World of StarCraft Mod Gets C&D From Blizzard 227
eldavojohn writes "If you've been following the team who created World of StarCraft (an amazing mod of StarCraft II to be more like World of Warcraft), their YouTube video of what they've done so far has already resulted in a cease and desist from Activision/Blizzard. Evidently when you are given tools to make custom mods to games you should be careful about making something too good. The author of the mod is hopeful that it's just a trademark problem with the name of his mod, but few reasons for the C&D were given."
In other StarCraft news, reader glwtta recommends an article about how a Berkeley team won the world's first StarCraft AI competition with code that can beat even pro-level human players.
I miss Blizzard. (Score:5, Insightful)
I remember back when Blizzard was an awesome company with great customer service. Well, that, and when the gamers buying their games were the "customers" they were so great to.
That Activision merger seems to have totally killed the company we used to know. Not that this is totally surprising, mind you, but it's sad. I would guess that this was a matter of the Blizzard company officials not being paranoid enough to check the fine print in their merger deal. Either that, or they were ready to cash out.
Re:When you see something like this... (Score:4, Insightful)
Who do you think they are...Valve? :p
Geez, is everyone a baby? (Score:3, Insightful)
Following the link, no copy of the C&D letter. So we have no idea WTF is going, just the incoherent ramblings of a developer who is whining about not allowed to have anything good. Apparently he e-mailed the tech support department for clarification....
It could be as simple as the legal department scouring the web for the name "Starcraft" - not even knowing there is a tool out there to build mods.
Bottom line, we know nothing at this point. No need to pucker up.
Code beating human ain't a surprise... (Score:3, Insightful)
The problem in the RTS genre is that there's *way* too much emphasis put on micro-management. When I write *way*, I really mean **wwaayy** or something like that (jokes welcome).
The fact that so much emphasis is put on micro-management instead of strategy leaves the door to a great many hacks/cheats and also make it easy to write AI beating even top-notch players.
Bring us RTS where the 'S' means something. A lot of people would love it.
Btw, I was highly ranked on Case's ladder at Warcraft II but not in the top 10. Yet my rank was due to me outsmarting my opponents using real strategies. In Warcraft III it became much harder if not impossible (besides a few cheap builds that get rendered useless by the next anti-imba-patch anyway and that anyway aren't "strategies").
So yup, please, bring back the 'S' in RTS...
Re:As for the Starcraft AI... (Score:5, Insightful)
Since the competition was AI vs. AI, and the Berkeley guys cleaned up, they obviously deserve kudos; but it is arguably a weakness of Starcraft's design that such a lot of it revolves around high-speed micro. The AIs just make that more blatant.
Your memory betrays you (Score:5, Insightful)
Here we go again... (Score:4, Insightful)
So apparently they already had his demo yanked off of youtube, and the above linked youtube video is just a repost - so they are taking it fairly seriously.
I am always amazed on how little forsight is put into legal decisions like this one.
Why don't they just hire the guy, and let him run with it. He clearly has the skillset they are looking for - he made the entire app, demo and produced a bulk of materials by himself. Sounds like he deserves at least an interview with them...
Re:I miss Blizzard. (Score:5, Insightful)
I remember back when Blizzard was an awesome company with great customer service. Well, that, and when the gamers buying their games were the "customers" they were so great to.
What timeline were you living in? Blizzard has been known to be quite hostile to modders and independent developers for some time now. Just look at the original map editor for Starcraft. Look at what they did to bnetd [wikipedia.org]. Heck, I'm surprised to no end that the makers of bwapi [google.com] have been allowed to continue with the project, given that the project relies on hacking the Starcraft client via DLL injection.
Re:I miss Blizzard. (Score:2, Insightful)
I hate to break this to you, but your real name is absolutely not a secret. Not even your SSN is a secret, if you think about what 'secret' means. Both of these are a matter of public record, and are absolutely trivial to discover about you by anyone and everyone with whom you trade data bits. If you think you have 'privacy' online, you're setting yourself up for disappointment.
In short, if you're in public, expect to be in public. And it goes without saying that the internet is 'in public'.
I know this isn't a popular idea, but I just thought I'd chime in here because you've illustrated a decently bad example of your thesis. By way of saying that Blizzard is less of the company they used to be, you're simply illustrating that they are coming to grips with the realities of the online world. It isn't the wild west any more, and Blizzard is reflecting that. You're not, but that's scarcely their fault.
I'll sum up by offering that you could easily find better examples...
Re:I miss Blizzard. (Score:2, Insightful)
Know this: They are not alone. By 'tomorrow' the whole notion of anonymity online will be gone from any and all mainstream places. You'll still be able to create unique and disposable handles on some sites, but the vast majority will be tied to, say, your Facebook account, and will proudly display your real name.
I did not fail to comprehend what Blizzard was planning to do. You, on the other hand, have failed to realize the impact of the popularity of things like Facebook's API.
And I'd like to pre-stipulate that Facebook may or may not win out. It could well be some other service entirely that manages your identity online. That's not relevant. SOMETHING will unify you amongst any and all main stream media sources online. Count on it.
Re:Geez, is everyone a baby? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Geez, is everyone a baby? (Score:4, Insightful)