Orange County Register

After a live demonstration of the current “StarCraft II” build, we got some hands-on time with the game and its project manager, Chris Sigaty, sat down with us for a quick chat.

Today, the meat and potatoes — while Blizzard didn’t have a full (or even nearly finalized) Battle.net system to show to us (yet, anyway), we did get a taste of what’s to come. The biggest change is a welcome one — players can fast forward, rewind and replay any piece of a multiplayer game in the post-game viewer; this is, obviously, a huge upgrade from “StarCraft” and its once-through player in which games must be watched from the beginning. Up to eight players can play on a map, and observers can crowd in until there’s a total of 12 people in a game — for example, seven observers could watch a five-player game, or nine could watch a three-person game.

In addition, viewers can keep tabs on what any player’s got on the field in real time; players will have access to those numbers on graphs in the post-game wrap up. Just about everything’s covered — number and types of units, resources harvested per minute, clicks per minute, resources not spent, etc. It’s a really decent system to review mistakes and to iron out inefficiencies; hopefully, it’ll also help smooth the insane online play curve.

The game itself is what you’ve seen in the Battle Reports — polished, final-looking and very playable. I’m hardly a “StarCraft” champion — I get a little breathless trying to wrap my head around the number of clicks the e-sports guys do every minute — but I didn’t notice any slowdown or any weird pathing, either during the presentation or the hands-on demonstration.

Single-player play was absent in this go around; Blizzard said they’ll showcase that soon.

The multiplayer was easy to jump into if you’re familiar with “StarCraft.” The sides all have the same basic setup they did in the first game — the sci-fi peasants harvest; zerg larva are the catalyst for all zerg units; Protoss still summon buildings and units in; and Teranns can still zip around the field in souped-up flying bases. Also just like the original, don’t expect to jump into a multiplayer game and melt faces left and right; the tech trees and unit production is just as arcane as ever and can be a high wall for a newcomer to overcome.

It’s a little early to really have any complaints about the game; it’s cleaner in this pre-beta stage than many games are at release. Still, if pressed, I’d have to point out that the game is very, very similar to “StarCraft.” I’m not talking strictly sylistically here; I don’t mind that the Protoss still warp in buildings and the zerg still swarm. No, the similarities are deeper than that — it’s got an identical on-screen interface, for instance, and the controls and hotkeys are the same. From what I saw, this sequel doesn’t just channel “StarCraft” — rather, it uses the original’s mold. It’s hard to blame Blizzard; “StarCraft” is still one of the most popular PC games in the world (Nielsen says it’s one of the Top 10 most-played PC games in the U.S., no small feat 11 years after release), and there’s little reason to change things simply for the sake of changing them.

However, in an unusual move for a company that’s often hailed for its innovation, this game isn’t likely to appeal to anyone who didn’t love the original. That would often be considered a critical flaw in lesser products, but the “StarCraft” franchise has an inertia that may overcome the similarities — and “StarCraft II” has not only inherited the polish, panache and simple coolness of the original, it’s dragged it into the 3D world. Of course, that just puts even more pressure to have a highly balanced game out of the box at launch; after all, if “StarCraft II” is judged to have a bias toward one of the three playable races, it could find itself having to contend with its predecessor — and having to compete with the original “StarCraft” is an unenviable position to be in.

Tomorrow: Our interview with “StarCraft II” Lead Producer Chris Sigaty.

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