Blizzcon Sheds Light on StarCraft 2 Heart of the Swarm
;)
;)
While there was no announcement of a StarCraft 2: Heart of the Swarm release date at BlizzCon 2011, there were some juicy details dished out.
So you’ve led Raynor’s Raiders across the galaxy; stealing, scavenging, ambushing and generally pulling off near-impossible strategic raids. In the next instalment of StarCraft 2, it’s time to kick things up a notch and move from Raynor’s heroic but decidedly ragtag group of rebels to an all-consuming, horde of bioengineered monstrosities.
It’s almost time to take control of the Swarm.
At this weekend’s BlizzCon, lead SC2 writer Brian Kindergen and lead level designer Matt Morris had a whole bunch of exciting insights and details to share with StarCraft fans who were as hungry for knowledge as the Zerg are hungry for genetic material.
Brian started the proceedings by reminding everyone how much of an interesting and complex a character Kerrigan is. He referred to the protagonist of StarCraft 2: Heart of the Swarm as a “Conflicted, angry anti-hero”. He said that while he couldn’t go too far into detail as he didn’t want to ruin all the good stuff packed into the game, he could reveal that Kerrigan remembers very little of what happened during her time as the Zerg’s Queen of Blades.
If you’ve seen the incredible Heart of the Swarm cinematic trailer already, you’ll know that Kerrigan has not taken her reversion to humanity lightly. She’s still pretty mad at the ones responsible for her suffering. She’s out for revenge.
Brian took the opportunity to flesh out Kerrigan’s lieutenants for the single player campaign. He described Izsha as a one of a kind Zerg created by Kerrigan in order to become the ideal advisor with the ability to store thoughts, plans and ideas and concentrate on applying the best strategies to control the Swarm.
There is also Abathur, a bloated, hideous fleshy being who acts as the Swarm’s master breeder and gene-splicer. Abathur ingests creatures in order to break them down to their component parts and rebuild their genetic code to make them serve the Swarm in whatever function is needed most.
Finally, he described Kerrigan’s Zerg opponents, the Brood Mothers. These are sentient Zerg created by Kerrigan when she was the Queen of Blades in order to act as leaders with initiative and independence from the hive mind. If you remember the Cerebrates from StarCraft 1, then you’re on the right track as they sound pretty similar.
Then Brian passed over to lead level designer Matt Morris, who laid out some of the bare bones of how the campaign itself would work. He said to expect grander, most impressive battles as the Zerg rushed to wipe out whole planets and stop desperate refugees from escaping. He said Heart of the Swarm would look and feel much larger in scale compared to Wings of Liberty as you take on the role of the unstoppable Zerg.
Perhaps the most interesting detail he uncovered was the slightly different upgrading system that would be featured in Heart of the Swarm. Unlike with the armory in Wings of Liberty, Matt Morris said that unlocked upgrades would come in the form of three different mutations for each type of unit, which will be unlocked during the missions, rather than between them.
The really cool climax of this ugrading system is the “genetic split” effect. Genetic splits mean that at the third stage of mutation, you have the option of evolving the unit in question into an entirely new type of Zerg.
The example he gave was for the Zergling, which at the third stage of mutation could be changed into a Raptor or a Swarmling. The former option lets the Zergling sprout miniature wings, letting it leap up levels of terrain. The latter upgrades the speed with which Swarmlings can be hatched, letting you amass them much more quickly.
While we almost certainly won’t be seeing StarCraft 2 Heart of the Swarm hit the shelves this year, with any luck a 2012 release will let StarCraft fans take command of the furious Swarm like never before.
I can’t wait until the expansion comes out. At blizzcon, they showed off a lot of the new units for terran, zerg, and protoss, and it looks like they’ll make the multiplayer game have a ton of new options in terms of strategy. I’m excited to see how the pro-gamers take advantage of these new units. The replicant seems especially interesting, and being able to clone any unit provides so many awesome possibilities.