We have the scans from the yet to be published “Games for Windows” magazine, containing an interview with Chris Sigaty, StarCraft 2′s lead producer.

Here are a few interesting excerpts from the interview:

GFW: Are some units now officially retired? Because some of the new Protoss units seem to make older units, like the Shuttle, somewhat redundant….

 

Chris Sigaty: At this point in time, that’s definitely true across the board. We’re experimenting unit by unit across all of the races, and there are definitely a lot of new things, so dynamics are going to change drastically. As an example with the Protoss, the Phase Prism – which is the unit you saw create prism fields where other units could be warped into – is also a Dropship equivalent. So it’s both; it’s dual-roled. As it stands right now, we plan to keep it that way, but we’re not even at internal alpha yet, so we’ve got a lot of time to see how these things play out.

 

GFW: So it’s possible that some units in every race will find themselves out of the job.

 

CS: Absolutely, and [some] already have – in all the races – been dropped. It’s interesting, even in the microcosm of our own team, it’s like two people get pissed off whenever Unit X gets cut. “I thought no one even liked Unit X” “No, that was one of the most important ones to the game! You ruined it!”

I’m exaggerating, but we get that sort of play, back and forth. It’s challenging and fun at the same time, to go through the journey of it. And we have a lot more time to continue that exploration, but yeah, units will disappear. And for units that exist that we do keep, we’ve envisioned some new ideas; the Zealot has a “charge”, for example.

Chris also mentions the return of the Big Game Hunters and Lost Temple maps, talks about the new and improved map editor, and reports that Blizzard hasn’t explored the concept of a StarCraft MMO.

Blizzard has released information about a new Protoss production building, the StarGate.

The warships of the Protoss fleet require a much stronger warp link in order to materialize than a standard gateway can provide. The immense stargate is capable of calling ships from high orbit or across immense distances to appear on a planet surface. The construction of one or more stargates at a Protoss base is a sure sign that it has become a major staging point for an offensive.

Currently, the only officially confirmed unit that the StarGate can call from orbit is the Phoenix, but considering the variety of Air Units (Protoss Mothership, Tempest, Warp Ray) that were present in both official gameplay videos and the information leaked to to the net, additional units will be available via the StarGate, if not all of the mentioned above.

* The fact the multiple pylons accompany the Stargates might indicate that Blizzard are considering an alternative to the classic Protoss building powering scheme, and bringing buildings’ power consumption into play…

MTV’s G-Hole have returned from their trip to Korea, where they had attended the unveiling of StarCraft 2. They’ve published a video interview with Blizzard developers: Chris Metzen, VP Creative Development; Mike Morhaime, Blizzard’s President; Dustin Browder, Lead Game Designer; and Jungwon Hahn, Managing Director for Blizzard Korea, who provided a short summary of the game and showed bits of the gameplay and cinematics.

Check it out on MTV’s page.

Another preview from computerandvideogames.com explains StarCraft’s history and the story’s basics, and features a few great screenshots.

In 1998, StarCraft told the story of three races in conflict, and it went a little something like this… The Terrans – human colonists – are torn apart by civil war and find themselves stuck in the middle of a war between the Protoss and the Zerg. The Protoss and the Zerg are enhanced alien races given an evolutionary leg-up by a meddling super-race called the Xel’Naga.

 

The Protoss gained psionic powers that singularly failed to stop them from waging civil war, while the Zerg were given advanced parasitic powers, turning them into a hive-like plague, wiping out or infesting everything in their path.

According to the recent official BlizzCon update, StarCraft 2 will be playable at the upcoming BlizzCon !

Visitors to BlizzCon 2007 will be treated to the first-ever public hands-on with StarCraft II. Demo stations will be set up at the convention, and attendees can sample the new units and gameplay elements for themselves in multiplayer battles. We’re excited to offer this exclusive opportunity to our players, and look forward to seeing you at BlizzCon.

The announcement also means that not only is the 3D engine ripe for simplistic presentations of gameplay, but the game’s mechanics already support multiplayer action, or will at least start supporting it by August 3, 2007.