Note that every other prediction from this rumor about the Korean Air-Blizzard event was dead-wrong.

If you’re wondering what the facts are — we will be addressing StarCraft II tournament functionality in a post launch patch to the game, soon after ship. This patch will include features to address the needs of location-based pro tournaments, but we have not discussed any specifics about tournament support beyond that.

Original post:

Even with the StarCraft 2 Beta down until further notice, the eSports arena is heating up. Rumors and teasers mentioning of a massive event scheduled to take place on June 24 have been released, and it appears that the event is not only meant to generate hype.
Big thanks goes to the TL and SCL communities for posting translations of the original material, which was released via PlayXP and sc2.178.com.

June 24 11:00~14:00
Gimpo Airport Korean Air Hangar

This event will run from June 24, from 11:00am until 2:00pm at the Korean Air Hangar, with the attendance of Blizzard HQ executives, national VIPs of the industry, reporters, and community members.

It was asked if the general public could participate, but unfortunately the event is planned to be invitation-only.

It is expected that all the details of StarCraft II’s release will be made public here.

Following Blizzard’s lockdown of the StarCraft franchise, many were expecting a major announcement to come out of Korea regarding the future of major league StarCraft competition, one that is approved by Blizzard. The event is planned to have Blizzard executives in attendance, so this just might be what fans and progamers worldwide have been waiting for.

1. There will be an upcoming “Ongame Net Starcraft 2 League,” or OSL2.
2. The sponsor of the first one will be Korean Air.
3. The first OS2L will have preliminaries all over the world and then the players will be gathered in Seoul for the Ro16.
4. There will be a “Starcraft 2 Professional Edition” that will only be provided to tournament organizers, which will include LAN functionality. Only with a special account + password that gets activated will it work. Blizzard staff will be present at tournaments to assist. Apparently, this news was first told to the organizers of the Stars War tournament after it had ended.

While the actual GomTV/OSL arrangement is not clear or fully confirmed yet, it is reasonable to assume that GomTV has found a way to work with one of the scene’s largest and most established operators. However, the most interesting part of this story is the StarCraft 2 Professional Edition, which is said to include LAN functionality.

LAN support, or the the lack of it, has been a major issue throughout StarCraft 2′s development. The gaming community did not approve of Blizzard’s decision to not support gameplay over local networks, and many fans have vowed to abstain from StarCraft 2 as long as it does not support this type of connection. It will be interesting to see if Blizzard actually does launch this “StarCraft 2 Professional Edition” and if the requirements for acquiring it will be made standard and public.

Update: Note that every other prediction from this rumor about the Korean Air-Blizzard event was dead-wrong.

For this event, Blizzard has effectively produced a Blizzcon parallel in Russia. StarCraft 2 was playable for two whole days and fans got a chance to talk with Blizzard’s representatives, who were also present. No new information was revealed, but Chris Sigaty, StarCraft 2′s Lead Producer, has unequivocally confirmed that the StarCraft 2 beta will be released in 2010, and not during November of this year as previously promised.

To the same effect, Blizzard’s President, Mike Morhaim, gave a talk to BlizzaVision’s investors, stating that the game is set to be released towards the end of the second quarter of 2010. This is in line with the statements regarding the length of the beta – 4-6 months – and lends more credit to Sigaty’s statement. Of course, this doesn’t mean that the dates won’t be pushed back yet again, even though Morhaime said that the bulk of the work on the game has been completed, with the project still progressing according to the established timeline.

Last Saturday’s Blizzcast dealt with a few open issues from August’s event, and, most importantly (or relevantly) for the StarCraft 2 audience, produced two new screenshots:

Blizzard has reinstalled the Vespene Laughs competition, allowing artists to submit StarCraft-themed comics and win some much coveted beta keys. The competition was likely scheduled to end close to the original planned date of the beta, but is now being extended in conjunction with the recent delays.

Lastly, Cydra has been kind enough to answer a series of Sensor Tower related questions on the official StarCraft 2 General Discussion Forum.

1. Is the proper name Radar Tower or Sensor Tower?

Sensor Tower

2. What model is being used: Radar Tower, Sensor Tower, or a completely new one?

Sensor Tower has a passive Radar ability which expose enemy movements within its radar capacity.

3. What are the stats? (mineral cost, gas cost, build time, HP, armor)

It costs 125 mineral and 100 geyser gas and it takes 25 build time. Sensor Tower has 200 hp and 0 default armor. You can upgrade the armor of buildings by 2 at Engineering Bay.

5. Do cloaked and burrowed units appear as blips within the radar’s range?

No. Cloaked and burrowed units don’t appear.

7. Does the Tower have any other special abilities besides its radar function?

No.

8. Is the Tower salvageable?

Yes. you can salvage it for 100% fund.

In this post, we transform the information released and rehashed by the numerous sources into one chewable, concise piece.

First up, new tidbits of information about the single player from the newest version of the official StarCraft 2 FAQ:

• The campaign will focus on the adventures of Jim Raynor and his Raiders as they fight off Arcturus Mengsk’s New Dominion.
• Kerrigan has resurfaced with her Zerg Brood, laying waste to all life as she sweeps across the galaxy.
• Completing missions and specific secondary objectives in them will reward the player with new units and currency, which can be used to customize the army between missions.
• Some of the units in the campaign are unique to the single player, and include classic StarCraft 1 units (Firebat, Wraith) as well as completely new ones (Diamondback Tank).
• Credits earned can be used to unlock the service of mercenaries, which can then be recruited from Merc Havens during missions. Mercs are normal units with better stats.
• Credits can also be used to purchase upgrades to units and buildings, allowing players to customize their army to suit their playstyle.
• More than 25 missions will be available in the campaign, each designed to offer a unique gameplay experience.
• Many side missions and optional objectives will yield researchable artifacts which have to be collected to unlock further upgrades.
• In between missions, the “story mode” will let players explore an interactive environment which will have them interacting with NPCs, getting reports about current events, and learning more about the background story.

Blizzard has revealed the story mode locations in which the player will spend his time between missions:

Hyperion’s Bridge:

The main area of the ship and the story mode. Tychus Findlay, of Marine suit-up video fame, can be found here. In older builds, Raynor was able to use the large Starmap view, but this has been taken out from the game to simplify matters, the functionality and information integrated into other parts of the gameplay experience more seamlessly. The decision about which mission the proceed to will likely be taken here, where Hyperion’s ship captain, Matt Horner, also resides.

Hyperion’s Armory:

Where story-aversive players will spend most of their time. This is where Raynor’s hard-earned credits will be spent on upgrading his available units and buildings. In last year’s single player presentation, units were purchased and unlocked here as well, but the Armory will now serve only as an upgrade center, with units being unlocked throughout the missions.

Hyperion’s Lab:

Stetman, the ship’s scientist, will brief you on the research aspect of the game: finding artifacts in secondary mission objective and investigating them to procure upgrades to equipment.

Hyperion’s Cantina:

Lore center. Chat up the ship’s crew members and learn about the StarCraft universe. Graven Hill, sitting at the left with his laptop, will be your contact to the available mercenaries.

Cantina television screen:

More lore and relevant “current events” will be presented through the Cantina’s TV screen. Many of the featured characters will be recognizable from StarCraft’s various book and comic spin-offs.

The campaign will have four difficulty levels: Easy, Moderate, Hard and Insane. According to Dustin, only the “Insane” AI will actually cheat; the rest are pure AI, which will have to gather all their resources and scout the map. Skirmish games will also feature a Beginner AI to help newcomers adjust to the quick pace of StarCraft 2 matches.

During the campaign, the player will be able to choose between several available missions, but will not have to complete all of them to proceed with the campaign. However, these missions and ones that the player has already completed will still be available if the player wishes to return to them.

It’s also worth noting that it will be possible to record replays of single player missions.

***

Two massive Question and Answer sessions have been released, spanning 37 Q&As in total and covering in detail many aspects that were brushed over up until now.

The full Q&A session with Rob Pardo is availible at Starcraft-Source. Here’s our summary of the juicy parts:

• The Blizzard game development method mandates the creation of the hard-core, multiplayer aspect of the game before approaching its more casual parts. This, they believe, is the key to creating depth, making for games that people can enjoy playing for 500 hours or more. Units and their design come from the requirements of the multi-player game first and are only then used for the campaign.
• Blizzard will go with digital distribution for StarCraft 2, but will give physical retail stores an exclusivity window. Another Blizzard box for the collection!
• The StarCraft 2 expansions, featuring the Protoss and Zerg campaigns, will likely be priced as expansions and not full retail games.
• Battle.net 2.0: “Will it require a subscription?” We are certainly not doing that for Starcraft 2.
• Single player will be playable offline, but Dustin believes that not having access to achievements, which do require a connection to Battle.net, is game breaking. You’re basically saying, “Please, I would like to break your game now because I want to play offline for some reason.”
• Dustin and Rob confirm that demo or spawn versions will be available in some way.
• Match-making will work similar to WarCraft 3, where players are matched based on their approximate skill level. Anti-smurf measures will be taken, though no details have been provided.

And a few of the more interesting answers in full:

1) You build in-depth to the hardcore first, then work backwards into making the game more accessible for more casual players. Is that a design philosophy that you employ across all of your products, or is that a product-specific thing?

n

It’s something we do across all of our games. I’m a big believer in that it’s the right way to develop a multi-player game, one that is capable of lasting for years and years. It’s a little bit counter-intuitive in the gaming industry that I think most other gaming companies tend to tag multi-player on at the end. From an hours of play standpoint, it’s logical if you want a game to last for 500+ hours, which is something we strive for in all of our games. You have to spend a lot of time making sure that your game has that much depth to it. Then you really want to put in that single player element and read that story through, once you have those fundamental foundations of gameplay if you consider single player can last anywhere from 24-50 hours of gameplay. People go through it once, twice, maybe a few times. But multi-player is really what has longevity that can last for years and years.

Five hundred hours of gameplay per title is quite an ambitions mark, and an absurd one to aim for for virtually any other video game company in the world. Blizzard’s games are indeed unique in this regard, containing enough depth to keep people playing for extremely long periods of time.

16) How does match-making work on the new Battle.net?

n

Dustin: It’s similar to how it works in Warcraft 3. After about 5 or 10 games, we have a pretty good idea of your skill level, and we’re matching you at that point based on your skill level. So assuming you’re paying attention, you should win about half of your games. As you begin to improve, we upgrade your skill level once again. I know a lot of players would rather win 60-70% of their games because that would be the most fun, but that means that somebody else is losing 60-70% of their games. We had some – not a whole lot – of issues with players re-rolling characters in Warcraft 3 and coming back through ranks and being rematched. So you’d be enjoying your lower rank of gameplay, and here comes somebody who’s obviously meant to be at level 25. He’s going to be there in a minute, but meanwhile he’s going to pound on you. We’ve got some ideas on how to smooth that kind of thing out and prevent a lot of that kind of behavior.

The matchmaking algorithm, as well as perhaps other means, will be implemented to prevent experienced players from repeatedly plowing through the lower ranks every time they create a new account.

The second Q&A, with Dustin Browder, focuses mainly on single player and campaign gameplay issues, and is also availible in full at StarCraft-Source.

• Missions will not “evolve” or change if you don’t complete them right away.
• There are two incentives to doing well in missions rather than just finishing them: Achievements, which are for bragging rights only and have no impact on the game, and secondary objectives, which provide research artifacts that unlock more upgrades.
• There are only few and very specific points in the campaign where the player’s decision affects the plot and events, but all paths eventually converge to one ending. Blizzard wants to maintain one continuity line that’s congruent with the books and comics of the StarCraft universe as well as the beginning of the next game in the series.
• A Protoss mini-game will be a part of the campaign, providing the opportunity to play as Protoss for a bit.
• Heros will mostly show up on more specialized maps so they don’t get lost in the confusion when large armies clash. While heroes cannot use items in the campaign, this option will  be easily available to modders through the game editor.

n

5) Does it matter if you succeed “very well” at a mission or just “OK”?

n

Well, it does in some ways. We do have these achievements that you can show off to your friends which is one measure of success. The second is whether you completed all the secondary objectives as they relate to research. If you complete those objectives, that will add additional firepower to your forces. Again, we’re still working on what those bonuses are going to be, but it will give you additional access.

10) How many endings will the game have?

n

There’s one ending. We really wanted to have a game that still had a continuity to it, and this is the important thing, too – that this is not Fallout, you’re not choosing whether Raynor is good or evil. Raynor is who he is, a conflicted man, a troubled man who’s seen too much war; and it will have a very specific ending, and the next game will have a very specific beginning.

A single ending, to segue into the single beginnings of the upcoming expansions. StarCraft is a universe with its key characters and its own lore, and players can not change the fate of neither villains nor heroes, at least as long as StarCraft is an RTS game.

17) If you use a hero, does it have the ability to get and use items?

n

We have the ability to put in items for mod makers, but it’s not something we typically use in the Starcraft environment. They’re not around often enough for you to collect a lot of items; it just didn’t make sense to include that in the gameplay. But we are working on the interface and having the UI available for people who want to make mods because we know that there’s a huge tradition of mods from Warcraft 3 that are dependent on that interface. We’ve got that interface in and we’ll be polishing it up as we get closer to ship so that we have that available for the mod makers.

StarCraft 2′s editor, Scumedit, supports items, despite the fact that this feature will not be incorporated into the the campaign. The support for unit items was made available to capitalize on the massively popular hero-based WarCraft custom scenarios, such as DoTA.

20) How do the units change from single player to multi-player?

n

The actual units are the same. A marine is a marine; a medic is a medic. We do, however, have units in the single player that are not in the multi-player, such as medics, cobras, wraiths, and cannons on top of your bunkers.

Over at ShackNews, an Interview with Chris Sigaty, lead producer, yields this new piece of interesting information:

Chris Sigaty: Challenges are something we’re trying. We always hear people say, “You look at singleplayer as the training ground for multiplayer, right?” And we don’t really.

And in fact here we’re kind of training you all wrong, because you can have any unit depending on what missions you went through, and there are units that aren’t in multiplayer at all, like Firebats, Medics, all sorts of stuff. We kind of created challenges out of this, and our concept behind challenges is to train you at some of the things that are important to a good competitive player, to be at least aware of. They’re little minigames that teach you about things like economy, how to maximize getting resources, unit countering, control grouping, micro, spell usage, all sorts of things like that. Those two things are available when you’re offline.

n

Shack: It almost sounds like a tutorial-plus.

n

Chris Sigaty: Yeah, it’s like a master version of a tutorial. And you can best yourself too. There’s a minimum bar we want you to hit, and you can try to best yourself by playing them again and again. It’s pretty cool stuff–I’m really excited about it, because I think that’s one of the things we haven’t done as well in the past, is really helped out people who aren’t really experience in multiplayer. And when they jump on there for the first time, nobody’s telling them these things, they jump into a game and get their assed handed out, and they just walk out of the experience. We want people to have a place they can go to learn, and eventually get to the point–some of the better players do research, they get replays, they see what the best players do.

A great new idea from Blizzard. Such challenges have appeared in many other genres before, but this is a first for RTS games, and it’s certainly a welcome addition. Coupled with replay capability for single player, this feature will certainly become an integral and fun part of StarCraft 2.

Another Q&A session with Chris Metzen, vice president of creative development, has been published over at SC Legacy. The interviewer challenges Chris with lore questions from the StarCraft 2 books to the disabled mission on the original StarCraft CD. Where Chris fumbles a bit is the question about the possibility of infesting the Protoss:

Q: Can Protoss get infested?

n

A: I’m trying to think if there are specific fictional answers to that, I could have sworn we had a story or two like that in the manga recently. But I’m spacing out… I feel like I wanna take the 5th on that too. It’s a weird one. Off the top of your head you’d think “sure!”

This conforms to Blizzard’s original stance regarding the concept, but directly contradicts a statement from last month:

Based on the lore, the Protoss do not become infested. The combination of the two result in a hybrid race.

Can the Protoss become infested? It is a mystery.

***

The new single player HD video provides short glimpses into the first few missions of the campaign and showcases the various mission types available. Among them are a quest to find Zerg Crysalis DNA, a turtling mission against the Zerg horde, an obligatory civilian escort objective, and a mission to retrieve Protoss relics.

Lastly, a somewhat single-player-unrelated but quite interesting, strictly gameplay/development interview with Chris Sigaty and Dustin Browder delivers a few highlights:

• Terran buildings can be repaired in mid-air.
• Emphasis is put on tech paths that do not over-simplify unit countering decisions, i.e. no “one tech path fits all”.
• Immortal Hardened Shields are now available by default.

n

That’s it for the single player information explosion. With BlizzCon coming up in just a couple of days, it’s safe to assume we’ll get just as much new information about the multiplayer part of the game, if not more…

The entire collection of screenshots which were released during the event is available for download here.

Blizzard’s partners for this event provide several video streams to cater to fans that will not be able to attend, with the full live HD video stream available via DirectTV, just like with last year’s convention. The stream, however, will not be free:

AIR DATES
August 21-22, 2009
PRICE
$39.95
DIRECTV Package Includes:

• Over 16 hours of crystal clear high definition coverage
• Live internet streaming footage
• Exclusive interviews and commentary
• Main stage presentations including opening ceremony
• Tournament coverage and team highlights
• BlizzCon 2009 exclusive World of Warcraft in-game pet, Grunty the Murloc Marine

Fortunately, not all of BlizzCon’s video streams are Pay-Per-View, as tournament play will be streamed live, free of charge, as recently announced by Cydra on Battle.net official StarCraft 2 forums:

We are pleased to announce that this year, for the first time, all of our streaming tournament coverage for BlizzCon will be available in both high-resolution and low-resolution formats, and you can choose whichever fits your available bandwidth. The BlizzCon website (http://www.blizzard.com/blizzcon/tournaments) will host one stream featuring StarCraft and Warcraft III events and another dedicated to World of Warcraft. As in previous years, all of this streaming tournament coverage will be provided free of charge. Be sure to tune in to find out which teams and players are the best in the world by visiting the BlizzCon site on August 21 and 22.

To clarify, the tournament coverage streams are free, but to watch panels, see new announcements as they are made, or receive the in-game pet, you will need to order the Pay Per View Internet stream (http://blizzcon.rayv.com/).

Intel, one of the event’s key sponsors, will be holding a giveaway contest for not only the event’s physical attendees, but also via an online “guessing game”, where entrants will be able to win prizes by correctly guessing this year’s champions.

Intel at BlizzCon 2009

We’re excited for BlizzCon 2009 and we hope you are too! If you’re a fan of Blizzard games, this is the place to test out your skills. We’re hosting the Choose a Champion: BlizzCon 2009 contest where fans like you can submit your guess for which contestants you think will win this year’s tournaments for Warcraft III, World of Warcraft Arena Tournament and StarCraft Invitational.

Submit an educated guess (or take a stab in the dark) to select winners for either one or all three BlizzCon tournaments. Those who guess correctly will be entered to win one of three Asus G50Vt Laptops powered by Intel technology – one prize will be given away for each tournament.

How to enter Choose a Champion:

• Register for the contest and submit your selections for Warcraft III and World of Warcraft Arena Tournament by clicking here
• Entries for the StarCraft Invitational will be available in early August when Blizzard announces the bracket for this tournament. Check back for more info!
• One entry per person

People on the floor will be presented with even more opportunities, as Intel will be giving out hundreds of prizes to this year’s attendees, including its latest generation of Core i7 processors.

Game On at BlizzCon 2009:

Fans lucky enough to be at BlizzCon this year will have even more chances to win. We’ll be giving away hundreds of prizes, including five Core i7 processors daily, for the Intel Game On: Wear it to Win contest. To participate, BlizzCon attendees can visit the Intel booth during regular BlizzCon 2009 show hours to receive a button. If Intel’s Prize Patrol spots you wearing or displaying the button during the show, you will be given a game card that can be redeemed at the Intel booth for a prize.

For the inside scoop on where our Prize Patrol will be at throughout the show, follow us on Twitter.

Let the BlizzCon 2009 countdown begin… We’ll see you there!

Blizzard has also made some unique merchandise available for those who have purchased a BlizzCon ticket, so if you’ve got one, pay a visit to Blizzard’s official store. Since the stores in the event (in accordance with other Blizzard’s public offerings… ) are notorious for their long waiting lines, this is a chance to avoid wasting time and pick up some goodies. Here’s a sneak peak, and be sure to visit BlizzPlanet for screenshots of the entire selection of unique products.

In other, completely unsurprising news: in an official Activision Blizzard press release, titled

Activision Blizzard Announces Better-Than-Expected Second Quarter CY 2009 Financial Results, Robert Kotick, CEO of Activision Blizzard, has finally confirmed that StarCraft 2 will not be released in 2009.

“As we prepare for next year, we have moved the expected release dates for two games, Activision Publishing’s Singularity and Blizzard Entertainment’s StarCraft^® II, into 2010. However, we are increasing our calendar year earnings-per-share GAAP outlook and reaffirming our calendar year earnings-per-share non-GAAP outlook and still expect to deliver record non-GAAP operating margins. Although there is a great deal of economic uncertainty in the global marketplace, we remain focused on the opportunities afforded by our industry and will continue exploring potential new markets and business models that should enable us to continue expanding our operating margins,“

Company outlook summary, however, adds the following clarification:

Blizzard Entertainment has moved the anticipated release date of StarCraft II to the first half of 2010 to coincide with the relaunch of its upgraded Battle.net^® online -gaming service.

To those following StarCraft 2′s long and complex evolutionary path, this comes as no surprise. The social, E-sports and care-bear features planned to be implemented in next-gen Battle.net are extensive, and together with the actual StarCraft 2 balancing, testing and debugging left for the upcoming beta, the improbability of achieving Gold status within the five months left for 2009 is clear.

Unfortunately, StarCraft 2 was banned from public play due to a recent ruling by China’s State Bureau Of Culture, which declared that “Starcraft 2 is much too bloody, which will severely affect the mental as well as physical health of adolescents” (translation courtesy of TeamLiquid).  The decision draws from a regulatory note, released on July 1st, 2009, which stated that

Any activity related to foreign games, including their showing, demonstrating, trading and marketing promotion, shall also abide by the censorship laws aiming at imported online games and shall be subject to censorship and approval by the State Administration of News and Press. All promoters, sponsors, and companies related shall held their respective legal responsibilities.

The StarCraft 2 South Korean E-Stars Seoul 2009 event, however, was a great success, and some media has been released both officially and by fans. You can find the official extensive media gallery here.

Two decent-quality gameplay videos have been released during the event, showing a short and intensive Protoss vs. Terran match:

The video is another example of just how fast paced and merciless StarCraft 2 multiplayer is designed to be, as mentioned repeatedly by the design team in various interviews. One on one games are not supposed to last more than 20 minutes (if that!), as the game provides players with sufficient tools to exploit the opponent’s mistakes and leverage them, along with the player’s own skills, into quick victories.

While fans and gamers around the world marvel at every released detail, battle report or gameplay video, the stock market is not as patient and forgiving towards Blizzard’s developmental practices, and analysts blame the recent stock dive on the realization that StarCraft 2 will not be coming out in 2009.

Now, there is a growing concern that an even bigger game — “StarCraft 2″ — may be pushed out of this year, due to development delays.

“The beta testing for ‘StarCraft’ hasn’t started yet. If it starts in August and takes 5-6 months, then launching the game this year is next to impossible,” said Jess Lubert, video game analyst with Brean Murray.

While it doesn’t take a genius mutant ninja analyst to figure out that the StarCraft 2 beta is highly unlikely to be over by the end of 2009, it does take some history knowledge to understand that virtually all of Blizzard’s titles end up being played for many years, each serving as a benchmark and a poster child for their respective niche; that is to say, there is no doubt that when it is released, it will generate considerable revenue for Activision-Blizzard.

While these might not be Michael Morhaime’s exact thoughts, Blizzard deserves credit for having BlizzCon tickets sold out within seconds of becoming available. Although it was not “officially” confirmed, an experiment run by IncGamers provides some justification for the strange ticket queue system that Blizzard had used.

A staff member of IncGamers tried the new system and refreshed the site every second before sales opening. Four seconds after the sales had started, the queue was over 2.500 buyers long, and 10 seconds later the queue was full. The actual queue time to pay the tickets took about 30 minutes. Every fan in the queue could buy up to five tickets.

The event is planned to take place in a convention centre fit to accomodate nearly 30,000 people, and the rest of the tickets (A guesstimate total of 10,000-14,000) will be realeased in a second batch ten days from now, on May 30th. Keep your wallets close by – you’ll only have a few seconds to get in on the ground floor.

The first batch of tickets to the “‘Celebration of All Things Blizzard” convention, BlizzCon 2009, will become available on May 16 – nine days from today, with the second batch of BlizzCon tickets becoming available on 30th of May.

Due to BlizzCon’s popularity and the small window of time of ticket availability, Blizzard has struggled with site load and purchase volume issues in recent years. This year, a brand new Queuing system has been introduced, taking advantage of the recently implemented Battle.net account system in order to make sure fans won’t run into problems purchasing the $125 BlizzCon 2009 tickets.

Here are a few important Q&As from the Queue FAQ:

Why did you introduce this queue system?

The queue allows controlled groups of Blizzard Store visitors to finalize their purchases, helping ensure that the purchasing experience for everyone goes smoothly when high-demand items go on sale in the Blizzard Store.


If I am in the queue, am I guaranteed to be able to purchase all of the items in my cart?


No. Being in the queue does not guarantee you will have an opportunity to purchase an item, as it’s possible that the remaining stock will run out before you reach the front of the queue. While in the queue, you will receive regular updates about the remaining stock of items you wish to purchase, along with an estimate of the time remaining before you reach the front of the queue.

And most importantly, what happens when you get to the front of the queue:

What happens when I reach the front of the queue?



When you have reached the front of the queue, a message will be displayed prominently to alert you, along with a link to proceed to checkout and finalize your purchase. If you do not click the link immediately, you will be taken to checkout automatically after a few moments.


How long do I have to finalize my purchase?


Once you reach the front of the queue, you will have 15 minutes to finalize your purchase. To help speed up the process, we recommend you have a valid Battle.net account (create one now!) with up-to-date payment information ready to go, as this will be required to make a purchase from the Blizzard Store.

So be sure to have your Battle.net account set up correctly and verify that it contains up-to-date payment information so you won’t run into trouble once you’ve reached the front of the queue.

StarCraft2.com has been updated with a highly detailed FAQ covering the different aspects of participation eligibility and clarifications concerning beta requirements, availability and sign-up instructions. The FAQ is available here, and you can download the FAQ in PDF format here. The most important new item on that list is the system profiling application, that scans your PC‘s specification and reports it to Blizzard.

What is a beta profile?


A beta profile is a snapshot of your current system specifications. It includes such information as how much RAM you have, available hard drive space, your graphics card and driver, and other information about your system. We gather this information to ensure that we are able to test our games on a wide range and distribution of systems.


Why do I have to download an application to create a beta profile?


Our beta opt-in application allows us to gather information about potential beta testers’ systems quickly and accurately, helping us ensure that the resulting pool of beta testers we select most closely represents the range and distribution of systems we wish to test.


How does the beta opt-in application work?


Running the beta opt-in application quickly and automatically generates a profile based on your system specifications. It then displays this information and asks if you wish to submit the specifications to create a beta profile for the Battle.net account you used to download the application.


Does the application also profile the software I have installed on my system?


No, the opt-in application simply scans the major hardware components of your system, along with your graphics card driver. Other system information, such as the contents of your hard drive, is not scanned.

Considering the fact that StarCraft is 11 years old and WarCraft 3 was released 7 years ago, Blizzard’s RTS fans may still be using 10 year old systems which have no chance of running even StarCraft 2′s single player campaign – precluding some of them from being able to test StarCraft 2 at all.

Lastly, we’ve received a Q&A Interview by Chris Sigaty, focusing exclusively on the StarCraft 2 Beta. The interview clarifies several key issues which have been mentioned in the official Beta FAQ, and explains the regional release plan.

Questions answered by Chris Sigaty, StarCraft II lead producer

Q. StarCraft II opt-ins are now available through Battle.net. Does the opt-in process mean that the start of the StarCraft II beta is imminent?


A. We’re getting closer and closer to the start of our closed beta with each week that passes. Several months ago, we expanded our internal testing of the game to the entire company, and we’ve made significant progress since then. We’re looking forward to inviting external testers into the process soon, which is why we’re starting sign-ups now.

Q. What aspects of the game will be available for testing in this beta?


A. As with previous betas for our real-time strategy games, the StarCraft II beta test will be multiplayer only, and players will have access to all three races — terrans, protoss, and zerg — and all of their units. We’ll include a selection of multiplayer maps, but they won’t necessarily include all of the maps that will be in the final version of the game. We’re making some great progress on the single-player campaign, but we don’t plan to do a public beta since we want to keep the story under wraps until the game’s out.

Q. Will we be able to try the new Battle.net during this beta?

A. You’ll be connecting to and playing on the new Battle.net in the StarCraft II beta, and you’ll definitely have a chance to play around with a few of the new features — but what you’ll see in the beta is really only a taste of what’s to come.

There is no mention of two important components of StarCraft 2:

• SCumEdit, the much anticipated and powerful map editor
• The enhanced replay viewer

Both these features are of key importance to the community. Replays and custom maps are the fans’ bread and butter, and their absence is bound to disappoint many should Blizzard decide not to make them available during the beta.

Q. What updates and changes have you made to the game recently?

A. We’re constantly tweaking the gameplay and balance, and we will be all throughout the beta process, but perhaps the most visible changes have been made to the zerg. Our art team has done a polishing and iteration pass on many of the zerg unit models and structures, so players can look forward to seeing a lot more detail there. Compared to the versions you’ve seen before, the zerg units and bases now look a lot slimier and more sinister.
We’re also really looking forward to seeing testers try out the new gameplay mechanics we’ve introduced to each race, like the proton charge for the protoss and the MULE for the terrans that allow them to harvest minerals faster. The zerg also have a spawn larvae ability that gives them a new way to expand their production. We’re hoping these abilities increase the strategic tension for players and force some tough tactical decisions when managing economies and micromanaging battles.

Q. Which regions can join the StarCraft II beta test?

A. Our plan is to include multiple regions and countries in the StarCraft II beta-testing process. We’ll be starting with a North American beta, where testers from the United States and Canada, as well as Australia and New Zealand will be able to join. We’ll then phase in testers in other regions such as Korea, Taiwan, and Europe as soon as we’re able to set up in those areas.

It is not entirely clear whether BlizzCon 2008 attendees that have acquired a StarCraft 2 Beta key but are not living in the aforementioned regions will have access to the beta.

Q. Why aren’t you running StarCraft II beta simultaneously in all regions?

A. It’s more efficient from a development standpoint to phase in each region one at a time. A big part of the beta test involves setting up new hardware and networking infrastructure, which is not a trivial process. If we set up one region at a time, we can more quickly address any issues we run into at the start, and take the lessons we learn from that experience to establish a smoother setup experience for the next region.
We can also implement all sorts of gameplay and balance changes, view the results, and react to what we’ve observed much more quickly in a single test environment, as opposed to getting bogged down trying to push those changes out across several test environments. Once the major issues are ironed out, we can expand the testing to additional regions. Going region by region will also put us in a better position to test localized versions of the beta.

Q. Will testers be allowed to write about the beta? Take screenshots and videos?


A. Yes! Beta testers will be free to write about their experiences playing the beta as well as take screenshots or videos. We’re really looking forward to getting the game into players’ hands so we can hear their feedback, since that will help propel us into the final stages of development and balancing. We’ve been working hard on StarCraft II, and we can’t wait to finally be able to hear what everyone has to say about it.

This is an important aspect of the beta, as it allows fans who won’t get to participate in it a chance to enjoy the beta process, during which the game will be explored intensively and changes will constantly be made.

Last year’s event was a massive success, with all tickets sold out in just one day – prompting Mike Morhaime to add 3000 tickets to the pool to meet demands. Mike also mentions 2008′s runaway success in this year’s BlizzCon announcement.

“We’ve been amazed by the incredible response to each of our previous BlizzCon events,” said Mike Morhaime, CEO and cofounder of Blizzard Entertainment. “We’re pleased to be bringing the convention back to Anaheim this year, and we look forward to this new opportunity to meet Blizzard gamers from around the world.”

Blizzard fans should expect an event of similar proportions, and it is highly unlikely that the ticket availability window will be any wider. If you plan to attend BlizzCon 2009, you should follow the news feed closely and grab a ticket as soon as they become available.

BlizzCon will offer a wide variety of activities throughout the two-day event. In addition to serving as a gathering place for Blizzard Entertainment gaming communities, attendees will be able to enjoy:

• Hands-on play time with upcoming Blizzard Entertainment games
• Discussion panels with Blizzard Entertainment developers
• Competitive and casual tournaments for players to showcase their talents
• Community contests with great prizes
• Commemorative merchandise based on Blizzard Entertainment’s game universes
• A silent auction
• More exciting activities and attractions to be announced

Speaking of grabbing, three winners of the StarCraft 2 comic contest walked away with a StarCraft 2 goody bag, each receiving

• StarCraft II Hat
• StarCraft II T-Shirt
• StarCraft II Poster

With the 1st place winner receiving the coveted StarCraft 2 Beta key, as Karune has recently announced.
Here are the January 2009 winners. You can visit the official winners page to to browse through 12 more StarCraft 2 Comic sketches from the previous four months.

While the community was buzzing about beta keys and beta release date speculations, Cavez, Blizzard’s Lead Designer, was busy writing his reality check FAQ and has now released it to the forums:

I see lots of questions about timelines. Here is a little FAQ.

Question: “Why hasn’t Blizzard released the Beta?” or “WTF have they been working on, I played it at Blizzcon last year and I thought it was done!”

Answer: Solo campaign is under heavy construction as is Battlenet. When these things have enough work done that we know when our release date is going to be with strong confidence we will announce the Beta. Unless something crazy happens, the Beta is going to happen this year.

The above statement, coming from a senior member of the development team, should effectively put an end to any speculation that puts the StarCraft 2 beta release date before June 2009. Considering the fact that game development usually has a 60% chance of “something crazy happens”, we might be reading a similar FAQ a year from now.

Question: “Why don’t you just give us your target dates if you don’t know the final date? We promise, we won’t get mad if Blizzard misses target dates.”

Answer: Let’s be realistic. Our target dates are not something we hit more than half the time. Putting those out there would be pretty close to lying to the fans. We are not going to do that. We want to be able to give good info, not info that we know is suspect. We’ll give target dates when we think it is very likely that we will hit them.

Question: When can we have the next Battle Report?

Answer: We were waiting on getting some improved graphics in (some of the new stuff looked REALLY rough). That was finished last week and we are now playing and looking for a good game. Once we get that game the process is reasonably quick to get it out. Once we go Beta, you guys can do these and put them up. When that happens I’m sure there will be a ton of them and I’m sure the quality of the games played and the announcing will go way up.

Question: “I notice that you haven’t actually given us any dates….”

Answer: Yeah. Sorry. We don’t want to lie about the Beta, and we don’t even want to lie about the next Battle Report. When we know a date (for anything) for certain, we’ll let you know.

Hang in there. We’re in the final stretch.

Just kidding.

Please note that there is no official announcement of a StarCraft II Beta start date. Beta keys to winners will be distributed during the StarCraft II Beta process.

The above statement was made by Karune to curb the community’s enthusiasm over the announcement of the the first StarCraft 2 beta key contest.

It happened to be that Karune’s announcement regarding the beta key giveaway came amidst a significant rumor storm caused by the Captcha beta image hoax that followed Xordiah’s mention of an existing timetable for the beta as well as plans for beta key competitions.

That same evening we have also received an (unofficial) message that insisted that a functional StarCraft 2 multiplayer demo of a recent build has been stolen in France, cracked, and that its torrent is already being seeded. In the context of the above events, the sudden addition of beta keys to the contest might have been an indication of Blizzard’s awareness of the leak, with the announcement being part of a broader “Given lemons, make lemonade” strategy.

Luckily, that was not the case – the only news that mattered was posted by Blizzard’s officials, with the Captcha being outed as a hoax, and we have yet to receive a proof of an existing, playable and redistributable StarCraft 2 demo.

The comic contest is currently the only way the general public (the part that has not attended Blizzcon) can get their hands on StarCraft 2 beta keys, and artists have all of February to try and craft a worthy “Graphic Novel”.

StarCraft II Beta Keys are up for grabs to the funniest, wittiest, able to cause a fun chuckle in your fellow StarCraft fans!

As a FYI, we will be adding (2) StarCraft II Beta Keys to the Vespene Laughs 1st place winner’s prize package each month for the StarCraft II Comic Contest. The rules will be updated accordingly for the February round of entries. Additionally, we will also reward previous 1st place winners of the contest as well with the beta keys as well.

This contest will be the first of various contests that will begin offering a chance to get into the StarCraft II Beta. If you know there isn’t a funny bone anywhere in ya, don’t worry, there will be plenty of other opportunities, just keep checking back with us.

Blizzard has a long running WoW comic tradition and the official gallery is home to more than 260 comic sketches, some being of amazing artistic quality, while others are recognized for their comedic value. The official StarCraft 2 comic contest winners page currently holds just 6 sketches, with the following being our personal favorite:

Creating a comic is very time consuming, especially if the characters are not recurring and the graphics are unique to the sketch. Perhaps the following sketch, the winner of the official September 2008 competition, will give hope to the graphically challenged:

You can submit your entries here, and the official rules (lawyerspeak) are here.

In confirmed and official news, the ESL event, held in Paris, France, will give its visitors a chance to play StarCraft 2 on multiple high-end (Intel® Core™ 2 Extreme and Intel® Core™ 2 Quad) laptops, availible at the publically open eSports arena.

Out of the thousands of gaming rigs, only 16 had StarCraft 2 installed, but these were enough for GosuGamers to compile quite an extensive hands-on gameplay report, spanning multiple pages and covering

• Graphics
• Mechanics
• Macro Management

Graphics:

StarCraft 2′s initial graphics and unit design were criticized by many fans for lacking the rough, dirty, mechanical feel that StarCraft 1 graphics have so masterfully projected. Initially, graphics were shiny, lively and colorful, and Blizzard did what Blizzard does best – it asked the community for feedback. And then the community answered, and they have listened.

Over the next few weeks we will be trying out a few things on the upcoming screenshots, including a reduced saturation which will increase the realism of the units and environment.

The reports from DreamHack address that exact concern, and news from the front seem to be good:

has been concerns that the graphic is too bright, or that the units look too much like toys. Playing the game, however, it all felt just right. It felt down worn and dirty, especially on the darker tilesets of maps

Mechanics:

Path algorithms are hard to program. Path algorithms that respond perfectly and consistently to a constantly changing environment with multiple human inputs at any given time are even harder.
Now that you know that, you should also know that apparently Zerglings have some AI and path selection issues which will hopefully be solved before the game hits beta.
The Zerg are also experiencing some unit acceleration and response issues, with Mutalisks receiving noticeable acceleration/deceleration and momentum adjustment mechanisms.

The Mutalisks were clumsy. ….

….First, it takes for ever for them to accelerate. Meaning of you do a turn or an attack or anything than flying in a straight line they are slow as hell.
Second, sometimes I would order them to make a turn to go somewhere else, and they would instead end up on a slightly different spot from where I ordered them to go to!

One of StarCraft’s deadliest weapons have been well controlled clumped Mutalisks. The ability to move fast, hit hard and change targets repeatedly according to their vulnerability has provided the Zerg with one of the best hit n’run tools in any RTS. Apparently, StarCraft 2 Zerg players will have to adjust their tactics, especially considering the fact that everything owns Mutalisks.

Macro – MBS, Gas and Automining:

StarCraft 2′s automation mechanisms have been debated from the very start – the game contains significantly less “chores” and streamlines production and worker management. Trivial tasks are made truly trivial, leaving more time for battles… and babysitting gas.

the gas mechanic. It’s annoying. It doesn’t ruin anything really, but it’s just annoying hearing a BEEP BEEP everytime it goes offline and online. Sure, it creates an interesting aspect but it’s too annoying. Blizzard said they try to put in cool stuff and units. Well this is not cool in any way. if it’s done to make macro harder, just remove automining instead.

Blizzard should probably notice and address the concerns raised by many gamers regarding the Vespene Gas mechanic. It feels forced, and as one of our readers put it,

putting speed bumps like this in the way of pro players is just gonna frustrate casual players