BlizzCon '09: The Future of Battle.net

Keane Ng

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BlizzCon '09: The Future of Battle.net



What's the deal with Blizzard's fancy new version of its Battle.net online multiplayer service? Blizzard offered a look into the future of Battle.net at BlizzCon today.

There's quite a bit to digest about the new Battle.net, but the bottom line is that Blizzard is taking what is an extremely outdated service and bringing it up to date in a world that's full of social networking, community-oriented gaming and all that "let's be friends online" jazz. Blizzard executive VP of game design Rob Pardo namedropped names of everyone from Facebook to Xbox Live to Plants vs. Zombies to Google Talk, and the influences are clear in the features.

First off, how this all relates to the thing you kids really want to know about: StarCraft II. The service will launch with the game, and as Pardo says, the two are "extremely connected." Your Battle.net account covers all your Blizzard games, tracking achievements and info across multiple games. For SC2, the game's interface is designed to look like an online service, with multiple panels ("widgets") that bring to mind the old Battle.net multiplayer interface meets the World of Warcraft launcher. You've got campaign and the different modes, but also a friends list and a feed of Blizzard and StarCraft news.

"Even before you play your first game you're already connected to the online community," Pardo said. "We really feel like we're in an online world."

Battle.net will maintain a profile for your StarCraft account, which is a bit like a WoW Armory page. It tracks your achievements, match history and more. Speaking of achievements, there are some concrete rewards for unlocking them - you unlock user icons to use on your Battle.net account, but more interestingly you get Decals, which are little icons and designs which will appear in-game on your SC2 units and give a real touch of customization to your Battle.net play.

As much as people love superficial stuff like decorations and user icons, Battle.net's about playing the damn games, and this new iteration brings quite a few new features for both competitive and casual players. The Ladder system has been totally overhauled so that it caters to players of all stripes. Now the Ladder is divided into seven different leagues (from "Practice" to "Pro") and within each league you're grouped into a division of 100 people that Battle.net's magic machines guarantee will be on your level of play. "Everyone has a chance to win your division," Pardo said, and if you do happen to win, you'll advance to an inter-division tournament to really prove your mettle and "win the league."

For casual casuals (as opposed to "serious casuals"), there are other multiplayer options, like the Practice League, which will offer slowed-down gameplay and maps designed to prevent you from getting completely steamrolled by advanced techniques.

Of course when you're getting steamrolled it's a bit easier to swallow when it's by someone you'll never have to face the shame of confronting in real-life, but if you're the kind of guy who likes to mix your real with your online life, Battle.net is pretty much made for you. Blizzard's planning a system called "Battle.net Real ID," which structures your online social life around your real world one. If you add someone to your friends list using Real ID (they have to verify you're actually friends, you can't just e-stalk them after a click), Battle.net will group them at the top of your friends list.

You can register Real ID friends by actual human names, rather than having to remember who WORGENWARRIOR1 is in one game and who he is another. That's something I'd love to see in Xbox Live. Real ID friends can publish "Toasts" or "broadcasts," which sound a lot like Facebook status updates. This makes it so you can do things like play SC2 while having a message up that says you'd like to play WoW later, so you're not jumping around private messaging people or sending them texts just to tell them what you'd like to do.

Of course there are other features of the type you expect from any online social network service these days: an IM-style chat system that lets you group chats (and should alleviate some headaches when you're juggling a million different whispers), a Party function that lets you create Xbox Live-style parties with groups of friends and more.

Those things will launch when Battle.net comes out with StarCraft II...whenever it comes out. What comes after that should prove to be one of the most interesting things about Battle.net: the StarCraft II Marketplace, which Blizzard says will "a vibrant ecosystem of user-generated content, including multiplayer maps, single-player scenarios, challenges, themes, and more."

Maps will come in free and premium varieties. Premium maps, Pardo said, will be maps that add a "layer of professional content" and - here's the sweet part - will not only be publishable (like regular user-made maps) but sellable. Yes, if you design that really perfect SC2 map, you can actually make money off it. Blizzard cited examples like Counter-Strike and Day of Defeat, saying that they envision amateur designers using "StarCraft II like an engine."

The details are a bit sketchy - Pardo said that a game like Defense of the Ancients would go for free, which leaves it a bit up in the air what would constitute the "layer of professional content" that would define a premium map. Hopefully we'll learn more as BlizzCon '09 continues.

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oliveira8

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So it's Steam with some fancy add-ons? This is why we won't have LAN in SC2 or D3? Bah...
 

AceDiamond

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oliveira8 said:
So it's Steam with some fancy add-ons? This is why we won't have LAN in SC2 or D3? Bah...
Please.

It's Steam with fancy addons and maps you'll have to pay money to use. :p
 

hansari

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AceDiamond said:
oliveira8 said:
So it's Steam with some fancy add-ons? This is why we won't have LAN in SC2 or D3? Bah...
Please.

It's Steam with fancy addons and maps you'll have to pay money to use. :p
Are we actually gonna have to pay money for this though? The article is way too big. I just wanna know if I'm gonna have to pay for service. Thats a deal breaker for me...
 

John Funk

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Dec 20, 2005
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hansari said:
AceDiamond said:
oliveira8 said:
So it's Steam with some fancy add-ons? This is why we won't have LAN in SC2 or D3? Bah...
Please.

It's Steam with fancy addons and maps you'll have to pay money to use. :p
Are we actually gonna have to pay money for this though? The article is way too big. I just wanna know if I'm gonna have to pay for service. Thats a deal breaker for me...
There will be premium maps on the community that you can buy. The service will still be 100% free to use.
 

randommaster

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The funny thing to me is that almost everyone who reads it, myself included, is doing so because they want to see some kind of local play feature unveiled and will be disappointed when it isn't.
 

oliveira8

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hansari said:
AceDiamond said:
oliveira8 said:
So it's Steam with some fancy add-ons? This is why we won't have LAN in SC2 or D3? Bah...
Please.

It's Steam with fancy addons and maps you'll have to pay money to use. :p
Are we actually gonna have to pay money for this though? The article is way too big. I just wanna know if I'm gonna have to pay for service. Thats a deal breaker for me...
Well if you had to pay for the service Sc2 wouldn't sell half of the copies, cause it's going to require B.Net 2.0. The service is free but there will be special community maps that you have to buy.(Which kinda ruins the spirit of user made content. But hooray for the map makers)

Either way, there's little that this service can do what other 3 programs on the PC can't do...and all those 3 have LAN.
 

Brett Alex

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Hmm... the idea of map makers and modders getting money for their work sounds pretty damn interesting.
 

Motiv_

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*Sigh*

So, here's what I've been able to gather.

It's Steam, and Facebook, which is awesome, BUT, you have to either pay money for decent maps, or stick with shitty ones.
 

AceDiamond

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CantFaketheFunk said:
hansari said:
AceDiamond said:
oliveira8 said:
So it's Steam with some fancy add-ons? This is why we won't have LAN in SC2 or D3? Bah...
Please.

It's Steam with fancy addons and maps you'll have to pay money to use. :p
Are we actually gonna have to pay money for this though? The article is way too big. I just wanna know if I'm gonna have to pay for service. Thats a deal breaker for me...
There will be premium maps on the community that you can buy. The service will still be 100% free to use.
I didn't mean to say the maps were all going to cost money (just to clear up my end of things), but it seems really elitist to separate maps into two tiers. I mean sure Valve throws in community maps with some of their updates for TF2, meaning they considered those really good maps, but ultimately they're still free for everyone to use. Here, not so much. I personally don't think it's a good idea but maybe it'll work out better than one expects

And yes, the money angle for creators is interesting, but IIRC (and I can be way off-base with this), the community mappers who got their stuff included in TF2 updates got money in exchange for Valve distributing them. I'm not entirely sure on the particulars but I do know the guys who made the Swamp Pack that came out recently got paid. I'm guessing here it would be more widespread so maybe i'm being a bit too quick to judge the idea.
 

Valiance

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I bet "professional" "premium" maps will be the ones that are used in serious tournaments, and competitive 1v1 games. That is, of course, assuming that this game isn't garbage for competitive 1v1, which it probably won't be but a lot of people think MBS (Multiple-building select) will apparently RUIN the game, lol.

Really though, it's gonna be like "Oh you can play on lost temple for free but 80% of the world plays Python now, and you have to pay for it if you want to compete on that level of play."
 

oliveira8

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AceDiamond said:
CantFaketheFunk said:
hansari said:
AceDiamond said:
oliveira8 said:
So it's Steam with some fancy add-ons? This is why we won't have LAN in SC2 or D3? Bah...
Please.

It's Steam with fancy addons and maps you'll have to pay money to use. :p
Are we actually gonna have to pay money for this though? The article is way too big. I just wanna know if I'm gonna have to pay for service. Thats a deal breaker for me...
There will be premium maps on the community that you can buy. The service will still be 100% free to use.
I didn't mean to say the maps were all going to cost money (just to clear up my end of things), but it seems really elitist to separate maps into two tiers. I mean sure Valve throws in community maps with some of their updates for TF2, meaning they considered those really good maps, but ultimately they're still free for everyone to use. Here, not so much. I personally don't think it's a good idea but maybe it'll work out better than one expects

And yes, the money angle for creators is interesting, but IIRC (and I can be way off-base with this), the community mappers who got their stuff included in TF2 updates got money in exchange for Valve distributing them. I'm not entirely sure on the particulars but I do know the guys who made the Swamp Pack that came out recently got paid. I'm guessing here it would be more widespread so maybe i'm being a bit too quick to judge the idea.
But VALVe pays those maps and releases to the communtiy for free. It costed VALVe but not the fans. Here it costs the fans but not Blizzard.(Unless they decide to buy too.)

VALVe's plan is much better for us(the costumers), while Blizzard is better to the mapmaker.
 

John Funk

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Dec 20, 2005
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oliveira8 said:
AceDiamond said:
CantFaketheFunk said:
hansari said:
AceDiamond said:
oliveira8 said:
So it's Steam with some fancy add-ons? This is why we won't have LAN in SC2 or D3? Bah...
Please.

It's Steam with fancy addons and maps you'll have to pay money to use. :p
Are we actually gonna have to pay money for this though? The article is way too big. I just wanna know if I'm gonna have to pay for service. Thats a deal breaker for me...
There will be premium maps on the community that you can buy. The service will still be 100% free to use.
I didn't mean to say the maps were all going to cost money (just to clear up my end of things), but it seems really elitist to separate maps into two tiers. I mean sure Valve throws in community maps with some of their updates for TF2, meaning they considered those really good maps, but ultimately they're still free for everyone to use. Here, not so much. I personally don't think it's a good idea but maybe it'll work out better than one expects

And yes, the money angle for creators is interesting, but IIRC (and I can be way off-base with this), the community mappers who got their stuff included in TF2 updates got money in exchange for Valve distributing them. I'm not entirely sure on the particulars but I do know the guys who made the Swamp Pack that came out recently got paid. I'm guessing here it would be more widespread so maybe i'm being a bit too quick to judge the idea.
But VALVe pays those maps and releases to the communtiy for free. It costed VALVe but not the fans. Here it costs the fans but not Blizzard.(Unless they decide to buy too.)

VALVe's plan is much better for us(the costumers), while Blizzard is better to the mapmaker.
The explanation, as I understood it, was that Blizzard noticed that all of the WC3 custom maps (well, almost all) used existing art and models, because amateur map makers couldn't afford to hire professional model makers and arts. Their hope is that by having these funds go to the mapmakers, they'd be able to produce genuinely high-quality and unique work.
 

oliveira8

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CantFaketheFunk said:
oliveira8 said:
AceDiamond said:
CantFaketheFunk said:
hansari said:
AceDiamond said:
oliveira8 said:
So it's Steam with some fancy add-ons? This is why we won't have LAN in SC2 or D3? Bah...
Please.

It's Steam with fancy addons and maps you'll have to pay money to use. :p
Are we actually gonna have to pay money for this though? The article is way too big. I just wanna know if I'm gonna have to pay for service. Thats a deal breaker for me...
There will be premium maps on the community that you can buy. The service will still be 100% free to use.
I didn't mean to say the maps were all going to cost money (just to clear up my end of things), but it seems really elitist to separate maps into two tiers. I mean sure Valve throws in community maps with some of their updates for TF2, meaning they considered those really good maps, but ultimately they're still free for everyone to use. Here, not so much. I personally don't think it's a good idea but maybe it'll work out better than one expects

And yes, the money angle for creators is interesting, but IIRC (and I can be way off-base with this), the community mappers who got their stuff included in TF2 updates got money in exchange for Valve distributing them. I'm not entirely sure on the particulars but I do know the guys who made the Swamp Pack that came out recently got paid. I'm guessing here it would be more widespread so maybe i'm being a bit too quick to judge the idea.
But VALVe pays those maps and releases to the communtiy for free. It costed VALVe but not the fans. Here it costs the fans but not Blizzard.(Unless they decide to buy too.)

VALVe's plan is much better for us(the costumers), while Blizzard is better to the mapmaker.
The explanation, as I understood it, was that Blizzard noticed that all of the WC3 custom maps (well, almost all) used existing art and models, because amateur map makers couldn't afford to hire professional model makers and arts. Their hope is that by having these funds go to the mapmakers, they'd be able to produce genuinely high-quality and unique work.
Thats what I got from it. Like I said. VALVe plan on communtiy maps favors more the costumers, while Blizzard supports more the mapmakers.

VALVe sees the maps the communtiy plays more, brings them in,(gives some touches) and opens to everyone by making them official.

Blizzard gives the tools to the mapmaker to create something "great" and if the communtiy wants buys from the mapmaker directly.(Talk about cheap ways of DLC. Let others do it for you.)

As a costumer I prefer VALVe way, if I made maps I would team up with Blizzard.
 

Joeshie

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Oct 9, 2007
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Blizzard can go fuck themselves.

And I don't say that lightly either. They have gone from a very consumer-oriented developer to a money-grubbing developer who will go to any lengths in order to scrap every dollar they can out of their userbase. Gee, who does that remind us of....

 

John Funk

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Dec 20, 2005
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Fredrick2003 said:
Hey remember when custom maps were free?

Good times man, good times.
They still will be, for the most part. I don't understand a backlash against what is - as I understand it - essentially just a method for the best mapmakers to see some return and some capital to continue delivering the best custom maps that they can.
 

Joeshie

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CantFaketheFunk said:
Fredrick2003 said:
Hey remember when custom maps were free?

Good times man, good times.
They still will be, for the most part. I don't understand a backlash against what is - as I understand it - essentially just a method for the best mapmakers to see some return and some capital to continue delivering the best custom maps that they can.
Because they made good custom maps without the financial incentive as well. Basically what this is going to do is cluster all the good custom maps into the payment method and force people to buy maps if they want decent ones.

"You want good custom maps? Screw you, pay us more money."
 

Capo Taco

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Man, people have such a messed up relationship with money. If you'd understand economics just a little bit better, you would understand that the maps that would earn a 7 value on scale of 10, will now be able to produce maps of 9 or 10 out of 10 points. The maps that earn a 6 or 7, (which is the highest value produced under the old economic model) will have a hard time competing with these better 9 or 10 maps and will have to be free to see effective distribution.

In short, for a few bucks more you get counterstrike equivalent value on top of your purchased half life. Oh noes!