.
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Aug 7, 2020 15:45
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Big Mad Drongo posted:Every post-Warcraft 3 Blizzard game suffers from too much writing. Their stories are fine in dribs and drabs, but no one in the company has the chops to write a plot that serves as more than a framing device of "this is why these groups are fighting." Trying to think of a good blizzard character or story that isn't corny or overwrought. Maybe the "it's a zergling, Lester" cutscene. I honestly can't believe people like anything about WCIII story or care about retconning. TFT is even worse.
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Aug 7, 2020 16:29
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TFT ends with a very very anime cut scene that is still bafflingly out of place even after the last 15 years of Blizzard leaning extra hard into cringey anime poo poo. RoC campaign ruled though, and the ending was dope and cathartic.
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Aug 7, 2020 16:41
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FoolyCharged posted:The literal opening cutscene of sc1 features a satellite with the Confederate flag on it. SC1 the Terrans are all southerners. The faction is literally the Confederacy, one of the missions is called "New Gettysburg", and both Raynor and Duke have very southern voices. Raynor your typical cowboy and Duke has a serious southern drawl. Mengsk is more Russian, and SC2 the main faction is mostly all Ruskis. We switch from Civil War style to Red October, with Stukov and even DuGalle being pretty Russian sounding (Not sure if DuGalle is actually French?) and the New Earth Directorate is kinda like USSR styled. I mean, World War 2 in space has been done to death, so Civil War in Space and Cold War in Space are at least decent ideas to play with, lol. FoolyCharged posted:The humans in the games are redneck exiles who drink beer that had been sitting in coolant for a nuke. Don't they even say something like "Thank god for cold fusion!" ? Lol. (Cold fusion isn't "cold" so those beers would be uncomfortably warm) The Wiggly Wizard posted:Trying to think of a good blizzard character or story that isn't corny or overwrought. Maybe the "it's a zergling, Lester" cutscene. Kerrigan in SC1 is fantastic. As is Raynor and Mengsk and Aldaris and Zeratul. They're all a parody of themselves in SC2 though. WC3 story is lower quality but still enjoyable. I don't like, have strong feelings for it, but it tells a decent tale between missions. Thrall has character, Jaina has character, Grom has character, etc. Much better than SC2 at least, not nearly as cringe. Zaphod42 fucked around with this message at 17:17 on Aug 7, 2020 |
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Aug 7, 2020 17:13
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I never cared about WarCraft 3's story it's just the last good game they made. It is funny they've made it impossible for there to be a WC4.
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Aug 7, 2020 18:03
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Zaphod42 posted:SC1 the Terrans are all southerners. The faction is literally the Confederacy, one of the missions is called "New Gettysburg", and both Raynor and Duke have very southern voices. Raynor your typical cowboy and Duke has a serious southern drawl. DuGalle is French. His name is a reference to General de Gaulle and his final words are "Au revoir."
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Aug 7, 2020 18:48
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Groovelord Neato posted:I never cared about WarCraft 3's story it's just the last good game they made. It is funny they've made it impossible for there to be a WC4. Eh, not really. They'd just have to ignore wow. And its not like they're adverse to retcons anyway, they've been all over the place since warcraft 2.
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Aug 7, 2020 18:48
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OhFunny posted:DuGalle is French. His name is a reference to General de Gaulle and his final words are "Au revoir." I know his name is a reference to the French General, that was hence my question. But his voice actor sounds like he could be shooting for Russian as much as French, its just a kinda stuffy nondescript European accent. I missed the "Au revoir" though, that's a nice touch.
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Aug 7, 2020 18:52
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FoolyCharged posted:Eh, not really. They'd just have to ignore wow. And its not like they're adverse to retcons anyway, they've been all over the place since warcraft 2. Yeah they can just have thrall go back in time or something, hell, they've done it at least once for wow already
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Aug 7, 2020 18:55
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Elephunk posted:https://imgur.com/OS2ZEww looks like a boris vallejo pastiche
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Aug 7, 2020 19:22
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The Wiggly Wizard posted:Trying to think of a good blizzard character or story that isn't corny or overwrought. Maybe the "it's a zergling, Lester" cutscene. I'm not claiming it was good, just the opposite. It's just up to WC3 the plot scenes were short enough to ignore and existed mainly to set up "this is why you need to do [thing]." I could see the argument that WC3 is where they became intrusive, but to each their own. At least WC3 doesn't expect us to stop killing demons for infodumps every few feet or to care that a secondary character from a decade-old almost plotless game was secretly evil this whole time.
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Aug 7, 2020 19:49
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Actually WC3's story was good
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Aug 7, 2020 22:41
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Big Mad Drongo posted:or to care that a secondary character from a decade-old almost plotless game was secretly evil this whole time. Two decades, OP, Adria wasn't in 2. She went unmentioned and she was peresumed dead because Cain said everyone else was killed.
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Aug 8, 2020 06:21
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The SC1 Terran vanilla story is actually a pretty good one. Not mindblowing or anything but a good story with plenty of atmosphere and character. It does go downhill after that, especially the Protoss stuff, but is passable throughout. SC2 on the other hand is utter poo poo. Raynor and Kerrigan as characters in particular are completely destroyed and eviscerated as interesting people. Personally I think they were afraid to make Kerrigan into the proper villain she deserved to be so she feels very neutered and watered down while Raynors transition from space cowboy/survivor to unbeatable superman takes everything that made the character work and throws it in the trash. The less said about the romance angle, the better.
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Aug 10, 2020 10:33
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All the space fantasy stuff is garbo and they really needed to have the UED returning as a villain.
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Aug 10, 2020 15:19
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Flayer posted:The SC1 Terran vanilla story is actually a pretty good one. Not mindblowing or anything but a good story with plenty of atmosphere and character. It does go downhill after that, especially the Protoss stuff, but is passable throughout. Kerrigan's Brood War story where she embraced her villainhood by backstabbing everyone else gloriously and laughing in Raynor's face about it was absolutely great and the decision to throw all that entertaining characterization out the window in favor of making her a brainwashed damsel in distress was....perplexing.
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Aug 10, 2020 16:10
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Flayer posted:The SC1 Terran vanilla story is actually a pretty good one. Not mindblowing or anything but a good story with plenty of atmosphere and character. It does go downhill after that, especially the Protoss stuff, but is passable throughout. Sorry but the Protoss story owns, especially how they spend half the story killing each other over various bullshit instead of dealing with the imminent annihilation of their entire civilization. It's great characterization. And OG Zeratul gets some fantastic lines. Kanos posted:Kerrigan's Brood War story where she embraced her villainhood by backstabbing everyone else gloriously and laughing in Raynor's face about it was absolutely great and the decision to throw all that entertaining characterization out the window in favor of making her a brainwashed damsel in distress was....perplexing.  Kerrigan's reaction to a lifetime of control and manipulation by the Confederacy, Mengsk, and the Overmind was to become queen bitch of the universe and personally I think that's feminist praxis.
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Aug 10, 2020 16:19
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