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Starcraft II: Legacy of the Void pre-order is up, grants beta+prologue campaign

D

Draft

Member
Ghost_Messiah said:
Anyone tried the Whispers of Oblivion missions yet? Decent missions? Just wondering whether I should drop the cash on this now. The prologue missions (plus the updated multiplayer) would be the only motivating factors given the game's still about six months out.
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I preordered because I am a hypocrite and a sucker. The prologue missions are similar to early missions from WOL and HOTS. Most of the T2/T3 units aren't available. A couple of the maps are base builders with sub objectives or hazards to avoid. The third map is Zeratul and his squad of stalkers blinking over pits. They are fun but in hindsight nothing I needed to play right this very second.

And boy, do they ever go hard on the space magic nonsense in this story. Spoilers? Do you even care? I think Zeratul says prophecy about 100 times.
 
N

NaDannMaGoGo

Member
Draft said:
And boy, do they ever go hard on the space magic nonsense in this story. Spoilers? Do you even care? I think Zeratul says prophecy about 100 times.
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I despise the use of prophecies in just about every story. No matter if it holds true, gets subverted or reinterpreted with a twist. Because before you know what it's ultimately going to be, you're aware that there might be some all knowing entity/mechanism in the world (inherently lame) and the story itself will be somewhat predictable as you know what it will likely focus around, even if the prophecy isn't 100% clear or will come true.

And where's the benefit? I guess it's a sort of everlasting cliffhanger as it foreshadows potentially interesting events...in the least subtle way possible.

The moment the one pre-rendered cinematic with Zeratul plays in WoL you can be 97% sure about the conclusion the story is heading forward to. Lame.
 
N

NaDannMaGoGo

Member
What the fucking hell, I put up fairly low graphic settings for my GTX 660 but I'm starting the first mission and my framerate goes almost single digit. Apparently I'm not alone in that and it's only the first mission but still what the hell. Gonna restart with lowest graphics settings for this I geuss.
 
L

Linkark07

Banned
Draft said:
And boy, do they ever go hard on the space magic nonsense in this story. Spoilers? Do you even care? I think Zeratul says prophecy about 100 times.
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So the entire campaign will be Zeratul talking about prophecy? Should I even be surprised?

Well, hopefully the campaign missions will still be interesting and enjoyable like WoL or HotS.
 
Moff

Moff

Member
NaDannMaGoGo said:
What the fucking hell, I put up fairly low graphic settings for my GTX 660 but I'm starting the first mission and my framerate goes almost single digit. Apparently I'm not alone in that and it's only the first mission but still what the hell. Gonna restart with lowest graphics settings for this I geuss.
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I did that and it didnt help. I only had stuttery camera movement though. if it's still playable, don't worry about it.
the second and third mission will run perfectly.
 
P

Palette Swap

Member
ITT, I preorder the game and don't even play the beta or WoO because I didn't understand WoO was already available nor how to set it. God, I am dumb.

NaDannMaGoGo said:
What the fucking hell, I put up fairly low graphic settings for my GTX 660 but I'm starting the first mission and my framerate goes almost single digit. Apparently I'm not alone in that and it's only the first mission but still what the hell. Gonna restart with lowest graphics settings for this I geuss.
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That's really surprising considering I essentially maxed out the two other parts on my old 560Ti.
 
N

NaDannMaGoGo

Member
Well put everything to low and was able to play at 60fps that way. Gonna up the options again though, as it's supposedly just for this first mission (and even there mostly at the beginning).
 
S

SmartWaffles

Member
The first mission has some really bad optimization issue, was told that the beta client is mainly for multiplayer so the shader isn't optimized for campaign yet, it will be fixed at launch.
 
G

grandwizard

Member
Moff said:
I think heart of the swarm was way below in quality. it's the first blizzard game I played that just didn't feel quite right. I still think it was good and enjoyed it, but it just wasn't as great perfectly polished as WOL, or diablo3.
I really feel that starcraft is blizzards least loved IP. will there even be cgi cutscenes for LOTV? I'm starting to get the feeling they are just phoning this in because they kinda have to, which is a shame because protoss are my favourite race, I was very disappointed that WOL did not feauture all three races and I had to wait so long to finally have a protoss campaign again, and after heart of the swarm I am afraid blizzard don't care enough to make it a worthy finale for the starcraft saga. I am also pretty certain that's the last we ever see of starcraft.

and replaying SC1, it also reminded me what WOL lacked. it has easily and by far the best mission design in any RTS campaign. but I really miss the twists and interactions with the heroes during the missions. that was so great in SC/BW. wings of liberty felt like it was mostly side missions. great mission design and gameplay, yes, but the lack of hero interaction and twists made it feel much less immersive than SC/BW.
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What was your issues with heart of the swarm, if you don't mind me asking? I know it's a bit shorter than WoL but I still found it to be a cut above the rest of the RTS campaigns out there. I think I might have enjoyed it slightly less simply due to preferring terran over Zerg. However the mission variety is still great with how they introduce you to units and evolution choices, plus it's a change from WoL with having a hero unit to use abilities on similar to WC3 which was a nice throwback for me. As someone who never played a lot of Zerg generally, I also found it good at teaching the general basic mechanics of the race.

Production value wise I don't think they skimped on HotS at all, it has probably the most expensive and most fanservicey opening CG cutscene of the entire series with that huge Zerg army assault. And it's packed with really good but not cg cutscenes throughout the game. The one mid-way through is one of my favorite ones in all Blizzard games.

Story wise I think all the SC stuff is pretty cheesy, but the actual events and characters are cool enough to get by. I do love the space trucker style space setting though, needs to be used more often in games.
 
S

Syf

Banned
OddSockZA said:
Can't create threads - thought you may be interested to know that a retailer has apparently leaked the release date for Legacy of the void.

http://www.lazygamer.net/activision...i-legacy-of-the-void-launching-november-27th/

European date seems to be November 27th, so a November 24th date in the US. Cheers.

Full disclosure: Site linked is one I work for.
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Nice. I find this pretty believable tbh, they've said it will release in 2015 and that's shortly after BlizzCon & WCS global finals.
 
Ghost_Messiah

Ghost_Messiah

Member
Just a heads up for anyone who may have missed this:

Play the Free "Whispers of Oblivion" Prologue Today
Blizzard Entertainment 10/6/2015

With the upcoming changes in patch 3.0, all players will gain access to “Whispers of Oblivion,” a three-mission prologue featuring the legendary Dark Templar Zeratul. These missions serve as an introduction to the campaign, and help bridge the story between Heart of the Swarm and Legacy of the Void. In Whispers of Oblivion, players will take part in the story of Zeratul for the first time since Wings of Liberty. Therein, they’ll seek to unravel the final piece of the Xel’naga prophecy. If you want to learn more about what’s to come in Whispers of Oblivion, we’ve created this video to catch you up to speed:

The Whispers of Oblivion prologue ends directly where Legacy of the Void begins. So if you’re ready to join Artanis and reclaim Aiur, you can pre-purchase Legacy of the Void today at LegacyoftheVoid.com. Furthermore, anyone who purchases Legacy of the Void will unlock Artanis, a StarCraft Warrior Hero, in Heroes of the Storm, Blizzard’s new free-to-play team brawler. To learn more about how to unlock Artanis you can check out our blog on the topic here.

We look forward to seeing you in Whispers of Oblivion, and trust that what you find will serve only to whet your appetite for the adventures that await you in StarCraft II: Legacy of the Void.
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Source: http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/blog/19...whispers-of-oblivion-prologue-today-10-6-2015

Played through the three Whispers of Oblivion missions just now. They're awesome. Really great Protoss centric missions. Nothing too unfamiliar if you've played the previous expansions but it's a joy to play through the prologue Protoss missions. Give them a shot. They're completely free now. To access the missions download the SC2 client from Battle.net.

Also if anyone experiences any frame rate/lag issues try this fix: https://www.reddit.com/r/starcraft/comments/3nwrxz/fyi_32bitsc2exe_mode_is_far_faster_than_64bitsc2/

Worked for me. My machine's quite ancient now but I ran Whispers of Oblivion at a solid frame rate using this fix. Lagged like hell beforehand.
 
Blackage

Blackage

Member
Also if anyone experiences any frame rate/lag issues try this fix: https://www.reddit.com/r/starcraft/c...than_64bitsc2/

Worked for me. My machine's quite ancient now but I ran Whispers of Oblivion at a solid frame rate using this fix. Lagged like hell beforehand.
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It always amazes me that Blizzard's games can work on a freakin toaster, but on the high-end stuff they always have issues with optimization(64-Bit, SLI, Quad Cores when they were first rolling out) etc.

So the prologue missions are free just with updating the client? Or do you still have to preorder the expansion?
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Free, just need to patch to 3.0
 
Ghost_Messiah

Ghost_Messiah

Member
Hollywood Duo said:
So the prologue missions are free just with updating the client? Or do you still have to preorder the expansion?
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Completely free. Just update the client to patch 3.0 and launch Starcraft and you can access Whispers of Oblivion via the campaign tab. No pre-order required whatsoever. I just played through the three missions without paying anything. Enjoy. :)
 
S

Syf

Banned
The first prologue mission stutters pretty badly for me while the other two are smooth as usual. Something off about that first one.
 
D

Deleted member 17706

Unconfirmed Member
I barely played Heart of the Swarm... I should really go back and play through the campaign.

I was super into Starcraft II when it came out, but fell off it after about a year. I like the Protoss, so I think this will get me back in.
 
O

Oshimai

Member
Absolutely regret spending money on Heart of the Swarm, even when it was on sale.

Will YouTube the story mode to find out what happens.
 
Ghost_Messiah

Ghost_Messiah

Member
Oshimai said:
Absolutely regret spending money on Heart of the Swarm, even when it was on sale.

Will YouTube the story mode to find out what happens.
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Story wise yeah I'd agree. HOTS was a disappointment in the narrative department. Weaker than WOL which was in itself weaker than the original Starcraft. However SC2 and its expansions are wonderful, super enjoyable RTS campaigns that are the best on the planet and that's why I keep playing them and coming back for the new expansions.

Also in Whispers of Oblivion:
It does genuinely appear the story's going to be better this time round. There's this notion that the story is leading up to this epic final confrontation with Amon with even Tassadar showing up at the end to give Zeratul a vision. I have a feeling LOTV is going to be superior to what came before story wise. Also I'm dying to see the conclusion of the Zerg hybrid narrative arc what with it first being introduced in that secret mission decades ago in Brood War.

Just feel like LOTV is going to be one hell of a campaign and I'm still excited to play through to the conclusion of the story regardless of previous narrative complaints. And you just know the campaign's going to be amazing. Personally I'm pretty hyped for LOTV on November 10. Guess it helps that I just enjoyed the hell out of Whispers of Oblivion.
 
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