6 ms·
omg for real? I wonder how much the beta invites are going to be going for on eBay.
by rms 17y ago
omg for real? I wonder how much the beta invites are going to be going for on eBay.
- DrJokepu 17y agoI feel really sorry for the people who don't have the patience to wait a bit more and fork out large amounts of money to participate in beta. Clearly the final product will provide a lot more polished experience. They're giving up a lot of fun for some bragging rights.
- Psyonic 17y agoI'm not part of this beta, and I wouldn't pay $300 for a key either, but I've participated in Blizzard's betas before, and I have to say there is something kind of special about it. I'm not just talking about bragging rights... it's about playing when everything is unknown. By the time the game comes out, strategies from the beta will already be well-known. Things change, not only over time, but as Blizzard makes changes, but never quite as fast as in the beta.
- Alex3917 17y agoThe only reason it would make sense to pay $300 would be if you wanted a job at Blizzard. For example I know there was a blogger named Shlonglor who got a job there because of his awesome Warcraft 2 blog. Although perhaps the culture of blizzard has changed some since 1996.
- Psyonic 17y agoI remember reading his blog a few times. Pretty cool that it landed him a job. Do you know what he does there, exactly?
- NickPollard 17y agoHe was (and I believe still is) their main webmaster, last I heard he was particularly focused on the WoW website. He often goes by the name 'Nebu' (short for Nebuchadnezzar).
- mrbad101 17y agoI didn't think I'd ever see the name Schlonglor again. Here's my story: I used to be a very avid Warcraft II player. I used KALI for the IPX over TCP/IP emulation to play online through my 14.4 modem. Anyways, I had gotten really good at playing the game online, thanks to Schlonglor's guides along with lots of practice. One day I had just finished playing a game, and beat the other person. I started chatting when them, when they told me that they were pretty new to Warcraft II. I asked how they got into it, and she told me, her brother was the Schlonglor! At first I was floored. I couldn't believe it. We talked for quite awhile, and then shes tells me that her brother is there. She then asked if I would like to play against him. Of course I accepted! My hands were literally shaking at the thought of playing against one of Warcraft II idols. We start playing, and I work faster and harder that I've ever played in a game. I instantly could tell this guy was him, because the way he played was exactly like all the screenshots I had memorized of his games. (Wayyyy before YouTube, so there were no videos.) The game progressed, and long(ish) story short, he made some heavy attacks on me, killed my base, and assume he had won. Moments later, my real army and real base that I was hiding moved in, and crushed him. He was asking me.. "How did you do that??" "Where did that all come from??" I had the most s$%t-eating grin on my face. I was so proud that I had beat him. He then tells me that he hasn't play for the last few weeks, and was out of practice. I didn't care.. I had still just beaten the Schlonglor!! Him and I proceeded to chat it up for awhile. He congratulated me on the win, we parted ways, and I never heard from him again. Soon after I put down the game, figuring there was no way to really beat that experience. Good memories.. Thanks for bringing them up Alex :)
- lambdom 17y agoYes, and more than that, there are strategies that were pretty cool in the beta but removed from the real game for different reasons. I remember in warcraft3 beta, we tried some unique strategies with units that were removed from the game!
- Psyonic 17y agoYa, those are always fond memories. I remember when the mutalisk still shot a gas cloud... good times
- chaosmachine 17y agoIf it's anything like past betas (Warcraft 3), there will be leaked copies and pirate servers set up.
- zackattack 17y agoOkay, how on EARTH does a pirate server work? That must take an INCREDIBLE amount of reverse engineering/packet monitoring.. Or they stole a copy of the server sw?
- DarkShikari 17y agoThere have been pirate servers of many MMORPGs, far more complex than any simple RTS (Everquest, World of Warcraft, Earth and Beyond, Ragnarok Online, among others).
- zackattack 17y agoRight, that's what i mean, how?
- daeken 17y agoYou start off simple. You write a packet sniffer and begin analysis of the protocol. As you determine how the protocol works, you can start to implement the base of a server. Implement authorization, game discovery, etc. If you'd like to know more, hit me up on IRC -- I cut my teeth on MMO server emulation, so it's a subject that's near and dear to my heart.
- hristov 17y agoWell if you want to start a professional career as a starcraft player, if you want to be a "starcraft athlete" if you will, you pretty much have to be in the beta.
- mlinsey 17y agoI don't see why. Plenty of current pro StarCraft players achieved that status by intense training long after the game was even released.
- hristov 17y agoYeah but it was much tougher for them than those few guys that were lucky enough to be in the beta. The tournaments that came first couple of years after the game came out were almost exclusively won by beta players, such as Grrr and Maynard. It took some time for the Koreans to come in and start owning everyone. Now that the most talented Korean pros are guaranteed to be in the beta, good luck out training them.
- mlinsey 17y agoI still disagree. For example, Jaedong started playing a lot later than Boxer and Soso. I don't think missing out on the beta will be a singificant disadvantage for pro players for more than 8-12 months.
- lambdom 17y agoJust for your information, since starcraft and warcraft are really popular in Korea, we usually use the term "gosu" for professional player which basically mean "progammer" in Korean. So, we often see things such as: This guy is pretty gosu or This guy is chobo (beginner) ;)
- hristov 17y agoOh I know that, I have wasted enough time getting maphacked on battlenet.