We have two interviews with Samwise Didier, Senior Art Director for StarCraft 2.

The first interview is from the Leipzig Games Convention, where GGL Wire caught Sam for a chat.

Here are the interview highlights:

• Each unit added to the game brings about a process of balance decisions, concerning the new unit, the old ones already present, and the interactions between them.
• The Protoss were the first race to be developed and exhibited because Blizzard wanted to show off their new engine using the shiny Protoss units and their particle effects.

• The Zerg are last to be developed because they’re the most “wacky” race which Blizzard wants to have the most time to work on.
• The Zerg race has been completed and demoed internally, but is now being remade. Blizzard won’t stop until it’s perfect!
• The single player game will feel a lot like an RPG (role playing game). The Protoss and Zerg campaigns will play similarly to the Terran campaign that Blizzard has already exhibited, but will be overall unique. Decisions made by the player will actually be important and change the course of the game, adding to the replayability factor.
• A beta is going to be released to perfect the balance.

The second interview, also from the Leipzig gaming convention, shows a more excited Sam, and is worth watching for his Orc impression alone. Brought to you by Gamona.

Click here to see the Video.

Highlights:

• Sam talks about the updates Blizzard has given to old, returning units and the process they go through when designing them.
• New StarCraft 2 units were inspired by books, comic books and movies. Blizzard takes inspiration from anywhere.
• Blizzard employees are all gamers!
• Sam’s favorite Street Fighter character is Blanka.
• The StarCraft 2 story takes place 4 years after the events of Brood War.

13 Comments to “Interviews with Sam Didier, StarCraft 2 Senior Art Director”

1. Ken — September 4, 2007 @ 5:31 pm
   

   The decision of demoing Protoss to introduce SC2 was great because personally I learned my first Starcraft game using the Protoss race, therefore they are, and forever will be, my fave race. Although I have fun playing Terran and Zerg too.

   I am excited to see the Zerg Demo. I wish you guys made a strong counter to the Terran mechs. Let’s not permit the Terrans to flourish further in the Koprulu Sector. Hehe

   Thanks BLIZZBoys!

2. Battlarmd — September 5, 2007 @ 12:15 am
   

   I am also a strong Protoss fan, been with Protoss when they are strong or weak. Never swayed far. Hate the zerg, fine with terrans.

   So please give our Protoss lots of eye candy and impressive things to play with. thanks!

3. whiteknight — September 5, 2007 @ 3:18 am
   

   Sam’s favorite Street Fighter character is Blanka.

4. whiteknight — September 5, 2007 @ 3:29 am
   

   so ultralisk will have lightning attack ?

5. chrysrobyn — September 5, 2007 @ 5:41 am
   

   Can’t post on the battle.net questions page because I can’t find any of my three SC or BW CDs for the keys. Anybody know about battle.net features to make up for the currently necessary third party hacks?
   1) Reputations. Tracking leavers, pluggers, harassers, etc, in the form of a banlist. Private banlists are okay, but clan / community banlists would be better. I foresee liabilities if Blizzard itself controls a banlist.
   2) Pings. Latencies through the gameplay protocol, not the ICMP packets, will make it router agnostic and provide a true indication of game lag. Pinging in gameplay and in the chatroom would be very useful.
   3) Eliminated need for slot refreshing — where you must close a slot and then reopen it in order to get a better place in the battle.net queue.

6. Anon — September 5, 2007 @ 5:13 pm
   

   Why can’t they just let the game speak for itself instead of the bullshit marketspeak? That’s fucking ridiculous.

7. Anon — September 5, 2007 @ 5:14 pm
   

   And by ‘bullshit marketspeak’ I mean stuff like ‘particle effects’ and whatever. Of course I like a pretty game but come on.

8. i luv guardians — September 5, 2007 @ 11:23 pm
   

   samwise didier draws things wonderfull and i really admire h abiity to do so

9. Starcraft 2 — September 6, 2007 @ 1:40 am
   

   Anon, i agree..

   I’m eagerly looking forward to the some more Zerg content though.

   luckily my fav race was released first, Protoss

10. Arnie — November 6, 2007 @ 5:00 am
    

    
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11. Arnie — March 15, 2008 @ 1:48 am
    

12. Halo — March 15, 2008 @ 3:10 am
    

13. Still — March 15, 2008 @ 2:48 pm