Not sure, since I'm getting the physical copy, but I found this (re: preloading for digital buyers)



But that may not work for the trial keys. I'd suggest you wait for a day or two until I get them, it probably says in the box where to go exactly.

Yeah i got a Blizzard account now but it seems that there is no option to download without buying.

Mm sucks. Ah well, we'll have it soon enough. I'm kinda doubting I'll have it in my hands tonight already, seeing as I also ordered two books and the package may not fit my mailbox. Might have to go pick it up at the post office tomorrow in that case.

Btw, the much-touted editor that comes with the game is already coming up to speed. Some people have already been working in it in the beta, creating things like this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAvZlonNTDg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vjuf7DELz9s

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=05lBfffB ... re=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WMupsZAP ... re=related

and much much more. This is...what, one day after release? Danng!!

Ok, so I picked up the game from the post office yesterday and play the first two-three missions. So it's first impressions time.

Overall, a feeling of amazing polish, both in the game and in the menus. The detail on the maps in the game is pretty great, and the keyboard menu even has options specifically for lefties (!). The Battle.net features are completely built in into the game and you can move almost seamlessly back and forth between the SP and MP aspects, and the options are wide: the SP has special achievements for each map (may appeal to some, not really to me though) and the MP offers things like a practice league, ranked ladder games and even 2-man co-op competition games as a standard option. And then there's the normal skirmish, obviously.

I have only played SP so far and a MP skirmish game with the Zerg to get a feel of things again. The SP is presented as a sort of very light RPG-ish story, with hubs between each mission where you can go clickedy-click on TV's, characters, pictures etc. to initiate conversations, watch news reels and other stuff. It's all polished and neat, but the characters are so cliché and meh that it's had to like it more than as a sort of guilty pleasure.

But that's all offset by the tight tight tight gameplay. The first 2 missions were like taking candy from a baby, clearly, but the third already gave me some trouble. Basically it was a bunker defence/holdout against a Zerg swarm until reinforcements arrived, and lord did I only just make it alive. Ok I'm playing on Hard but still. Seeing as there are still 20+ missions to go in this campaign I'm predicting tough times ahead. But it plays like a dream, it really does.

They also gave you some more freedom in what you want to pursue first in terms of research. You can earn credits in missions and between missions you can visit the armory to 'purchase' upgrades that can then later be used in the game. In my first armory visit I could for example choose between two bunker upgrades, 2 medic upgrades and 2 marine upgrade. I picked both of the bunker ones (increased range + 2 extra slots inside) I'm a bunker whore. Anyway it's not a revolutionary idea, but it sure gives you a feeling of being in charge a bit more.

And last but not least, the cutscenes are very Blizzard. Incredibly well done. I'll get back to you with more info later.

I couldn't really resist myself from buying this at the shops today. I played a couple of very easy missions with Rinox against the CPU and my god it's hilarious Pretty easy on this setting, so we should bump it up next time, but my god i was in stitches at the stuff Ox and I were getting up to... Probably most funny of all was when I realised I could Yamato Ox's units He didn't realise but at one point I yamatoed 3 of his units in a row and they exploded in a bloody splatter.

Then, we played against 2 very easy Protoss enemies, and Rinox had like a million zerg units ready by the time I had 5 battlecruseres.. We set off to rape the enemy and boy and battlecruisers slow as fuck I was quoting space balls to myself while playing "no no, lightspeed is too slow...we must go to........ LUDICROUS SPEED!"

Also, the laser sounds for the battlecruisers sound exactly like the laser guns of the enemy ship in spaceballs

"hey asshole, i said shoot across her nose, not up it!"
"sorry sir, im doing my best"
".... who made this man a gunner?"

haha, actually we beat an opposition of 2 Medium enemies yesterday, so there! After we had been plowing through a few very easy and easy opponents of course.

But it's a lot of fun to work together. You can even trade resources with your allies! Very cool if one has excess Vespene and the other excess minerals. I usualyl play Zerg, Derf Terrans. I'm an aggressive expander, Derf's a turtler. So quite the duo!

I actually tried some 1 vs 1 matches online today...they make you play 5 placement matches after which you're placed in an appropriate difficulty league from which you can advance or drop depending on your victories.

I lost both matches pretty hard. Against the Zerg player I knew after 5 minutes I was gonna lose but kept on regardless. The Terran had a little more difficulty, but still beat me quite handily. First conclusion: I'm doing something wrong. These guys must have special interfaces to work between their base(s) and units without clicking back and forth all the time.

Btw I completed the singleplayer campaign. Did the entire thing on hard except for the final mission...after the 15th try and a lot of banging my head into the wall I just went fuck it and put it on normal. Stupidly, I did it on the first try on normal without any problems at all and even without using the "special help" in the mission. SO I must have been doing something stupid on hard, dunno.

Just for general information...Derf and I have been teaming up on the AI and having a blast (and some minor frustration, mostly from yours truly) doing so. We worked our way up from very easy to the harder difficulties, and this weekend we twice beat the AI in 2 vs 2 co-op on insane, the highest difficulty mode.

It must be said, however, that we cherry-picked maps with some things in common: 1) we were close together and 2) there was a common bottleneck we could jointly defend. And defend we did, with insane amounts of defensive structures.

Then we speed-built our base and mass-produced huge armies and crushed every opposition. The next stop probably is playing on maps that are less of a fit for our plans and/or trying another race collaboration than dual protoss. It's hard, though, as for example Derf can't build on zerg creep (if I were to go Zerg) and I need it to build on.

Still having some singleplayer fun too...doing the singleplayer campaign missions I missed (there are some one-or-the-other choices in the game) and then there's the singleplayer challenges, which are pretty neat. They 'teach' you how to counter units groups with others and how to micro them to minimize losses, how to fend off an early zerg/protoss rush, how to build a strong early economy/army within 15 minutes, how to kill as many units as possible with covert ops units, and so forth. The fact that they have bronze, silver and gold ratings depending on just how well you do makes it fun to try until you "get" it.

Although I found the battle.net interface counterintuitive at first, I love the idea behind it. Can't wait to team up on Diablo 3, like with actual story/co-op/character progression in an environment like that.

P.S. Derf: I noticed that our last victorious game vs the AI had been "saved" for some reason. So I grabbed a beer and sat down to watch and analyse it. Most important conclusion: you won't believe it, but the AI didn't expand off their main platform (where we stayed all game) until deep, deep into the game. The game was 47 min in total; with our assault starting around 35min in, and their first expansion(s) was only at the 30min mark. They really just ultramicroed their production and economy before that...that's how they got those huge unit groups so early. Pretty shocking huh? I assumed they'd need to expand really early to sustain their armies...it's pretty interesting to see what the AI does if you have the saved replay too. If not, I can probably send it.

Played the last 3 "placement" matches for online combat just now...final tally: 2 wins, 3 losses. I have as such been placed in the bronze league. Which is the lowest league after diamond, platinum, gold and silver. No doubt because the wins I did have were lame ass zergling rushes.

Footage of another SC2 mod project (this time a 3rd person zopmbie surival type shooter)

http://gamingbolt.com/starcraft-2-as-a- ... oter-video

I'm getting the feeling that the price on SC2 will be justified even if it was just for the many mods/TC's coming out for it.

Had a goddamn awesome time playing SC last night!!!

Played like maybe 10 games against humans allied with Ox. We won maybe 4-5 of them. But they were glorious victories. I'm still learning how to play against humans, but i'd say i'm learning fast. I started off trying my usual Protoss turtle (phase cannons until i get some Carriers) but the defenses are just too weak to hold enemy attacks mid-game, regardless of the amount of defenses.

Now i'm trying out the Marine spam tactic with Terrans, which imo works pretty well, but I am still rusty with the various counterstrategies that opponents pull out of the bag. E.g. Protoss phase cannon rush, zerg rush, cloaked enemy attack. Whatever, i'll learn as I go along.

I also need to resist the urge to expand so early, since actually you can get a lot of resources from your starting location if you produce a shitload of gatherers.

I am considering 2 tactics to try out for next time, in addition to my learnings from last time:

1) To defend against zerg rush, i could quickly upgrade my HQ to a fortress (big gun on top) and build everything else close by. If i get rushed, my SCV's hole up inside and the zerg get bummed by the gun.

2) If the map has a "rich" resource area away from my starting location, I may try to liftoff my HQ and plant it there as early as possible. But I dont know exactly what the difference is between standard resources and the better stuff. Ox?

I still kinda need the game to be one speed setting lower than the max since it still feels a bit rushed. I'd prefer to lose in a 30 min game than a 15 min one.

Also, maybe it just comes down to practice, but I hope that in order to get good, you dont need to micromanage like a whore.

I'm afraid the answer to that is...yes, yes you will have to. At least that's what I gathered from my games 1 vs 1 so far. But there's "good" (as in, win a few games now and then) and "really good" (as in, win the majority of your games). I think we can make it to 'good' by playing the way we like and a little more experience, without having to resort to micromanaging like a total whore.

This warrants a few questions though:

- should I stop playing Zerg? They tend to suck serious ass in SC2. Otoh, one of my biggest problems (scouting) could be remedied by your terran radar sweeps. With some idea of what our opponents are doing I could dp a few things that ay surprise you/them.

- should we coordinate more? I think the key to 2 vs 2 is attacking in tune and come toeach other's aid in defense. I'll be sure to use a mic next time though.

eiher way, looking forward to some more owning humans together.

Had another awesome session last night in SC2 playing coop against humans with Ox. If I recall correctly, we played 4 and won them all. Ox as Zerg and myself as Terran. It felt as if we were matched against more suitable opponents this time, as opposed to having been lumped with pro microing lamers.

Basically I went into the first game with 1 strategy and since it worked so well, I used it in the other games too. It consisted of:

1. Build the first 1 or 2 depots on the ramp, followed by a barracks. That provides a wall.
2. Start marine production on a 1-by-1 basis immediately. This at least gives me a few units to fend off stray gatherers or small rushes.
3. Start the Marine Spam Program. Get 4 barracks up and build the reactor addon for all. At which point I should have a good number of SCV's, so I start churning out marines for defensive duty.
4. Build 4 Medivac transporters. Load them up and take those 32 marines on a flanking paradrop into the enemy base. Mission = destroy gatherers, which is a suicide mission, but worth it.
5. Continue producing marines and continue attacking with them. The idea is not to destroy the enemy, but assess his strength. If he can't handle it, I stick with marines. If he's dug-in or pwning my marines, I invoke the last phase.
6. Battlecruiser Spam Program. I pull the marines back into defensive duty, build 3 starports and start churning out Battlecruisers. I try to keep them hidden from view, and then launch them in coordination with Ox.

Yeah we had a great run.

I feel we're getting more tuned to each other's playing styles as well. Derf's strength is his economy and paradrops, mine is extreme harassment. Since I started focusing on almost nothing but fully upgraded zerglings (and their suicide brothers banelings) and the Zerg air superiority unit (corruptor) things have been looking up. Fully upgraded zerlings are a menace and are so awesome for map control...just have a band of 20-30 of them scout around and destroy any outposts they set up and all the workers. Ouch. And the corruptors deal with air spam...groups of 10+ void rays, vikings, battlecruisers and carriers are pretty much toast.

The more because corruptors have a special ability that 'corrupts' a single target for a while and makes it take 20% additional damage from all attacks. So 15 corruptors can use that almost 30 times in a single battle if they're at full energy, and it is devastating against large units which don't come in huge groups.

And the scan + nydus worm ownage was also awesome.