A Chill Wind Blows

If you haven’t heard already, Starcraft : Ghost is being delayed, with the reason given that Blizzard wants to re-evaluate the capabilities of the next-gen consoles. This should seem fishy to you already, as Ghost was originally announced as a next-generation game, back when the X-Box was fighting for its share of Sony’s market. While the company has become rather known for their sadism when it comes to giving gamers around the world virtual blue-balls, it seems that they just cannot get their priorities straight anymore.

Ghost’s carbonite freezing comes just a few weeks after rumors surfaced of Blizzard’s demand for new developers in their division formerly known as Blizzard North, where they make their famous Diablo series. If that isn’t as much a downer as Boba Fett scurrying off to Jabba the Hutt with a frozen Han Solo at the end of Empire, then I don’t know what is. These reports only led to a bunch of intelligence-challenged people squirming and neighing for the next Diablo game. Here-in lays the ridiculousness of this clamoring.

Aside from the fantastic Lost Vikings games, Blizzard finally caught on to something big with the original Warcraft (1994). The marginal success of this game brought about a quick sequel, Warcraft II (1995) which is often seen as the first massive success of the company, and rightfully so. An expansion for WCII was released a year later, as well as the beginning of their second popular franchise, Diablo (1996). Blizzard’s method of expansion became a trend as an expansion for Diablo was released in 1997, along with the launching of battle.net, only a year before they would start their third franchise. Real-time strategy fans everywhere rejoiced as they released the game Starcraft (1998), which quickly grew to be one of the best and most played RTS’ ever, and was only further improved by an expansion later in the same year.

Now let’s take a step back and look at where Blizzard was at this point. They had released two Warcraft games, one Diablo game, and one Starcraft game. Arguably the original Warcraft can be discredited as it began their modern forays into the computer gaming world, and it only seems logical to put Warcraft II, Starcraft, and Diablo all around the same level of game quality. Now, four years after the original game was released, Diablo II (2000) is released and sells amazingly well. The game featured improved graphics, though often viewed as worse then many other games at the time, they were stylized and streamlined to enhance the game experience, rather then bog it down with cutting edge visuals that require the latest video cards to run. The game also introduced many new features, items, and enemies to the genre. However, the game play mechanics were practically identical to the original, and in the end the game often boiled down to massive amounts of mouse-clicking to move/attack, and barely anything more. Obviously, an expansion was released a year later.

Now we get to the epic release of Warcraft III (2002), a full seven years after the previous game’s release, which featured massive upgrades to both graphics and game play, taking a lot of things learned during the creation and balancing of Starcraft into the Warcraft universe. Warcraft III added the hero mechanic to the game, which greatly changed the game play, as well as the tactics and strategies used when compared to Warcraft II. It also successfully brought the Warcraft world from 2d into 3d, and the artistic style that was consistent throughout the game brought character and life to everything you saw. Yet again, which should not surprise anyone, the expansion for WC3 was released a year later and even further improved the game play and mechanics of the original.

Now we are at 2003, Blizzard has released two Diablo games, three Warcraft games, and one Starcraft game. At this point, Diablo II and Warcraft III can be seen as sister games, though not exactly comparable upgrades of their predecessors they are still the next generation of Blizzard games. Where is Starcraft? It was in this year that Blizzard announced their plans to make a 3^rd person shooter/stealth game based in the world of SC, which satiated many fan’s appetites at the time. This does not help the core game though, as at this point it is still back in the previous generation, it has not been brought into the world of 3d and there has been no sign of a sequel on the horizon.

Let’s advance a little further to when Blizzard releases its mammoth, World of Warcraft (2004), which for all intents and purposes should not be considered a sequel to Warcraft III as it is a foray into a completely new genre. This puts the Warcraft and Diablo franchises still on the same level, though WC does have an additional game in WoW that Diablo does not, and Starcraft has an announced equivalent in Ghost, but that hardly counts at this point. Now, it is 2006, and Blizzard has not even delivered their “year-later” expansion for World of Warcraft, and as far as anyone knows it may not even be a “two-year-later” expansion. So what do the moronic Diabl-idiots start asking for? Diablo III! That’s right! They want a full-fledged sequel to their favorite franchise, because as you know, it’s been a full six years since they got a new gaming experience.

Starcraft came out in 1998. That’s when Seinfeld aired its final episode. Catholic priests were ousted for abusing little boys. Lewinsky blew Clinton. El Nino blew the world’s climate. Phil Hartman died. Google was founded. Pokemon premiered on the WB for the first time. Titanic won 11 Oscars.

The only thing that Blizzard should be staffing up the ex-Blizzard North with is people who can clean up after the Starcraft developers. They’re going to need it.