Why is blizzard so elitist?

Discussion in 'General Game Discussion and Questions' started by Stirolak26, Oct 29, 2010.

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  1. Stirolak26

    Stirolak26 Well-Known Member

    Sep 19, 2010
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    Why can't they port all three of the first war crafts already and the first sc? Heck with battle net comp ability to boot with game center. Ppl would pay at least 5 bucks for each and blizzard could probably get away with charging ten. All the ids emulator did was want me to play a proper Warcraft 2 port with good framerate because he controls work just fine with the mouse icon. Now hard would it be blizzard? Just do it already.

    Btw this is a prime example of their eliteness talk:
    http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2010/04/why-starcraft-isnt-coming-to-ipad-consoles-anytime-soon.ars

    It's like they are loyal to bill gates or something as they hate almost every system or pc outside windows or xbox.
     
  2. backtothis

    backtothis im in ur base killin ur d00dz
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    I'd pay 9.99 each easy...sigh
     
  3. da shiz wiz 19

    da shiz wiz 19 Well-Known Member

    Sep 24, 2009
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    Now that I've finally played a PC RTS, I can say the only thing holding back RTSs on the iPad are the bajillion hotkeys. You can't play as fast as you can on a PC without hotkeys. Everything else the iPad can do pretty well. I can understand Blizzards reluctance in a business perspective. Dirt cheap prices, a questionable fan base (most ipod/ipad users arent using it for hardcore games, like RTSs), and I can emagine there being hardware/software problems.
     
  4. Stirolak26

    Stirolak26 Well-Known Member

    Sep 19, 2010
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    They could add a hot key touch menu or even touch keyboard around the HUD on bottom of the screen. Heck the idos emu has a full keyboard and the games are still very visible and nice to play (bigger view distance than psp or ds I think on iPad). I agree that it wouldn't make sense to make these ports for iPhone. I am strictly talking ipad here folks.
     
  5. Qordobo

    Qordobo Well-Known Member

    Jun 11, 2010
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    The interface is a good point but I don't think it's the key.

    As da shiz pointed there a price problem. For team like Blizzard, Bioware and few other, the real point is to not start put in mind their games can be found for cheap.

    Another problem could be the size. I haven't startcraft 2 because RTS bore me with ther highly technical gameplay and the ton of keys to memorize and use. But a game like that could be a size too big.

    But another big problem is that iPad isn't iPhone plus iPod. It's not a game platform and nobody know how much sells. So release a game on iPad only isn't tempting yet for such big teams.

    And I quote big teams but I'm playing currently the RPG Drakensang The River of Time, it's not perfect nor top selling like games from big teams, but I seriously doubt such big RPG see soon a release on iPhone/iPad. There's just no comparison with anything yet released on idevice and 5gb isn't that much for modern games but igames are far from that because ton of devices just can't handle this.
     
  6. ScottColbert

    ScottColbert Well-Known Member

    The only elitist is you, and your rainman like obsession with iDevices. There was nothing elitist in that link at all. Like any company that cares about quality, if they can't do it to their liking, they won't. Better than a half assed port. And way better than your half assed posts.
     
  7. Improbability

    Improbability New Member

    Oct 29, 2010
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    I registered just so I could reply to your post, which really made me angry. I agree with the above poster and everything they just said.

    Blizzard is a top grade company, pumping out almost perfect games for the last two decades. Think about it, can you name a simple bad game made by them? I'm glad it's not just me who sees your post as childish, ignorant, and above all misinformed. Why would a company like them want to waste money in porting a game to a platform a minority take seriously, especially when it would degrade so much from the overall playing experience. And you honestly think they would sell one of their games for $5?
    Just because they are selective and not complete ****wits, does not make them elitist. Oh and by the way:

    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]

    Enjoy your cranial cancer.
     
  8. Olord

    Olord Well-Known Member

    Aug 26, 2010
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    I like some of Blizzard's games and agree that it's a reasonable decision to not port their games. However, it is kind of elitist (in a positive way!), since they seem to be worried about downgrading the quality and income of their games. Seeing so much hate spammed because the OP has a rasonable opinion of his own, makes me think that we're dealing with some lifeless WoW-addicts, who feel personally attacked by any criticism concerning Blizzard.

    Normally I don't participate in the flame-wars that (sadly) take place in almost every TA thread, so I do feel bad doing this :eek:
     
  9. Stirolak26

    Stirolak26 Well-Known Member

    Sep 19, 2010
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    Im not talking about starcraft 2 here, or a completely new game designed for the ipad. Or DIablo 3.

    I am talking stuff like warcraft 1 and 2 like we have almost succeded in enjoying warcraft 2 via freaking emulation with idos (warcraft 1 works perfectly but controls are not very customizable and thats its main problem that tapping on the screen is a left mouse botton instead of just dragging despite two touch mouse clicks already being on there but this is a small fix). WC2 almost works (speed is the only real issue) via emulation imagine how easy it would be for blizzard to do it. Heck they could just reesign the dosbox or make a dos emu themselves and dont really even need to port WC2.

    Stuff like WC3, and Diablo 1 and 2 would also be easy for them to transfer. They can do a sega and just emulate or cheaply port them.
     
  10. Stirolak26

    Stirolak26 Well-Known Member

    Sep 19, 2010
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    And I think it is pretty much becoming a gaming platform, because outside of novelty people just use it for internet, games, and movies. Music is for the iphone/ipod and you can do some word processing and stuff but it is as much for gaming as the multifaceted or multimedia-marketed psp is imo.
     
  11. Stirolak26

    Stirolak26 Well-Known Member

    Sep 19, 2010
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    but look what epic is doing with project sword and porting the unreal engine onto it. Many devs have ipads on the side and are hobbysts and enthusiasts and make games for the fun of it or to show they can not necessarily for pure profit. Look at the guys at id software for example like Carmak. Heck I believe he has some rocket program going on even on the side and made a doom freaking rpg just for fun.
     
  12. Stirolak26

    Stirolak26 Well-Known Member

    Sep 19, 2010
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    #12 Stirolak26, Oct 29, 2010
    Last edited: Oct 29, 2010
    also, cant idevice devs choose the size of their games or are they restricted by apple of a max size to put on the app store for a single app?

    Oh and my reply to Improbability:

    you havent tried wc 1 and 2 on the new idos emu. Outside of speed it plays just as effective as it did back then on a pc. You dont need new controls, just replicate a fake mouse and u hold ur finger away from it and away from main part of battlefield so they never get in the way of the view. And because of the small screen siz when the fake keyboard take sup most of the emulator, you can literally play the game one handed and control units from one side of the screen to the other. Emulators are sometimes better than real games anyway, like they offer save states often and real games dont and thats another example. And most "real" gamers are incredibly self absorbed in their own world and for a long time wouldnt even give the wii or motion controls a try. Or heck before the 3ds announcement, 3d gaming. I really dont care about their opinions as most dont want to move on to anything new outside better graphics. Playing on the ipad is often like in some genres including 2d platformers, just as enjoyable as on a real controller. All you have to do is get used to it. And it does have real games or challenging games, just because they are hard to find doesnt mean they dont exist. Look at the recent galaxy on fire 2. How many games like that does the ds have?

    Oh, and evens quaresoft makes pretty of crappy games and even made rts games for the ds that got low reviews based on mana and are still considered elite so I dont see why blizzard is so worried if they dont succed. WHo knows they could succed and set a new standard.
     
  13. tblrsa

    tblrsa Well-Known Member

    Nov 10, 2009
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    #13 tblrsa, Oct 29, 2010
    Last edited: Oct 29, 2010
    Warcraft 1 is playable in iDos(dosbox), it just needs a bit of tweaking to get it to run at decent speed. I´ll fiddle around with it in the coming days to find the optimal config for it.

    Doesn´t mean i wouldn´t buy a proper port though, as the original Warcraft is one of the few RTS games i enjoyed back in the old days. It´s a great game and i´d love to see this gem brought to a new audience of gamers. The hand drawn pixel art does fit the touchscreen of my iPhone 4 quite nicely. Love it!
     
  14. squarezero

    squarezero Moderator
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    I generally agree with the point that Blizzard could successfully port their older titles to the iPlatform -- I think this has been all but proven by the iDOS emulator. Games like the original Warcraft and Diablo are not making the company much money these days, and you can be sure that both would sell very well even at an App Store "premium" price.

    I think where this thread went off-rails is in the use of the term "elitist" when speaking about Blizzard. In fact, as far as Apple fans are concerned, Blizzard has been anything but. Every single game that Blizzard has ever released has been available for the Mac on the same day as it's Windows counterpart. Considering that we often wait over a year (or, in many cases, forever) to see hit PC titles come to our favorite platform, Blizzard has been the rare developer/publisher to take the Mac seriously. In the gaming world, that's about as anti-elitist as it gets.
     
  15. Vinvy

    Vinvy Well-Known Member

    Apr 9, 2010
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    All these games and game styles fit the touch screen, or at least don't get diminished too much by it. FPS and RPGs work nicely on the system. RTS gets butchered in the conversion to touch only, starcraft to me wouldnt work(to the guy that said they've never put out a bad game, SCN64). Diablo 1 or 2 would be the best and most possible ports in my opinion.
     
  16. Andiron

    Andiron Well-Known Member

    Oct 14, 2010
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    Not sure that I read the same article that the OP is going on about, but there was no hint of "elitism" anywhere in that article. If anything it seems from the article to me that Blizzard may not have taken mobile platforms very seriously, but I did not read into the article that they look down upon mobile platforms for games. If anything what I read from the article was that their main goal is to make premium quality games, and although I love my iPhone 4 very much it simply is NOT the same as an Xbox360, PS3, or an up to date PC.

    I also read in the article that they did not want to port or release what they called a "watered down" version of newer games just to make a few bucks - now how is THAT being elitist? I for one was happy to read that as too many companies seem to think that its cool to have crappy mobile versions of their new console games and I get the feeling that it is simply just to get more money.

    Now, with that being said, should Blizzard perhaps look into porting their older PC games (WC1&2, SC1, Diablo1) to mobile platforms like iPhone/iPod Touch 4th gen? Yeah, I'd be happy for that and I agree with squarezero who said this earlier in the thread. I can't see how that'd be a money loss for Blizzard.

    But no one in this thread can know what Blizzard thinks about mobile gaming but I am sure that they have had emphasis for a very long time has been on high quality games mostly geared towards PCs and Macs.

    Maybe the article was disappointing in that it didn't reveal that they have anything in the works for mobile platforms, but it was wrong to say they are "elitist".
     
  17. Scaramoosh

    Scaramoosh Well-Known Member

    Feb 25, 2010
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    Just play them on PC....
     
  18. ScottColbert

    ScottColbert Well-Known Member

    And it's not as if Blizzard is oblivious to the app store, they have at least three apps for wow. If they haven't released any old games for other systems, I don't see them starting now.
     
  19. da shiz wiz 19

    da shiz wiz 19 Well-Known Member

    Sep 24, 2009
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    Why is every discussion considered a flame war. The only post that could qualify was the one above yours. I didn't know we always have to agree with the OP for it to be considered 'civil'
     

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