The StarCraft II Beta Part 1: Download, Install
Step One: downloading and installing the client.
The time has finally come: Blizzard is finally revealing StarCraft II to eager fans who have waited years for the sequel. The company said earlier Wednesday that the beta will come in phases, with thousands receiving the initial invitations for the first round starting today.
After receiving the StarCraft II Beta invite via email, I was instructed to log onto my Battle.net account. I created the account sometime last year-- I actually haven't used the original service since the days when Diablo II was still fresh and new.
Currently the Battle.net account is storing digital copies of the Diablo II game, and the original StarCraft Anthology bundle. There's also a trial for World of Warcraft thrown into the mix as well, but that's just bad news for me.
However now there's a StarCraft II Beta icon next to my purchased games. After clicking on this icon, I downloaded the 1.87 MB Blizzard Downloader application needed to actually retrieve the 1.64 GB StarCraft II beta.
While I waited, the program told me it detected an incompatible network driver, disabling peer to peer support. Clicking "more info" led me to a separate window pointing out that I haven't updated my network card drivers in quite a while. Whoops.... glad someone told me about that.
Once the beta finally downloaded, the installer automatically kicked in with a rather spiffy StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty splash screen. Next step: installing the client.
Feeling lazy, I let the installer place the game in the default Program Files \ StarCraft II Beta folder.normally, I don't like doing this-- it makes Progam Files too big when everything is crammed into that single folder. It reminds me of packing a suitcase and you can't get the lid closed. Again, that's me.
Once all was said and done, the game ate around 2.09 GB of HDD space. The launcher finally splashed onto the screen after a quick and clean install process, telling me that I'm one of the first in the world to check out Battle.Net 2.0 and the next StarCraft installment.
Heck, the only thing I had to do now was press PLAY.
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J E L L O US
HAH... er... Jealous
Sigh, wish I had gotten one...
ugh! Wheres my invite!
i was the first to comment but now that comment has disappeared...is this normal or does tom's regularly delete comments they don't like?
soooo not fair :-( lol. I can't wait to get my hands on either a Beta or a retail copy!
i was the first to comment but now that comment has disappeared...is this normal or does tom's regularly delete comments they don't like?
I didn't like your comment. If you didn't like the article, you could have stopped reading it, skip it, or go read something else. No need to make a snark comment at the author. I asked Kevin to start blogging about his experiences with SC2 from ground zero. He's doing his job.
/ Tuan
Does this violate any terms of StarCraft's NDA?
Does this violate any terms of StarCraft's NDA?
They decided to lift confidentiality (source is a post on their beta forums) so people can screenshot and record all they like.
I didn't like your comment. If you didn't like the article, you could have stopped reading it, skip it, or go read something else. No need to make a snark comment at the author. I asked Kevin to start blogging about his experiences with SC2 from ground zero. He's doing his job./ Tuan
so u don't censor the trolls, only censor comments you don't like. brilliant job.
first of all, my comments were somewhere along the lines of "thanks for the diary entry, mr. parish. /sarcasm". the sarcastic tone was mainly directed towards the lack of enthusiasm portrayed in the article, which reads like a diary entry.
second of all, my comment contained no personal attack, no obscenity, or whatever you name it. what justification do u have for deleting it other than "because i can"? if u wanna play that card go ahead, and let the rest of the tom's readers truly see what kind of hypocrite you are.
i also didn't realize that mr. parrish can't take such a mild criticism very well. and also, for everyone's reference, my comment already got 2 thumbs up before mr. tuan removed it, when there were only 3 comments in total.
how do i get a key? is it random?
Extremely jealous
you have to have a battle net account, and opt in... but not everybody gets a key.
There is live gameplay going on on ustream and justin.tv, and lots of videos on youtube too.
so u don't censor the trolls, only censor comments you don't like. brilliant job.first of all, my comments were somewhere along the lines of "thanks for the diary entry, mr. parish. /sarcasm". the sarcastic tone was mainly directed towards the lack of enthusiasm portrayed in the article, which reads like a diary entry.second of all, my comment contained no personal attack, no obscenity, or whatever you name it. what justification do u have for deleting it other than "because i can"? if u wanna play that card go ahead, and let the rest of the tom's readers truly see what kind of hypocrite you are.
Oh we are going to start censoring trolls big time. Thanks for the reminder.
There are those that shouldn't comment here because they have nothing better to say than "Author X is stupid," "this article here sucks balls and is useless." We don't want those here anyway. Hypocrites? Sorry but you must think you run the show here, and that's simply not the case. We don't have to enable comments on the articles and just let the trolls run a mudslide, but we do. You guys can post whatever you want, but we can delete whatever we want as well. There's no hypocracy in that. Be glad you don't need to have approval for every comment you post.
Like Gizmodo said best in their article, "if you're going to be an asshole and not provide any contructive feedback, we don't want you here anyway."
/ Tuan
Here's to hoping we all get a beta invite sooner rather than later!
i also didn't realize that mr. parrish can't take such a mild criticism very well. and also, for everyone's reference, my comment already got 2 thumbs up before mr. tuan removed it, when there were only 3 comments in total.
Kevin didn't even see the comments in this article yet. It was I who didn't appreciate your attitude.
And please, spare me the lecture on commenting etiquette. Anyone who's been use to forum talk over the years can see right through your mud-in-the-face tone.
I'm willing to leave up a comment that says "this article could use more information." But you included his name as if he was doing you an injustice by blogging his Starcraft 2 experiences.
/ Tuan
i also didn't realize that mr. parrish can't take such a mild criticism very well. and also, for everyone's reference, my comment already got 2 thumbs up before mr. tuan removed it, when there were only 3 comments in total.
I didn't see the comment for one, so your assumptions were incorrect. Second, thanks for the "mild criticism," but frankly, there's nothing really exciting about installing a game. Perhaps next time I'll crack open a bottle of booze before blogging my experience. - Kevin
next time I'll crack open a bottle of booze before blogging my experience. - Kevin
or booze open a bottle of crack!
so u don't censor the trolls
I'm pretty sure you have been identified as a Troll... do you smell that?... it smells like the BAN HAMMER swinging your way!
I normally don't feed trolls, but I couldn't resist. Needless to say I've been waiting for StarCraftII to come out since I found out of development its existence (thankfully "ghost" never saw the light of day)and I am timing my next computer purchase for the enjoyment of said game. I do look forward to hearing more impressions; if Blizzard got it right by providing the fan-base with "more of the same" yet fresh & new.
Oh we are going to start censoring trolls big time. Thanks for the reminder.There are those that shouldn't comment here because they have nothing better to say than "Author X is stupid," "this article here sucks balls and is useless." We don't want those here anyway. Hypocrites? Sorry but you must think you run the show here, and that's simply not the case. We don't have to enable comments on the articles and just let the trolls run a mudslide, but we do. You guys can post whatever you want, but we can delete whatever we want as well. There's no hypocracy in that. Be glad you don't need to have approval for every comment you post.Like Gizmodo said best in their article, "if you're going to be an asshole and not provide any contructive feedback, we don't want you here anyway."/ Tuan
i guess u don't understand the term "constructive criticism". by stating the article reads like a diary entry, it's implying that the author lacks the enthusiasm needed for such an article. this can and should be improved upon. or would you rather all the readers to reply "A++++++++!!! Will deal with this author again!!" ??
the asshole comment was an uncalled for low blow, even though you cleverly paraphrased it instead of saying it yourself. it's also ironic how your comments were alot more of an asshole than mine. i won't take it personally since it's probably your time of the month /lowblow
This is some Lameness
I have EVERY single blizzard game.
And one strong PC that runs 1080P, and yet I don't get an invite? But I know a friend who got one and all he plays is WOW!!!!
all I can say is....
WOW.
Calling people Trolls on forums is as retarded as calling People who download stuff illegally a PIRATE.
Or calling JAILBREAKING, on an I-phone,
Seriously what Retard thought of these stupid half ass phrases?
They need to be stoned to death.
i guess u don't understand the term "constructive criticism". by stating the article reads like a diary entry, it's implying that the author lacks the enthusiasm needed for such an article. this can and should be improved upon. or would you rather all the readers to reply "A++++++++!!! Will deal with this author again!!" ??the asshole comment was an uncalled for low blow, even though you cleverly paraphrased it instead of saying it yourself. it's also ironic how your comments were alot more of an asshole than mine. i won't take it personally since it's probably your time of the month /lowblow
For your information, Gizmodo did write it like that, with the word "asshole" in their statement. It wasn't a "lowblow". I already gave you one warning but you can't swallow it.
Don't let the door smack you on the way out. Banned.
Nothing funnier, than people getting banned for no reason whatsoever.
There's so so so so so many ridiculously stupid articles i see by 2 out of the 3 people who post articles here.
Jane is by far the only reason I come here still.
The rest are like dirty laundry to be honest, and no im not defending that guy. He just can't control his temper, he hulked out. big-time.
But at least this time mr parrish has my reading on this article and any others about starcraft 2. As long as he dones't spoil it for me if I get the Beta key.
Seriously what Retard thought of these stupid half ass phrases?
They need to be stoned to death.
Jane is by far the only reason I come here still.
Snap!
Nah seriously, I disagree. I post many a ridiculous article.
or booze open a bottle of crack!
Lol sometimes after reading the comments, I need a little of both
59$ in US and 59 Euro (80$) in Europe. And that's only one third of the game. They are fucking asking me to pirate this crap.Bestbuy lists it as "will be released on 1 of June 2010)
Not that that would exactly be legal or an actual reason to break the law or anything....
Well 3 copies of this game to have the whole thing. No big deal, I only play Terran, wouldn't need the rest anyway. However I didn't play the first one online at all. I played it on LAN a bit but I guess this time around there's no LAN which is lame. Ah well no real need to purchase another game anyway.
CANT FREAKING WAIT!!!!
I just checked my gmail and I got my invitation
This game has it all: Zergs, spacecrafts, lasers and... drama!
What's the use of banning when this is a free forum?
Anyway, so there is no NDA? Then I hope to see gameplay vids in youtube very soon...
What's the use of banning when this is a free forum?Anyway, so there is no NDA? Then I hope to see gameplay vids in youtube very soon...
It makes us feel big, and it clears out the trolls. What's not to like?