Fearing the piracy, Blizzard opted to leave out LAN play as part of StarCraft II’s multiplayer. Blizzard is in the middle of launching Battlen.net 2.0 that will funnel every Blizzard game into that service. Some fans were upset at the exclusion of LAN play and started a petition to show support for the LAN play. Now, over 210,000 people have signed the petition since June.

Blizzard has always marched to their own beat and I doubt they will pay too much attention to the petition. However, over 200,000 petitions might make them reconsider some sort of compromise when it comes to LAN play.

Gamasutra recently published a new interview with Blizzard Entertainment’s head game designer, Dustin Browder, for StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty. As most StarCraft fans know, Blizzard will release StarCraft II in three parts with first part being Wings of Liberty. Ben Browder talks about multiplayer vs single player experience as well as the story line of Wings of Liberty. He talks about the continuity of the story line from original story line. Also, the multiplayer experience will be vastly different from single player experience. Even for the people who are not familiar with StarCraft, StarCraft II will be accessible and intuitive.

Gamasutra: With StarCraft II, you've said you're trying to avoid making a game that is significantly more complex than StarCraft, even as many individual elements change. How do you make the call as to what stays and what goes?

DB: It's just really tough. We have to make these calls on a daily basis. There were for a long time, and there's still a little bit of it, big debates on the team as to what is enough and what is not enough. What is too much?
We just walked the line, and we look at stuff that we sort of feel is core to the experience: "This is a defining element of the Zerg. We have to have the creep. It's defining." Or, "Siege tanks are a defining element for the Terrans." Then we look at elements where we'll say, "This was fun. We love these things. The fans have obviously been using them. Vultures and spider mines are huge -- but they're not defining elements. You could live without them. I can imagine the Terran army without these things."

So it's a combination of conceptual elements and mechanics. Where we think we can do better, we'll try do better. Stuff that we feel conceptually is not necessary, we'll remove. We've always felt that solo play and Battle.net were the areas where we could really do some stuff that was crazy, that was new and really interesting. And multiplayer really needed to harken to the game's legacy, while at the same time creating enough strategies so you don't think, "Well, I've played this game for ten years, guys. What are you giving me here?"

We want to have enough that it's still fresh. I think we're walking the line pretty well right now.

Visit Gamasutra for complete interview http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/4174/the_design_of_starcraft_ii.php

Karune of Blizzard has posted newest Q&A on the Blizzard forum. Karune usually does great job answering questions regarding the upcoming StarCraft 2.There are some interesting tidbits about the online play and the map editor. Other than that, this batch seems to lack real big revelations.

1. Computer AI – Does the computer’s online AI vary from its offline counterpart?
No. They are the same.

2. Have you considered allowing a post-game lobby for users to discuss the last game, collectively watch replays, or immediately enter into a rematch?
Yes, we have a plan for a post game lobby. However the details are not finalized yet.

3. Is there any update on additional map features other than the Xel’Naga watch towers, destructible rocks and tall grass?
No. Currently there is no update on additional map features.

4. How many different voice actors are needed for StarCraft II, including the unit sounds and campaign heroes?
There are 58 unique voice actors participating, with some voicing multiple roles, and the number may increase as the game gets closer to release.

5. The terrain types in StarCraft II we have seen so far had names like “Bel’Shir (Jungle)”. Does this mean that “Bel’Shir” is just an alias for jungle and every terrain is just named after a typical planet using it or are there – to stick with this example – other jungle maps with a different terrain set, something like “Aiur (Jungle)”?
We named our terrain sets based on the planets. There are a lot more terrain sets than in the original StarCraft and you will have huge flexibility in modifying the terrain sets (including adjusting textures, doodads, lighting) allowing you to create your own variations of the default maps. There may be other jungle-themed default maps named after other planets.

6. Will there be any chance to have more options on pausing the game? In StarCraft: Brood War every player can pause the game three times, but every other player can unpause it. How about a (user editable) time limit before other players can unpause the game?
We recommend that players communicate with each other in the game to agree on when to pause and unpause during the game. We feel that pausing the game interrupts the game flow and it would be inconvenient for players to be forced to wait for a certain amount of time before being able to unpause. The pausing feature is mainly meant to allow for pausing of the game when all players are in agreement and for which duration.

7. I already knew the map editor would be available to beta testers a while after Beta was released, but this is why I’m asking the bland question, will it also be available to non-participating people?
No, the map editor will only be available during the beta for beta testers.

8. When a unit comes out from a building will there be only 4 exits from the building like in Warcraft 3 or will there be “infinite”?
It is not infinite, but your units will come out from a building at the closest point on the building to where your rally point is set.

Most of the games get boring if there is endless iteration to achieve certain goal. However, Blizzard said the secret behind the success of their games is the endless iteration. On the surface, this seems absurd as you would not want to do the same thing over and over in a game. However, when you look closely at Blizzard games, most of them are repetitive. This holds true for the mega successful World of Warcraft where you do nothing but level up and get new items until new sets of items are released. Also, Diablo 1 and 2 are all about repetition. This can be somewhat true for Starcraft where the missions don’t vary too much and online play is basically same. The lead designer Kevin Martens said in an interview that the iteration is the key to the success.

This will also apply to the upcoming Starcraft 2 as well as Diablo 3. Both games won’t vary too much from their predecessor games. The key to having successful games with iteration design is simple. Make a fun game where you want to do things over and over. It has proven true for all the games released by Blizzard. You don’t mind doing same things over and over when it is fun. Starcraft 2 will certainly have updated graphics and new units. But, the core attraction, the strong game play, will not be changed.