StarCraft Devs Answer Our Biggest Questions at BlizzCon (Developer Interview) transcript

Honestly, the the very first thing that we had a conversation about was the story. What's the story that we want to tell? And so, we started to talk about the idea of, okay, well, how do we how do we give ourselves some real estate so that we can expand the universe and grow? So, we started to kick some stuff around and talk about some of the story elements and and it felt right to kind of drive towards 70 yearsish later.

It's not perfectly 70 years, but in that space, the reason being is that it gives us a little bit of creative license, but if we want to be able to go back and grab something or someone from the past, we can also do that, too, because it's possible. So, we want to be able to have that opportunity, but it started absolutely with story. And then that drove us to the idea of, all right, well, how do we want this to feel?

And one of the things that we talked about really early was is like this feeling of kind of like um like deadwood in space, right? One of the things that I really liked about the original was that it felt very much like sort of like this frontier industrial sci-fi western, right? And I was Deadwood's one of my favorite shows. And so I was kind of thinking about just you meet those characters, you meet them in the bar and you walk those streets and they feel very real, right?

And it doesn't feel like like everybody in that universe feels like they have a job. They're not just they're not just waiting for you to appear. And so we had to make it feel that way. So, the idea of this sort of interstellar western that had this sort of Deadwood vibe, I just felt right. What the previous versions were about were deploying troops, right? And you'd have a barracks and you deploy them. And that was super cool.

What is it if you're the troop being deployed? What if we think about the diamond and we look at it through a slightly different facet? What's it like? And you saw it in the teaser today. They fly on the barracks and it's super cool. And you see the look on his face, right? He's been doing training. He's been thinking about this. He's for sure going to win. Everything in his mind is saying, "Well, I beat the guy who was I was basically doing with the knives, and then I'm going in and I'm I'm basically going and doing target practice, and now I've got my gear, and I've got this huge armor.

I'm indestructible." >> And what's really interesting about that is it's kind of the lies we tell, you know, how good we'd be in certain situations, how much the world operates the way that we expect it to. And you can see it. Exactly. You can see it in You can see it on his face. And we really wanted to focus on that. And thank God for SFD who did a fantastic job on that teaser. But a lot of conversation went into the idea of I want to see the look on his face when he realizes all of the stuff that he's been told, all the propaganda that he's been told, all the dogma that he's been told is not true.

And now he's got to survive. He's got to go out there and basically deal with the fact this onslaught of Zerg are attacking. And they're not prepared despite the fact that they've been told anything that's thrown at you, you can handle. It's not true at all. >> And that feels um remarkably topical for today. >> How do those identities that players really have clung to for decades kind of uh populate right >> in this new this new shooter? >> Great question.

I like the way you asked it actually because it allows me a little bit of space to not give away everything. Um here's what I would say. It's like we play we we know the games really well. We understand the nature of what players are going to want. what we're talking about today, and I have to be conscientious about it. Yeah. >> Is that obviously we're showing you the marine fantasy. Obviously, we're showing you what it is to be in this armor.

And we also understand is that folks are going to want to make sure that the And what's the correct way to say this? What's the the right way to say this? That all of the logic and all of the truth of all of those other factions is represented in a way that makes sense and that speaks to people who played that way. So, it's a super tricky thing to manage and we understand we're kind of walking a bit of a knife edge, but that's where we live and that's okay for us.

And I'm doing I'm going to be very careful not to give away features. But what's important is is that if you think about the nature of what it's like to fight the protos, very different than to fight the Zerg. If you think about what the nature is it is to deal with the onslaught and the swarm and the Zerg coming in, very different than to fight Marines. And so, we have to think about that. Now, on the specificity of who and how will you play, our focus right now is on making sure that that marine fantasy is everything that we focus on that and make sure that it's clear that a single character who's named and is known and lives in this story is the story that we're telling.

But in terms of future options, I'm just going to stop talking. I think when you think about what the 70 years allows us and we we chose that number really carefully and it's not perfectly 70 years it's somewhere in 65 64 I think what it allows us to do is it gives us artistic license to go hey we want to tell a new story and new characters we want to introduce you to a new bevy of different characters and interactions but if if there is an opportunity to go back and take a much beloved character and bring them forward that it's not ridiculous that they show up in that timeline that it's not so far gone that it's 400 or 500 or 600 years in the future or it's not 2 years later to where where are they like where they they they should be right there.

It gives us just that space where we have a little bit more comfort to be able to tell a story that's ours. You want the world to have changed. You want the Dominion to have changed. You want people and some of the things that you know from lore to have grown and adjusted. And then you also want to be able to see that maybe if we do decide to bring folks back or somebody back that they struggle with that change. And that is an interesting thing because that's part of the themes of if you think about the original games you're watching literally change happen in the middle of the game.

You're an agent of change in it and you're watching as some of the characters in it can't believe what they're experiencing. They can't believe the amount of betrayal, the amount of political just the almost espionage that's happening. and they can't believe the upheaval. Then there's these incredible moments of loss, these incredible moments of camaraderie and these incredible moments of people just brinks personship just turning people over and and leaving them alone.

There's some great moments of people being left alone and just going no and screaming at the at the screen. We want that back. But we also want to be able to make it so that if you stumble on something and you open the right door or the right hatch or if you go into the right room, it's possible that you find something from the past. >> I'm curious how you two came about building, you know, a new team. Who's working on this?

I know there were there was speculation for for a while about like maybe an external partner. >> We have been waiting for this question. >> This is 100% Blizzard. >> This is a Blizzard product 100%. So in terms of building the team, you were a huge component of that. Talk about it. >> On our team, we have we have actual uh talent that was on the original Starcraft game, right? Blizzard's bench runs deep. So we have we have great talent from the original Starcraft games.

We have talent that has come in from every type of genre in gaming and they're bringing that in. And we're building the game from a foundation and making it even bigger. And just the scale and growth of that is really exciting because we have such a a great diverse team. >> We have people who've played those games. >> Yes. >> Worked on those games. We have people the cinematics folks you can see it in the cinematics.

We have people who are really good at shooters. We have people who are really good at open world. We have folks who are good at missions. What's really important and at least alluding to it is like there's a deep bench at Blizzard but there's also a want to go out and get new talent and so I think that there's an opportunity for us to go if you're thinking is this exactly the same type of game that Blizzard has made historically it's a little different and I think that there's an opportunity there right for us to go out and get more people and bring in different perspectives and and a different ideas and and I think that Blizzard is a great place to do that and they're giving us the license to do it.

So, we're going to take it for a spin. >> 2030 farther out than I think maybe I was expecting, but I mean that gives you a lot of time to cook. Can you just talk about like maybe where in the process you are? >> I think it's fair to say we've been working on this for a while, and I know a while is not the most it's not the most u doesn't satiate the the breadth of the question, but we've been thinking about this game for years.

Um, we've got a team that's been focused on it for a for a while. Um, I'll give you I'll give you the answer this way, which is when I think about I watched a teaser, but I can go back to the office and I can play the game. I can play the game. I can really play the game and it's not vaporware. Like, I can play the game and I can play it for I'm not allowed to say watching me. I can play it for a while and I can go in and I can meet characters and I can see the world and I can feel what it's like to have a hydrolisk almost take my head off.

I can feel what it's like to to take a G rifle and try and push that thing back. It's like we've been working on it enough to know and we've got a large enough team now that we've got so many unique ideas that now and this will maybe help answer the question, but we also have to make sure we scope properly. And the moment that you're getting into scoping, you know that you're getting into the real meat of it because you got to you got to measure carefully.

And we take that 2030 date very seriously. Like I've said this before, the difference between art and graffiti in my mind is the frame. And the date is the frame. It it clarifies certain, you know, we're in those jam sessions and we'll have a discussion about a thing and we'll go that's super cool. That would be awesome. Let's do that. Let's do that. And then we'll go, can we get it done by that date? And the answer is And the answer, okay, so hold on.

Rethink. And that's um sometimes a new bit of muscle you have to learn is like respect the date.