To anyone saying you can't criticize the game because it's in early access, that's exactly when you criticize it. That way they can take your input and make changes. Baldur's gate was a fantastic example of that.
This. I remember people criticizing the hell out of BG3 when it was in early access. it had somewhat mixed reviews, but look how this game turned out. Early access is an opportunity for devs to look at feedbacks and fix their game.
There's a difference between criticism and not understanding the game is in early access. There are tons of people unironically thinking this is the major release and that the game still needs at least a year of work left. Well of course it does they literally told us exactly that. There is plenty to critique about the game but acting like it's suppose to be near finished is braindead.
A comment from the subreddit 8 months ago that was downvoted to death. Fanboys going to fanboy I guess. "It's never about reinventing the wheel, it's about your setting and its characters having their own identity. Stormgate has NONE of that. There is no equivalent to Zerg even if they essentially recreated Zerg units with a different skin; there is none of the uniquely eerie and strange Night Elf/Protoss vibes, and the human faction is a forgettable mash of generic and mechanically confused nonsense, with a mix of visually bland units, with specialized and general-use units sharing the same tech tiers. There are so many layers to the problems I wouldn't even know where to start, but the first one is: where's the worldbuilding? Say what you want about RTS as a genre, but different races/factions need to have a robust identity where a core idea is reflected through every part of their design, aesthetic or mechanical. For Zerg in SC, the Hivemind and Evolution are central ideas, with strange and unsettling swarming units. They're organic, alien beings, and you see all manners of carapaces, tentacles and poisonous/acidic vesicles. The swarming aesthetic is reflected in the way units spawn, with Zerglings in pairs and larvae pooling allowing for massive biological spawning bursts. Their adaptibility is reflected through various distinct mutations, and it's a core pillar of the narrative about Zerg being a cosmic infestation almost impossible to overcome, because they constantly shift in form and function based on the challenges they encounter. There's an exploration of themes like control/freedom through Kerrigan and the Overmind, and that is reflected through strong and viscerally understandable intuitions about the way the Zerg organize, with Queens caring for Hatcheries and larvae, or through Drones sacrificing themselves for the growth of the hive. The audiovisual work ties it all together with blood, flesh, and squishy sounds with dripping, bubbling liquids and distorted, guttural animalistic growls and shrieks. For Protoss, core themes are somewhat adjacent to Technology and Spirituality. Their buildings AND physiognomy is all about smooth/sleek surfaces, and they all share a similar code of honor and duty, with ideas about tradition and progress interplaying in the narrative as tension points. This extends into themes of self-sacrifice, asceticism and redemption, witth their civilization presented as being on the brink of extinction; they're ancient, wise, and almost too set in their ways to survive in a world that demands adaptation. Their technological advance is, unlike Terran, NOT scrappy, but methodical, robust and optimized. Quality over quantity, essentially; that outmatched technological progress is seen in regenerating plasma shields (mirroring complex biological processes through technology) and teleportation-like mechanics with warp-ins/time manipulation. The robustness of the units is reflected by a higher resource cost in-game, which is aesthetically resonant. Their presentation is layered with mystical, drawn out choral music evoking the endless expanse of space, and they have echoing, reverberating artificial voices. The core ideas are reflected in EVERY FACET of their design. Terran? They're scrappy, resourceful and resilient; they're survivors first and foremost, and they'll harvest and use just about anything to increase their chance of surviving. The characterization paints them as unexceptional underdogs in the face of intergalactic, cosmic threats. Their buildings and units have a rugged look reminiscent of makeshift bases or industrial deserts; all of their gear and buildings show signs of wear, communicating implicitly Terran's focus on function over form. As long as it works, it's enough. They reuse their buildings by lifting them off, much like they reuse their people by turning felons and criminals into armed forces. They're thematically right between the biologically-adaptible Zerg and the technologically-dependent transcendent Protoss, and that is reflected in the duality of Bio and Mech. Terran's scrappiness and resourcefulness is also found in their trying to steal/adapt alien tech, borrowing Protoss psionic power to develop Ghosts, and in highly-targeted technology like Irradiate/EMP Shockwave from the Science Vessel. Character voices have a no-nonsense tone, with rough edges to reinforce the core characterization of Terran as a race of "frontier spirit" people focused on practicalities; all the sound design adds to this with mechanical noises, whether crackling fire for the Firebat, hydraulic pressure, high precision drilling from SCVs, gears grinding, or conveyor belt sounds droning on and on. It's a cohesive whole. I could do the same thing for Warcraft 3 races, no doubt. Well, there's nothing close to this in Stormgate. At all. It's not even remotely close."
so my only issue with saying those things are problems, especially from 8 months ago, is they were working on the mechanics of the game. Now I have zero issue with that being someone's opinion but context on where project is and the type of feedback they were looking for does matter. I will say one thing i have been happy to see is that each time the had a test the game looked better, they had better models, and the mechanics improved. All that being said I have played the campaign missions that have been released and it definitely doesnt have the impact of WC3 or SC2. I do hope it is good but plenty of anticipated games have been disappointing before.
Can't help but notice how every major "innovation" mentioned by players, is something someone else did a decade or more ago. "woah, the pillbox changes weapon to match the person inside it!" Red Alert 2 - Allied IFV & Pillbox (2000), Red Alert 3 Multigunner Turret (2008) "there's a quick-build menu so you can command workers to construct buildings before returning to work" Empires: Dawn of the Modern World (2003), Universe at War (2007), Grey Goo (2015) "you have a buddy bot to help you play by giving it broad commands to assist you in macro!" Rise of Nations (2003), AI War (2009) "Neutral camp objective capture points really add an extra layer to the game." C&C Generals (2003), Age of Empires 3 (2005), Act of War (2005) "Universal power-bar console at the top of the screen." Dawn of War Soulstorm (2008), C&C Generals (2003), The Battle for Middle-earth II (2006), Empires: Dawn of the Modern World (2003)
The base defense changing to whoever garrisons it is actually the multi-gunner turret from RA3. Which ironically people also hated for it's artstyle but has better worldbuilding and a fun and hilarious campaign than what FGS managed to churn out.
tbf, taking something someone else already did AND IMPROVING UPON IT, is what blizzard used to be known for. Also sometimes taking out of genre features can massively change the game, heroes in warcraft 3 an rpg mechanic in rts game
Since the old developers have no intuition to come up with their own innovations to the RTS genre, why not we brainstorm new ideas ourselves in the replies. I'll start first. Mutually exclusive permanent upgrades. Take two or three upgrades and group them together, but only one can be researched while the rest are locked out for the rest of the game. It forces players to strategize and think ahead of their game plan. That's the only innovation I have thought of in my head after playing RTS primarily for singleplayer for a decade. A basic example would be either increasing a weapon's fire rate to kill units faster or attack range for effective kiting or poking.
The art style & visual presentation is as generically bland and dull as any "direct to mobile" type of a game. What's even worse is they collected so many millions and yet chose this aesthetics...
39:15 I don’t think the issue is “art style” like Impressionism isn’t bad because you don’t like starry night. I look at Warz or the imps and see what they’re going for. They want the game to look good in 10 years. I see some concept art and really wonder what happened lol the final product is filled with simply bad design choices
@@Kamil2142 exactly, remember when I first saw Warcraft2 graphics that immediately glued me to the screen willing to find out more about that magical world with exaggerated spaulders and moustache adorned human knights - so emotionally captivating it was I can't forget that to this day.
The game completely lacks a soul. It feels like they took everything they found cool in Blizzard games, and bundled it together. And you end up with Overwatch characters fighting the funkier cousins of Diablo run of the mill demon. I never got interested in the game because the three factions never caught my eyes. I remember finding W2 orcs awesome, being enthusiastic for W3 undead and night elfs, for SC three races. Here, I'm like "who cares?"
It was obvious back in June 2022. And in every single reveal since then which was a failure. In a more charitable view, they are clueless coders with zero aesthetic vision. In a less charitable one, they are clueless hacks with an LG TV in their room. - Adûnâi
20:30 So basically the Allies' Multigunner Turret from Red Alert 3. The thing I see with Stormgate is that it's basically a very standard-looking-and-behaving RTS. And when a game is very standard, the only way it can succeed is by being better, and it's not. Or at least not yet.
Not even just the multigunner from RA3, but straight up the pillbox/IFV from RA2... From 2000... It's sad when your most innovative ideas are 24 years old. "there's a quick-build menu so you can command workers to construct buildings before returning to work" Empires: Dawn of the Modern World (2003), Universe at War (2007), Grey Goo (2015) "you have a buddy bot to help you play by giving it broad commands to assist you in macro!" Rise of Nations (2003), AI War (2009) "Neutral camp objective capture points really add an extra layer to the game." C&C Generals (2003), Age of Empires 3 (2005), Act of War (2005) "Universal power-bar console at the top of the screen." Dawn of War Soulstorm (2008), C&C Generals (2003), The Battle for Middle-earth II (2006), Empires: Dawn of the Modern World (2003)
Didn't they hire a well known actor to voice a character? Surely they didn't spend a big chunk of money on that shit instead of paying developers to finish the game, right?
@@Jimboquacks Probably less. Unless they can find additional capital. But I can't imagine investors would be scrambling to throw money at a game with such few active players. Not to mention their StartEngine campaign heavily diluted share value since they valued the company at $150M if you can believe it.
Honestly the biggest RTS games that stick with me strived to be more than just esport spiritual successors. Warcraft 3, OG Starcraft, AOE2, AoM, the CNC series up to 3, all of those could stand on their own without even an internet connection. And there are many more titles out there that are way more memorable than whatever Stormgate is trying to be.
@@MrGatonegroish I completely agree. The ONLY good thing to come out of forced esports wannabe games is that they will attempt to adhere to a certain standard of pace or quality of input>output latency minimization otherwise it wouldn't be acceptable as a competitive game at all. That doesn't mean they get it right either, but it does mean that somewhere in their mind they care about it being "playable". The downside to this is that such a fear leads to cloning existing titles from top to bottom so as to avoid criticisms of this nature. Some of my favourite games of all time have been confusing to get into, because usually it's "why did they devs do this like this ugh it's so weird" that becomes the charm of a game whose focus wasn't streamlining an experience but delivering a fun time
I don't see rts esports going anywhere at least for the next 5 years . When the fortnight kids grow up and their critical thinking develop maybe we will haave a mass big enough to have a good esport in rts . Aoe 2 have 4 people that live off that game , all the others pros have a job , aoe4 have 2/3 people , aom 0 , starcraft 5-6 but all in korea , i think the main reason for that is the old graphics , gameplay wise is hard to catch the generation that boast his lack of attention as a perk .
It reminds me of AOE4. They defended their graphics for a year before release, and a few months after release, more were already playing AOE2. Then Relic got dropped and had to lay ppl off. And AOE4 is somewhat successful, but I think a shell of what it could've been. It clearly didn't meet sales expectations when they had to drop the price so soon.
Stormgate is made by a small team of no-name indie developers who have never worked on RTS games before, in fact they don't even know what SC2 or WC3 are, give them some slack! /s 🤣
I guess they are aware of all of these. It's easy to say: "you should have a world editor like in SC2 that allows players to make their own games!". It's extremely hard to do such tool and it takes thousands of hours to implement and test it. Making games is hard, making games at SC2 level is very hard.
@@Olagfigh The problem is: They suck at EVERYTHING. Their campaign is a bad joke. He main char is horribly unlikable. The story is a bad copy of Warcraft. The dialogue is bad. There is 0 chemistry between the characters. All of this has nothing to do with money - but they fked it up big way too.
Age of Empires III, original version. When that awful mid 2000s Bloom effect is disabled that game looks amazing for 2005 release and it still looks better than most RTS games that came after it. I wonder how many people didn't know how amazing that game looks just because they didn't figure out to turn off Bloom.
They put so much money into expensive named composers and VA for subpar performance when other games like Tempest Rising used less famous composers to have might be even better OST...makes you think. Its like FGS tried to throw money at everything in hope it would work.
There are expensive voice actors there? Like main character is simply awful for instance, pretty objectively, she just doesn't have that great enunciation overall. I'm not as critical for some other aspects of Stormgate, even if I'm not fan of graphics those can fly by after some final polish but VA performance is just so damn bad so it's weird to hear that a lot of money went into that.
> used less famous composers Klepacki (Bless his soul) still working on Tempest Rising and Tempest Rising has VA problems... because they are using AI 💀💀💀💀💀💀💀💀
If studios don't want critical feedback and negative comments on a product, then they shouldn't have "early access". I see "early access", "alphas" and "betas" for digital products as a doubled edge sword: the more negative side - make as much money as possible on an unfinished product and bail, and the more positive side - allow the community to beta test, discover bugs, give feedback and ideas on how to improve.
Also, streamers with large audiences will withhold a lot of obvious criticisms, and be overly positive to a degree that is insulting to the people watching, and to the people who paid for the game. People are also repeatedly told to hold their criticisms until after the game is released, which makes absolutely no sense.
Bingo. The whole point of early access is so they can get feedback and criticism from the players, so they can improve the product before it's released. If they don't like that feedback, then they shouldn't have an early access.
Its not that the Art Style is bland or ripping of Starcraft/Warcraft. Its that the Concept art is low quality the artist doesnt understand the basic fundamentals of design. The Director doesnt understand the basic fundamentals of Racial Fantasy. Just take a look at the 2 headed Beer Bellied axe Wielder WHO WANTS HIM ON THEIR TEAM? Buzz Lightyear Mech Who wants to be caught dead playing that? Its infantilzation of gaming by FunkoPop collecting Manchildren Redditors
I'm sorry, but a game with a 40 million budget from allegedly experienced developers in the RTS genre should have not looked so lacking in literally every aspect. Making fun of it is completely fine.
How should I put it... Stormgate doesn't look fun or interesting to me, and I think I'm part of the targeted audience of RTS in general. I watch gameplay of Dawn of War, Dawn of War 2, Company of Heroes, Company of Heroes 2, Men of War - and I feel instantly interested and want to install to play. I watch gameplay of Warcraft 2, Warcraft 3, Starcraft, Starcraft 2, Age of Empires, Age of Mythology - and I feel relaxed and wonder if I should reinstall to feel some nostalgia. I watch gameplay of Sins of Solar Empire Rebellion, Empire Earth, Red Alert 1/2/3, Hearts of Iron... I simply startup the game as they're never uninstalled on my machines. Stormgate simply doesn't resonate with me at all, which is absolutely rare. The game looks very plastic, stiff, as if the design isn't aligned to be played as it is. Like a puppeteer doing a show with a few less strings attached - something's missing that I can't put my finger on. I dislike my own thinking like that and I haven't even tried Stormgate yet, but I refuse to play what I've been watching from content creators. In the future I'll surely give it a go and I hope I'll have a good time by then. Edit: I think I know what's feeling iffy for me, anyone played old league of legends? Know that feeling you got on the old map (2009~2010) while the newer champions came out with seemingly 3 generations ahead graphically? After they updated the map a few years later, all those 'new' champions felt just right - this is a world of league of legends. Then came the issue of the old champions looking like someone put Heroes of Might & Magic 2 heroes in Heroes of Might & Magic 5, as if they didn't belong anymore. Now that reworks have been made the entire game looks flawless (graphically). Stormgate has the same flavour of discrepancy, in my opinion.
Graphically Stormgate isn't finished yet. Like overall character designs can be criticized as those won't change by much at this point but sure thing it feels off - there is a lot of details still missing as well as not even all shaders are already in play. No idea of you seen Dota 2 late alpha version compared to open beta version - graphics looked almost identically in both. But lighting, shaders, terrain textures being improved, just dozens of small improvements gave completely different feeling. If that's the main concern I would just wait for proper release as I'm sure those will be fixed by then.
@@andrzejnadgirl2029 I haven't seen that dota comparisson, but I'm sure it must've been a stunning improvement. I felt the same way about Dawn of War 2's closed beta stepping into open beta, and release. My old Gtx 580 at the time essentially burped after the updates haha. Closed beta: "Well, it's clearly placeholder, zero shadows, no shiny colours to the armies." *580 whirrs at peace* Open beta: "Oh, there's shaders in the game, and some ridiculous 'metallic' types of colours that sparkle a lot?" *580 whirrs with stress* Release: "Oh my lord, there's even corpse and debris rendition that's lasting! How amazin... Why did I bluescreen?" *580 is melting with a whimper*
Oh yeah, league. I started playing just around season 4 and later they downgraded league to that horrible mobile map, old one had charm and just looked better overall.
They focused on the 1v1 and neglected the campaign. You know, the thing that the good Blizzard games were praised for and which half the player base for Stormgate spent most of their time. These people who bragged about their veterancy in game design didn't understand the fundamentals of the only genre they know and botched the entire development of this game as a result. Now, damage control is the operating term and there's not gonna be any more hype. This game can't survive in its present state and the bad decision making of Frost Giant's leadership means they won't have the money to continue operating long enough to fix it. In all likeliness, this game will be sold for a few million to EA and then they'll try to fix it. But there's nothing to salvage. Starcraft is still the better 1v1, the story and the characters are unlikable and boring and unmarketable and the co-op is nothing special. Stormgate is a game with no value despite a 40 million dollar investment. This entire thing was a joke.
I knew a guy that donated like $200 to the kickstarter, and little did he know it went into the Tim's next trip to Malibu, because they're getting paid like 250k each
If you ever hear the words “spiritual successor” and “made by the guys who made ___” assume it’s 3 of the interns who got the boot from the OG company because they were wankers.
You know, i could probably swallow alot of the issues. But nobody seems to talk about the pricing model, witch just wreak of greed and exploration. Theres no barrier to entry, but once inside you get squished like a ripe juicy peach. The value per dollar is just horrendous and these devs should know about it. The left a greedy dev house, but took every wrong lessen with them.
@@KingsNJenssons SG has been in development for 3.5 years and can use Unreal Engine to fall back on which sc2 did not. That would cut development time of sc2 down from 7 years to about 5 years. So your 5 years is really 1.5 years.
I was shocked when on Day9 stream some people were saying "its okay that there is no save-load in this mission and that you've been soflocked and have to restart, its an early access". Not an excuse. Brushing off any critisism is just insultingly stupid. I thought about playing it, but the sound alone pissed me off. Feels like some characters are 50% louder than others.
for me, it should be a design choice, if anything. These days I try to play without save-load as much as possible, and every single game is more fun for it. Some games are too much not designed for it though.
klepacki is a total legend btw. i once reached out to him to just let him know how epic i considered hell march back in -96 when RA1 was released, and the dude sent me a god damn vinyl with his music. absolute stellar 10/10 dude, and makes amazing rock-style soundtracks to games that are very unique. ive always wished klepacki would be hired for a doom game to hear his interpretation of that music, because i bet itd be absolutely fucking rad
Sorry but almost every single visual design choice is wrong. Every unit design is insultingly non-harmful and without grounding. Nothing makes logical sense for the universe they want you to believe in, so you really just cant suspend your disbelief at all
Agreed. Every design looks like it's the bastard child of Warcraft, Starcraft, and Overwatch, but without any originality, and with all the edges sanded down into a mass markatable mush that looks like a rushed out chinese gotcha game.
@@Simmons8519 This is exactly how I feel about it, as well. I think they put artwork of Warcraft, Starcraft and Overwatch in an AI art program and used the output as the basis of the final designs. They look painfully generic.
Exactly this! Where is the mighty tank? The awe inspiring ship? The agile looking lady? The strong looking guy? Where is the scifi tech that makes you want to build it as soon as you can to play with it? Where is the demon that makes everyone quake in fear? This art style does nothing for me, so sad.
First of all I want to say that your edits are really good, funny and just for that it's worth watching the entire video, great job! Second and last thing (and I will probably stir a hornet's nest here) is that 35-40 million dollars for 4 years of game development for 8 people, even after accounting for voice actors, renting studios etc. AND adding day one microtransactions for an EARLY ACCESS version... it's just a bit too rough after the quality of the product presented here. And I am not saying it's greed, it might as well be mismanagement of funds. Heck, It might as well be a horrendous payckech the voice actors took. I don't know, I don't blame anyone in particular. All I say is that something seems off.
Also, the game should BE somewhat popular, should have a sizeable player-base in the first place. Only then you can have enough free2play enjoyers who buy your stuff / only then you can have enough free loaders that keep the game populated so you can sell humongous amounts of bull shit to whales. If you go in with MTX first, while nothing is polished, who is there to sell it? This is just ripping off your loyal (to be) fans, who would market the game to other potential buyers for free.
This is my quarrel with art today in general; look at Acolyte, Rings of Power etc. how much money they spent and how shait and far removed from lore and fansbanses the final product is. You are asking the right question. How did CD Project Red make Witcher with pretty much no money? These days we seem to overpay for lack of quality and interest (not saying this is the case here, but it can be if they are not careful). Wtii's edits are famous, his Reforged review vidoes are something out of this world too
The devs built their own engine with Unreal only doing the graphical burden, which costs a lot of development time and resources. Frost Giant also invested into having a full on studio with a bunch of game development equipment and office appliances, which are not cheap either. Most indie studios do not start off with the kind of capital that FG did. Most indie studios also don't have the money to hire the kind of people behind this project and put them under one roof to develop games. That a lot of money is being spent on starting the studio is not surprising considering that it is often expensive to start a business. It is a risk that all parties involved are taking to get the return of that investment further down the line. The question is if they can sustain it through its live service or until their next project if the first one fails. We will likely only know for sure once 1.0 launches, but it is definitely off to a rough start.
To be pretty brutal frostgiant started hiring extremely experienced persons. These experienced persons didn't take states though they took salaries. People underwsti.ate how badly management slaalries weight down a company. In this case the salaries to some larger actors may have been the real problem.
I never felt like Dota 2 looked cartoony, best examples are some well anchored heroes in real looks like Broodmother. If people with arachnophobia had issues with her looks that meant that they nailed it IMHO. Only recent heroes from Dota 2 look properly cartoony, like Mars or Snapfire - those have that Pixar vibes but original Dota 2 designs didn't felt cartoony at all.
When dota was ported to source 2 it changed a bit and started to look more "cartoony" but really it's just more washed out, source 1 dota was king in terms of gritty atmosphere
yeah, dota 2 was on the edge of what I could stomach. I think it looks good though, which is why I was able to play it. But that style when it looks bad, eww..
The thing that bothers me how much copycat is it. It's not a problem if it was inspired by SC2 or Warcraft 3, but it's interface is literally a carbon copy of SC2. Where the icons are, coop commander selection screen, the top ability bar is literally spear of adun interface etc.
Playing Vanguard feels like playing Terran. The voicelines for the worker are the same. Also a medivac but less cool. Marines. Melee marines. Medic. Cyclones. Battleship carrier.
I'll just copy my response to the heroes journey excuse in the steam forum: "This is nonsense. You've not built up your characters. You've not created them in a way that feels real and relatable. You're just a couple of missions in before the "Frostmourne plot" kicks in and the characters have basically gone through zero character development. Lets compare it with the Human Campaign in WC3. You've seen Arthas go from high-spirited, friendly and reliable, to desperate and pragmatic, to vengeful and obsessed, to finally losing his humanity. Frostmourne doesn't even appear in the story line before you're 9 chapters in. By the time Arthas claims it, he is at his wits end, both mentally and physically, and he snaps. Amara throws herself at the McGuffin from the very beginning, and the cursed blade in question appears in the second chapter. Also while Amara is a bad character, she's not the worst one. That medal probably goes to the "treasure hunter", who is basically just an (self?) insert for a cali girl."
monetization in early access is something I'll never patronize, even if it was from pre-activision blizzard putting out sc3 - present me with a finished product first, then I'll get my wallet out
Stormgate should monetize every single aspect of the game from the UI to the music to the models, EVERYTHING!. Stick it ALL in the store and then charge 60-70$ to unlock everything at once.
Only $60? Nonsense, in order to install the game you must sign a binding contract that gives your soul and first born child to Frost Giant Studio. You should be grateful to even have the opportunity to play such a... wonderful game. Just consume product and get excited for next product.
The biggest problem people have with the game is the subversion of expectations. In WC3 and SC1/2 there were cinematics that grounded the games in reality and made it relatable in your head while at the same time the cartoony, very legible game was a design decision to make the gameplay more digestible. Do orcs need burrows to increase pop cap? Not really, but functionally they're better than the pig farms and are more fun and unique when compared to the farms from the human faction. The races aren't different because they ARE different, they're different for game reasons and the cinematics give you a window to look into their world and see that everything is grounded in some for of reality. Thrall and Grom VS Magtharedan still lives rent free in my head to this day. "Thrall. *wheezing cough* The blood haze has lifted. The demon's fire has burnt out in my veins. I have freed... myself..." "No... You have freed us all... RAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH" Prior to that I spent 15 minutes trying to figure out why I couldn't kill grom and he kept telling me "Ha, you'll have to do better then that, little brother" because I was a stupid kid that couldn't micro thrall. If the game was literally just the same as the IP "Small Soldiers" then this wouldn't be an issue because they cinematics would be from the perspective of these very stylized things, but it's not and that shatters your disbelief that this could be in anyway realistic.
Sorry mate, you got the wrong Pit Lord. It's Mannoroth, not Magtheridon. The former being the one who actually gave it's blood to the Orcs turning them into Fel Orcs, while the latter is the Ex-Lord of Outland.
The fact they didn’t know how shite their game was on release and instead replying “we are listening to your feedback” to help fix their game is insane. These devs are so out of touch it’s crazy Lmao. 😂
They're almost out of money, are burning $1M per month and they needed the EA launch to be a massive success in order to earn enough money for them to keep developing. So far the launch has been an abysmal failure.
The free-to-play model I am personally neutral on. But I will say this, I am long, long past any compulsive desire to own everything or buy something just because I see it and it looks cool. I don't have the money for that. So I'm going to look at what people say about things like the campaign or co-co characters and assess whether I think it is worth the money or not. Right now, I'm not convinced of this for the campaign. For co-op, I have not played it much yet so I can't say. The current price could be ok, but that kind of depends on whether or not I think Blockade specifically gives a lot of value for the time I use him while he is free. As they add characters though, I advise they add a free one for each race. As is, Vanguard is really the only race that is easy to jump into.
I was excited, but it just doesn't look fun. It looks soulless. I feel that the "made by ex-Blizzard to make a spiritual successor to WC3/SC2" is just a pitch to garner sympathy. They said they were funded, but constantly ask for more funding, and charge people to test the game for them. It just feels like a nostalgia bait cash grab.
Stormgate really makes us realize what a gem SC2 was, huh? 😅 I don't know...I find it weird that they already start charging for things, when nothing is certain or finished. It just feels...wrong? Or that's just me. That's understandable that they want to earn some money, but for now, i'd just give people a few random missions for free, so that they could try them out and give feedback. And when the full campaign is finished, charge for it. I'm also a bit worried about this roadmap. There's a lot of new features (especially the one you'd have to pay for), yet the things that are already in game, needs to be improved. I hope they take that into account
Shame that Blizzard abandoned it because it couldn't make hundreds of millions of dollars like Overwatch does. The RTS world has to move on, we can't just stay still forever, no new players play SC2 anymore, only the old ones.
That's the thing, as I was working on this & doing research for it by spending some time with Starcraft 2 it made me remember just how darn good that game is & how brutal it is to compare it with Stormgate
This review was done with an insane amount of detail and suggestion. Wtii's map breaking skills come in very handy when game testing! Personally, I cant care enough about this game unless it makes a major turnaround and fixes many of the things the community pointed out. I cant shake the feeling of looking at an overpriced Warcraft Reforged. I hate the way characters look, too cartoonish. But that's just me. Bonus points for the Overclocked Easter Egg and amazing breakdown of how a spell should look and feel like (i.e. Warden blink). Thoroughly enjoyed the review, Mr. Wtiinarius.
@@allanshpeley4284 Trust me buddy, that's not Fortnite graphics. All you guys keep saying Fortnite/Mobile game graphics to attract kids, but kids usually don't play these kinds of game.
Near futuristic humanity army vs. Demon horde (+ robotic angels) works as a setting with no problem. Look at Doom series, Quake series. It is just bad implementation.
@@mustardjelly1813 The problem is we've seen this setting already in StarCraft and it looked great there. Atleast make it so that its a distinguishable theme.
@@el33tkrewWhat do you suggest? Historical setting? A billion strategy games that have done that. Fantasie setting? Warcraft III Sure they could have picked a less represented architecture and are style and had a clash of the world's, but let us not kid ourselves that isn't the problem. Iron harvest was rather unique in their setting with a alternative WW1 setting with advanced and at the same time experimental technology. But that didn't carry over to extreme financial success. People complain about the graphics design and yeah they should have just gone with the realistic style SC2 is known for but the worst offender is gameplay. We got Tankivacs, snow balling infantry, psi storm 9000, immoral units that explode after a short time and so much more. At the end of the day an RTS is defined by its mechanics and the only impressions they leave is pain
@@gabrielreinalter2269 fantasy setting fantasy is so much richer than sci-fi a sci-fi can only be like sc while fantasy can be so muhc more than just wc3.
I don't think adding AI voices to the campaign will do the terrible reputation of the voice acting already in the game any favors. Just makes it sound unprofessional, ESPECIALLY for a studio with millions in their budget.
As an old shool Blizzard fanboy. I can still remember how WC3 blew my mind as a child. It was just so magical, interesting and new. It introduced fresh concepts. Like leveling heroes in an RTS. It was groundbreaking. The cinematics where the best there were at the time. You couldn't get better looking stuff anywhere else than what Blizzard did. When I look at Stormgate it's just sad. It is kinda a cheap copy whithout any vision. There is nothing new and exciting about it. There are no interesting characters or lore elements. It's just as bland as it's art style. I don't think this is likely to get salvaged. They are kinda locked in in too many bad directions already. Best you can hope that it gets marginally less bad. The foundation is still rotten though.
The campaign looks like a joke, that first mission is just a rip of Human 01 from WC3, the art style is just repulsive, and their monetization system is skeevy AF.
Campaing is shit, cut scenes are shit, characters are shit, voice acting is shit, actual gameplay is "passable" but the difference between its "spiritual precursors" like wc3 and sc2, is night and day, like holy shit, i don't even think they can fix this, only smooth it out, but playing this is straight up painful, everything feels as wrong and as unintuitive and unsatisfying as possible. We might have been spoiled by wc3 and sc2, becuse some other rts dont feel as good, but storm gate is just next level shit. And yeah, models and artstyle, lightining, etc is horrible, looking at a fight is painful, its so hard to tell anything apart becuse it just all blurs. And this all is just the actual "game" issues. The way they handle the game, 25$ for a glorifed beta test, where micro transactions are prioritrized over actual features, and how they went about responding to this criticism. Denying making many mistakes, and treating fans like we are stupid. Its honestly supprising its only mixed on steam, rather than straight negative.
It's not just shit compared to sc2 or wc3, it's shit compared to all modern RTS. BAR is free, made by part time devs and community, while being 10x this game
Free to play was a bad call. This is a great example of a 30 dollar middle market experience. Concerned about monetisation. Also, echoing negative thoughts on art style and game feel. I don't like what's here, how it looks or how it sounds. Its not just a lack of polish, i fundamentally disconnect from the basic vision here. Final point, this story introduces the idea of a demon invasion across a human empire, and has the audacity to skip the first twenty years of it or so. Why couldnt this be the demon campaign? Awful. Personally I've emotionally moved on. Will look at this again in two years, but my expectations are abysmal. The focus is on the part of starcraft 2 I hated (hardcore sweaty PVP), and it shows.
I just hate that the campaign story and character designs are a blatant rip-off. They say that 'imitation is the highest form of flattery', but this feels like SG skinned WC3, SC2's faces, and wearing over it's own face like some grotesque abomination.
I gonna be honest with the art style. Why? I mean warcraft 3 is cartoonish but remembers more a comic book (a good comic book btw), Starcraft gone directly to a more realistic vision (like gears of war, Bungie halo and half life 2) but stormgate... I'm just sick of this Pixar trending, a kid can play rts for sure but a kid playing rts wants battles and destruction. Not the next bootleg Pixar looking action Game where assets gonna be used mainly to extract your own essence
RoN was awesome in every way. It had innovative RTS implementations to make the game fun, easy, but at the same time, epic. Visual and sound design were so good, too. The music changing over age progression, building styles changing into modern era..
What I like about Warcraft 3 is the unique RPG component it has, leveling up your heroes, choosing which skills to spend points on, getting items or buying items to improve your hero, improving your units. All this makes Warcraft 3, IN MY POINT OF VIEW, the best RTS.
Agreed. The devs for Stormgate are apparently going to add those mechanics to the campaign, which I am all for. Would be cool if Co-op also had a mode where you need to level your Hero during the course of the match like classic WarCraft 3. Would add some additional depth to the gameplay where it encourages you to farm in-between objectives and such.
I like that it's on steam, but I can't ignore that the devs COMPLETELY shafted the backers by not giving them full access, and the fact that it seems a lot of feedback wasn't listened to at all? but the barebones of the gameplay are definitely alright for "free" as someone that does not care about campaign at all
There Are So many problems, bugs, lags, it looks like SC2 in the main menu Art style looks like plastic, And Story Is going towards arthas... And the worst problem... They ignore most of the feedback, there was a bug that they didn't fixed... FOR MONTHS FOR people who talks that it's early access, I played Songs of Conquest in Early access... And IT was better then Early Access then SG, I am sorry to say this If they can't fix every problem it Will not work And they Will fail
Let's say the exact same sentence, but with positivity and constructive vibe. "If they can fix every problem, it will work, and it will succeed" See ? Not that hard hu ? Completly changes the feeling about your feedback and the game itself. Makes people want to believe and support a studio THAT NEEDS SUPPORT. Why do you need to go the clown way ? You think it makes you look smart ? Calling for doom ? You have anything to prove ?
I don't get why it had to look so PLASTIC. Units look like they were made from play-dough. Overwatch uses a stylized approach too, but the models there don't look like someone ate lots of glossy paint and vomitted that onto plastic toys.
The aesthetics are the #1 reason I am not interested in Stormgate. It doesn't need "amazing graphics". But aesthetics matter. If steak had the consistency of snot, or Star Wars looked like Powerpuff Girls, they wouldn't have the same appeal.
Man, I really do not get the idea that Stormgate 1v1 is "generally solid". Very few of the units are like... Fun to use lol. The roster for every faction feels pretty anemic too. Like Infernals against Humans, half your units won't even be able to get into range to attack.
Making demons one of the factions I think was a mistake. Not only because it doesn’t fit the aesthetic at all, but because they’re evil. There’s no gray area there. There is plenty of games to compare this to, but since they’ve copied and pasted from WarCraft and StarCraft, I’m going to compare to that. In WarCraft, the orcs and undead appear like their going to be the big bad villains, and they sometimes are, but then you get to know them and see that they’re just as varied as the humans and elves. They’re evil, good, and everything in between. You can still feel like your playing rad monsters, and relate to them at the same time. It’s good to have straight evil enemies also, but when 1/3 of your playable game doesn’t have any sort of variation, it’s going to be a less interesting story. In StarCraft, you start off thinking both the Protoss and Zerg are evil, and you get the same thing when you learn more about them. They’re alien and very different from the humans, but there is a variety of personalities and morality. The Protoss would glass entire planets, but we’re doing that from what they believed was an honorable and good place.
I disagree about Zerg not being blatantly evil. Technically their goal isn't to kill, but to "survive" but they literally do that by consuming everything in sight and assimilating other species into their own. It's not something you can ultimately justify or call "morally grey" even. Also sometimes playing the bad guy is fun. The demons are just kinda generic and boring.
@@rh7474They saved the universe. So there’s that. They’re only as evil as their leader. The only evil leader they’ve had is Amon. Both the Hivemind and Kerrigan were just his puppets, but still fought against him. The Zerg are definitely not evil. They’re probably the least evil of the three armies, since they’re just animals unless someone controls them.
The very fact that the story to convert Kerrigan, then leave her the Swarm to control was possible was proof enough for the grey area. Kerrigan could be considered unaligned or even good at that point, before her nature came out and she started scheming, becoming more evil than Overmind ever could. Sc2 of course forgot about all of this, making Raynor touchy feely even after she killed his friend.
While the UI is not the worst part, but it makes me wonder. Does the UI of modern games designed by interns? Just like the UI for WC3 Reforged, it looks like a placeholder. It is just so simplistic that it does not feel like it is streamlined but just cheap and boring.
There's also just too much of it, but that's a problem with modern games in general. I'm still a dinosaur and prefer the more contextual UI of StarCraft 64. :(
@@KaiserMattTygore927 I'm quite the opposite, but that's a completely different topic again. For me the old PC games are the norm, especially for RTS. And they had lots of UI space on the screen, which I like.
@@KaiserMattTygore927 Speaking about old RTS games. I really miss that feeling that you could only see a small fragment of the map on the screen at once (because of the limitations of the resolution). It has this cozy feeling that you are in that small clearing in the middle of darkness. Plus it made the fights more intense as well, you could not see the attackers that easily.
the GUI in modern games is so bad, i have noticed from quite some time about this bland ui design in modern games. Take age of empires 2 vs the new modern version (definitive edition). age2 main menu was a medieval street, and the icons said menu where the bilboard on the street. definitive edition? just a generic, bland, run of the mill menu with buttons arrangerd from top to bottom. they are more concerned on functionallity than style. shout out to Majesty, its main menu is great.
Showing Sc2 is like putting more salt into the wound :D. (literally posted before you even said it in the video lol) Btw did you know - most of the stormgate spell/upgrade icons are bought assets (so no uniqueness here too) - icons by A-ravlik
Hey!! Back 4 blood was complete product when it was released!! I really enjoyed it (until before I hit higher difficulties with ridiculous rigged settings)
@@mustardjelly1813 yea Back 4 blood was lit when they finally fixed the game breaking bugs. The game metrics were polished at release, but it really lost most players between that difficulty scaling and the ridiculously tedious card system, but people still play it today and it IS a good game now when you get past the card hurdle.
Remember the philosophical intrigue of WC3's Arthas-analogous to seizing the one ring for your people-and StarCraft's original campaign-sacrifice at any cost for one's goals. Yea, well, here's a sassy female protagonist (again) with male features. Have fun. She's sad sometimes.
With this game being demonstrated in this way, I can only come to a conclusion: Warcraft III was the best RTS that we humans could create and there will be nothing like it for the rest of our existence because the technology was lost a long time ago...
20:40 Pillboxes changing according to who enters it is so creative we have never seen it. That is if you forcefully eject C&C: Red Alert 3 from your memory. Did you know that an allied soviet player could send his Tesla units into your bunkers to make mini Tesla Towers? Here's the other special effects: Allied infantry Peacekeeper: Shotgun turret faster than the IFV Javelin soldier: Heavy missile turret (6 Missile Launchers) but slower reload rate after all missiles are fired Allied engineer: Short ranged repair crane Attack dog: Sonic bark, stuns infantry. As of a recent patch, they can no longer garrison turrets, but can still enter Multigunner IFVs. Spy: Sniper turret Tanya: Supreme anti-infantry turret Cryo Legionnaire: Cryo Turret that freezes units. Can also freeze air units, and when they are fully frozen, will drop out of the sky. Fires a cryo-beam (similar to a Cryocopter's) instead of liquid nitrogen. Soviet infantry Conscript: Heavy machine gun Combat engineer: Short ranged repair crane War Bear: Infantry stunning ability. As of a recent patch, they can no longer garrison turrets, but only Multigunner IFVs. Flak Trooper: Bullfrog flak cannon Tesla Trooper: Tesla gun Natasha Volkova: Sniper turret (may shoot through multiple infantry) Desolator: Toxin spray gun Imperial infantry Imperial engineer: Short ranged repair crane Archer maiden: Anti-aircraft and anti-infantry bow Imperial warrior: Heavy machine gun Tankbuster: Tankbuster beam turret Shinobi: Shuriken turret Yuriko Omega: Psionic turret 26:10 Can't hold a candle to Warcraft III, released in 2002. Troll Witch Doctor "Someone call for de docter?" (reference to Desperados, the computer game) "I hear de summons!" "How may I serve?" "You seek me help?" "What you be cravin'?" "Taz'dingo!" (A common warcry among trolls.) "Righty way!" "Dat be good choice, mon!" "I do it, now!" "Ahaa!" "Eekum Bokum." (The quote Mumbo Jumbo says in the game Banjo-Kazooie) "Do ya be feelin' well?" "I may have somethin' for ya." "We be jammin'." (The song "Jammin' " by Bob Marley) "It's a cookbook. A cookbook!" (Reference to the short story by Damon Knight called "To Serve Man", or, better known, an episode of Twilight Zone of the same name) "Soylent gray is made from TROLLS?" (A reference to the movie Soylent Green) Ohta: "Fukui-san?" Fukui: "Yes, go ahead." Ohta: "What the Iron Troll is doing right now is putting heads in a pot. They have to boil for 20 minutes so the eyes can be used in a second dish, an eye and raspberry sorbet." Woman: "Mmm! Sounds good." My favorite would be the Tauren spiriitwalker though: _"Yes, the spirits are talking to me. _*_farts_*_ Oh yes, they´re coming in clearly. _*_fart_*_ Ahh, now they're forming into a gaseous material. _*_fart_*_ I can actually see them now. _*_fart_*_ The spirits are very powerful today."_
I would kill for a Warcraft that harkens back to WC1 (re-adds roads, gritty art style) as well as leveraging the town building aspect and granting depth and complexity to that rather than treating macro as a chore to be simplified.
@@snuffeldjuret but then it would be unfavorably compared against WC3, instead of being unfavorably compared against SC2. The truth is the irrespective of the style and setting, it need not to be undercooked.
Different people have different deal breakers. I really don't like the free-to-play with cash store stuff. But honestly, I feel like even I could have written a better story mode with the simplest 'demon war 1' kind of setting. The focus on the personal rather then the faction kinda kills it for me.
Man you’ve come a long way since the Captain Tryhard days when I discovered the channel. So happy for you and proud of you Richard ❤️ great informative video
I largely agree with everything you said but resonate hardest with the visual style, a knife edge for me, as I don't care for the art style of the current models, indeed, very rounded, cartoonish proportions, a lack of emotion from many of the faces. Even while SC2 and WC3 had sometimes more simplistic world models, the portrait models were usually more detailed.
From the very beginning I was criticizing the lack of artistic direction. I could probably get over it but only if the single-player experience is good. I haven't played it yet, so I won't say anything about that, but to me this game looks like one of those many multiplayer-focused RTS games that usually fail pretty soon after release because most hardcore RTS players are dead-set on sticking to their current games. Even if people like Grubby go on to play AoE for a bit, they still go back to their main game in the end and that's just a fact. I miss smaller, unique single-player focus RTS games like Original War or Earth 2150.
My biggest issue with the game is the artstyle, i have been subbed to Frostgiant since the beginning and really crossing my fingers for a dark fantasy RTS. I realize that this artstyle might hook in younger gamers but for me this is too cartoony. SC2 had the perfect atmosfere and i was really hoping for that level of dark but i don't think thats something that they will change.
What makes early access useful is that developers can get feedback on what issues the players stumble upon frequently and gain an understanding on which order they should fix the issues. In some cases it can highlight new issues that the developers either hasn't noticed or just overlooked. The argument "It's early access, so you shouldn't complain" ruins one of the essential points of early access.
Yup, starcraft was a very minority of their franchie games. Warcraft 3 was their moss well received game. Issue is this is aimed towards a minority, and therefore the reviews. Well, negatives reviews isnt towards the game, but the whole model around having to use $$$ to pay for ingame content and stuff like heroes. Honestly if they just had a "buy once" game it would be extremely positive in reviews.
Not sure if thats the case. It has the time to kill and engagement length of warcraft, with the unit designs of starcraft. The only mechanic missing is a hero unit that you need to level as well, and personally I never really liked that aspect of warcraft. They even retained the mining mechanics, and clearing forest in WC3. You'd think the art direction is inspired by starcraft with its futuristic mech units and whatnot, but everything has a sense of whimsy, from the very curvy, relatively simple designs of faction buildings and units, the abundance of saturated colors, and just how the game comes off thematically that reminds me alot of the camp and whimsy in warcraft 3, you even command dogs as scouts and attack creep camps for christsakes. This game's first impression reads as the last bastion of humanity fighting off demons in a lush verdant forest. It just seems so goofy and unfocused. I think its biggest mistake was trying to straddle fanbases of both games instead of being a more direct spiritual successor to either.
It's a 2024 game but it plays like a 2002 game and looks worse than a 2012 game....
28 дней назад+3
visuals are a dealbreaker for me. everything else would be passable for me if the visuals could capture me. no hero units in 1v1 is also a bummer but like I said, visuals! or more specifically: art style! and at this point, there is no return from that. damn, I even hoped for the next marine level of iconic units. even heroes look bland. The blockade seems like a regular unit ffs.
I feel like the last point you brought up is the most important. Even if they fix all the other stuff there is still the question why I would swap from Warcraft to this Game , I don’t really do anything new, even with all the mistakes fixed it’s just a light version at best.
I am watching your Videos many years now and even played with you sometimes by random ocasions in Warcraft 3. This is one of your best videos and i hope you achieve your goal! Ty for all the nice content!
Most of the shit that is wrong with the game is shit that was wrong in the alpha (and beta...and now in EA). It's shit they were given feedback about many times over and still haven't bothered to change. A lot of it is also shit they doubled down on and are adamant about it being the way it is. Also, it's a massive kick to the face that they are trying to charge money via MTX for missions that they are admitting are not finished. Like my god. Preordering an entire game is one thing, but having MTX for unfinished tidbits of content is just insane.
Stormgate doesn't make me want to play it at all, it's predominantly aimed towards PRO players, but if I don't want to play competitive, I have almost no reason to play it. Like the theme is so bland, space marines, with aliens, and angels, woah. Amazing. It's not like when I watch blizzard cinematics that makes me want to play WOW even though it sucks.
For me Stormgate clashes at a fundamental level before I look at anything else. It's scifi overwatch cartoony mixed with demons who look straight out of fantasy. I didn't see the angels yet since playtesting, but god damn they really just took too much inspiration from SC2. Angels remind me of the later campaigns where the story deviated from intergalatic content to gods and shit. And people I've spoken with don't like that.
I had really high hopes Stormgate would be next big RTS that finally takes the spotlight from Starcraft 2, but from the little I've played of it it really doesn't seem like they're even following their own advise. In early interviews they themselves stated that shockingly large portion of RTS players literally NEVER go on to any of the PvP ladder modes, and have only played the Campaign. They go on to say while the pros and hardcore RTS fans are all only interested in the competitive ladder and all the unique micro and macro mechanics, a majority of the people bringing the game money and popularity that are all essential to funding both the game and tournament prize pools only care about the campaign and other more relaxed modes. Yet despite knowing and stating this publicly, they release into EA with a dinky and unpolished campaign with most of their focus on ladder, and then are surprised when the majority of people looking at the game aren't finding anything fun for them to do. Obviously a solid pvp mode is necessary in the long-term competitive scene, but I think the priority should've been campaign first as they themselves knew and said multiple times that most people who play only care about that. Aside from mismatched priorities, the looks are just absolutely awful. I've been in the early playtesting and at first I had hopes it was just unfinished, but after much more time has past it's clear the general artstyle is just wrong in many ways...
There is potential and a possibility that major changes are made, but the writing likely will not. I'm not really interested in the competitive aspect of it as that likely won't be the reason for longevity but if they can properly adapt from here based on the user's concerns then there is a path forward to success. Models and graphics are likely to receive updates or maybe I'm just expecting too much after Baldur's Gate III. As Wtii pointed out there are many early QoL changes that Starcraft doesn't have so that's an immediate plus and there's plenty to do around the map to keep players engaged. edit: In general they must decide which direction they want to take the graphics because Diablo and Overwatch are completely opposing themes. They can't have it both ways! They understand how attractive and popular OW's cartoonishly light artstyle is, but want to retain the brutality of Diablo? I don't know how they can make that work
It's what they should focus on the most now - make the game impressive and more cinematic looking. All of the rest you can figure out down the line, but once this looks kick-ass, people will at least give it a shot. If you are making a Starcraft 2 successor 14 years after Starcraft 2, it needs to have a Wow moment.
10:00 "Stormgate has some great atmospheric moments and game cutscenes that immerse you, the player, into believing that these places exist." I'm sorry but seeing those 4 story tall humans next to the ruined buildings absolutely shattered that statement.
Well actually I just saw a new game in the works called Immortal: Gates of Pyre. Much better looking and closer to Diablo RTS, for sure. Those cartooney graphics in SG might look like D3, but definitely not D2.
I remember exactly my first time playing StarCraft. That first time I a clicked at zerglings with my marines. I remember thinking, wow those rifles sound awesome, and that splattered alien really sold it. Warcraft 3 too. The setting sucked me in, the 4 races were all so vibrant and different, I loved the heroes. Command and conquer I remember the soundtrack, and the first time I rolled a wave of tanks into my buddies wall of Tesla coils, it just felt awesome, almost visceral. StarCraft 2 sucked me in with its art style and smooth gameplay and the gameplay rhythm, inject, call down mules, do the probe thing. These games pushed things, they felt good to play, there was great feedback, you knew when you walked into a bad situation. It was akin to playing the latest shooter that was pushing graphics and gameplay. Stormgate? I’m not sure. Felt no cool factor, nothing was like oh yea I felt that explosion. Even Warcraft 3 without many explosions, I still felt an orc grunt swinging that axe, so chunky…The first time I heard the “marine” shoot I was like ehhhh…I just see Terran with robot dogs, diablo3 guys, and Protoss with a mothership but no zealots? And the maps look like it’s a Sunday in a sun filled meadow? While earth is under assault by inter dimensional demons and space angel aliens floating around with some purpose? And I have these creep camps with no heroes in 1v1?
Is Stormgate Bad or Misunderstood? Let me know what you thought! Like the Video if you enjoyed it & Thanks for Watching!
100k !! let's go bro !
@@WTiiWarcraft bad, they need to change strategie
Commenting for the algo so Wtii gets the exposure he so deserves. Also, BAD.
A bit of a loaded question considering the video title.
Neither, I really love the 1vs1 is hated because it's not SC2 xD for me personally I already prefer it over aoe4 or even wc3 in 1vs1
To anyone saying you can't criticize the game because it's in early access, that's exactly when you criticize it. That way they can take your input and make changes. Baldur's gate was a fantastic example of that.
Some people legit think glazing the game is what makes it better.
This. I remember people criticizing the hell out of BG3 when it was in early access. it had somewhat mixed reviews, but look how this game turned out. Early access is an opportunity for devs to look at feedbacks and fix their game.
Baldurs Gate is good game but bad Baldurs Gate entry
In some cases it’s not criticism along the lines of “this needs to be better” rather “this will never be good”
There's a difference between criticism and not understanding the game is in early access. There are tons of people unironically thinking this is the major release and that the game still needs at least a year of work left. Well of course it does they literally told us exactly that. There is plenty to critique about the game but acting like it's suppose to be near finished is braindead.
2:22 In the words of TotalBiscuit (RIP) "If an early access game has microtransactions, you should treat it as a complete product".
A comment from the subreddit 8 months ago that was downvoted to death.
Fanboys going to fanboy I guess.
"It's never about reinventing the wheel, it's about your setting and its characters having their own identity. Stormgate has NONE of that. There is no equivalent to Zerg even if they essentially recreated Zerg units with a different skin; there is none of the uniquely eerie and strange Night Elf/Protoss vibes, and the human faction is a forgettable mash of generic and mechanically confused nonsense, with a mix of visually bland units, with specialized and general-use units sharing the same tech tiers.
There are so many layers to the problems I wouldn't even know where to start, but the first one is: where's the worldbuilding? Say what you want about RTS as a genre, but different races/factions need to have a robust identity where a core idea is reflected through every part of their design, aesthetic or mechanical.
For Zerg in SC, the Hivemind and Evolution are central ideas, with strange and unsettling swarming units. They're organic, alien beings, and you see all manners of carapaces, tentacles and poisonous/acidic vesicles. The swarming aesthetic is reflected in the way units spawn, with Zerglings in pairs and larvae pooling allowing for massive biological spawning bursts. Their adaptibility is reflected through various distinct mutations, and it's a core pillar of the narrative about Zerg being a cosmic infestation almost impossible to overcome, because they constantly shift in form and function based on the challenges they encounter. There's an exploration of themes like control/freedom through Kerrigan and the Overmind, and that is reflected through strong and viscerally understandable intuitions about the way the Zerg organize, with Queens caring for Hatcheries and larvae, or through Drones sacrificing themselves for the growth of the hive. The audiovisual work ties it all together with blood, flesh, and squishy sounds with dripping, bubbling liquids and distorted, guttural animalistic growls and shrieks.
For Protoss, core themes are somewhat adjacent to Technology and Spirituality. Their buildings AND physiognomy is all about smooth/sleek surfaces, and they all share a similar code of honor and duty, with ideas about tradition and progress interplaying in the narrative as tension points. This extends into themes of self-sacrifice, asceticism and redemption, witth their civilization presented as being on the brink of extinction; they're ancient, wise, and almost too set in their ways to survive in a world that demands adaptation. Their technological advance is, unlike Terran, NOT scrappy, but methodical, robust and optimized. Quality over quantity, essentially; that outmatched technological progress is seen in regenerating plasma shields (mirroring complex biological processes through technology) and teleportation-like mechanics with warp-ins/time manipulation. The robustness of the units is reflected by a higher resource cost in-game, which is aesthetically resonant. Their presentation is layered with mystical, drawn out choral music evoking the endless expanse of space, and they have echoing, reverberating artificial voices. The core ideas are reflected in EVERY FACET of their design.
Terran? They're scrappy, resourceful and resilient; they're survivors first and foremost, and they'll harvest and use just about anything to increase their chance of surviving. The characterization paints them as unexceptional underdogs in the face of intergalactic, cosmic threats. Their buildings and units have a rugged look reminiscent of makeshift bases or industrial deserts; all of their gear and buildings show signs of wear, communicating implicitly Terran's focus on function over form. As long as it works, it's enough. They reuse their buildings by lifting them off, much like they reuse their people by turning felons and criminals into armed forces. They're thematically right between the biologically-adaptible Zerg and the technologically-dependent transcendent Protoss, and that is reflected in the duality of Bio and Mech. Terran's scrappiness and resourcefulness is also found in their trying to steal/adapt alien tech, borrowing Protoss psionic power to develop Ghosts, and in highly-targeted technology like Irradiate/EMP Shockwave from the Science Vessel. Character voices have a no-nonsense tone, with rough edges to reinforce the core characterization of Terran as a race of "frontier spirit" people focused on practicalities; all the sound design adds to this with mechanical noises, whether crackling fire for the Firebat, hydraulic pressure, high precision drilling from SCVs, gears grinding, or conveyor belt sounds droning on and on. It's a cohesive whole.
I could do the same thing for Warcraft 3 races, no doubt.
Well, there's nothing close to this in Stormgate. At all. It's not even remotely close."
Shame the original writer of this got downvoted on reddit. This is a great comment.
Stormgate: Humans in space. With mechas. Wow! Demons in space. Wow! Angels in space. Prisms? Wow!
have some gold, stranger.
Yeah good comment
so my only issue with saying those things are problems, especially from 8 months ago, is they were working on the mechanics of the game. Now I have zero issue with that being someone's opinion but context on where project is and the type of feedback they were looking for does matter. I will say one thing i have been happy to see is that each time the had a test the game looked better, they had better models, and the mechanics improved.
All that being said I have played the campaign missions that have been released and it definitely doesnt have the impact of WC3 or SC2. I do hope it is good but plenty of anticipated games have been disappointing before.
Can't help but notice how every major "innovation" mentioned by players, is something someone else did a decade or more ago.
"woah, the pillbox changes weapon to match the person inside it!"
Red Alert 2 - Allied IFV & Pillbox (2000), Red Alert 3 Multigunner Turret (2008)
"there's a quick-build menu so you can command workers to construct buildings before returning to work"
Empires: Dawn of the Modern World (2003), Universe at War (2007), Grey Goo (2015)
"you have a buddy bot to help you play by giving it broad commands to assist you in macro!"
Rise of Nations (2003), AI War (2009)
"Neutral camp objective capture points really add an extra layer to the game."
C&C Generals (2003), Age of Empires 3 (2005), Act of War (2005)
"Universal power-bar console at the top of the screen."
Dawn of War Soulstorm (2008), C&C Generals (2003), The Battle for Middle-earth II (2006), Empires: Dawn of the Modern World (2003)
The base defense changing to whoever garrisons it is actually the multi-gunner turret from RA3. Which ironically people also hated for it's artstyle but has better worldbuilding and a fun and hilarious campaign than what FGS managed to churn out.
tbf, taking something someone else already did AND IMPROVING UPON IT, is what blizzard used to be known for.
Also sometimes taking out of genre features can massively change the game, heroes in warcraft 3 an rpg mechanic in rts game
well, yeah, the Reddit Suggestions thread is filled with those. But it is nice to have an RTS that has all of them.
You know so much about RTSs
Since the old developers have no intuition to come up with their own innovations to the RTS genre, why not we brainstorm new ideas ourselves in the replies. I'll start first. Mutually exclusive permanent upgrades. Take two or three upgrades and group them together, but only one can be researched while the rest are locked out for the rest of the game. It forces players to strategize and think ahead of their game plan. That's the only innovation I have thought of in my head after playing RTS primarily for singleplayer for a decade. A basic example would be either increasing a weapon's fire rate to kill units faster or attack range for effective kiting or poking.
The art style & visual presentation is as generically bland and dull as any "direct to mobile" type of a game. What's even worse is they collected so many millions and yet chose this aesthetics...
39:15 I don’t think the issue is “art style” like Impressionism isn’t bad because you don’t like starry night. I look at Warz or the imps and see what they’re going for. They want the game to look good in 10 years.
I see some concept art and really wonder what happened lol the final product is filled with simply bad design choices
And they are sticking to it.
it's as if AI designed it. absolutely baffling they went with it
@@Kamil2142 Ai makes more consistent art. And is getting better and better.
@@Kamil2142 exactly, remember when I first saw Warcraft2 graphics that immediately glued me to the screen willing to find out more about that magical world with exaggerated spaulders and moustache adorned human knights - so emotionally captivating it was I can't forget that to this day.
The game completely lacks a soul. It feels like they took everything they found cool in Blizzard games, and bundled it together. And you end up with Overwatch characters fighting the funkier cousins of Diablo run of the mill demon. I never got interested in the game because the three factions never caught my eyes.
I remember finding W2 orcs awesome, being enthusiastic for W3 undead and night elfs, for SC three races. Here, I'm like "who cares?"
100% feels like soulless cash grab. "Guys blizzard fired of all their rts staff but i have bills"
It has 3 factions that look as if they belong in 3 completely different games and they don't work together.
It was obvious back in June 2022. And in every single reveal since then which was a failure. In a more charitable view, they are clueless coders with zero aesthetic vision. In a less charitable one, they are clueless hacks with an LG TV in their room.
- Adûnâi
Inferno is a good race. They could keep that
@@EmperorSigismund 3 factions that belong to three different games, and the map is from a completely separate 4th game. Nothing looks good lol
20:30 So basically the Allies' Multigunner Turret from Red Alert 3.
The thing I see with Stormgate is that it's basically a very standard-looking-and-behaving RTS. And when a game is very standard, the only way it can succeed is by being better, and it's not. Or at least not yet.
Not even just the multigunner from RA3, but straight up the pillbox/IFV from RA2... From 2000... It's sad when your most innovative ideas are 24 years old.
"there's a quick-build menu so you can command workers to construct buildings before returning to work"
Empires: Dawn of the Modern World (2003), Universe at War (2007), Grey Goo (2015)
"you have a buddy bot to help you play by giving it broad commands to assist you in macro!"
Rise of Nations (2003), AI War (2009)
"Neutral camp objective capture points really add an extra layer to the game."
C&C Generals (2003), Age of Empires 3 (2005), Act of War (2005)
"Universal power-bar console at the top of the screen."
Dawn of War Soulstorm (2008), C&C Generals (2003), The Battle for Middle-earth II (2006), Empires: Dawn of the Modern World (2003)
@Ultrox007 this should be a steam review. Also, by mentioning generals in capture points you do mean the tech buildings right?
@@Ultrox007 Heckin AoM... Retold!
Very knowledgeable!
@@Ultrox007 I don't know why people are talking about the RA2 pillbox, it does not work like that. Only IFVs act like that.
The real question is how much of a budget they have left. Do they have the resources left to get it right?
Didn't they hire a well known actor to voice a character? Surely they didn't spend a big chunk of money on that shit instead of paying developers to finish the game, right?
They're leaking a million dollars a month lmao
@@alanjefferson1127 If that is true. They will be out of business in a year.
@@SuperZura91 Sir we did it, we got brad pitt to make the car noises - what about the rest of the game? what game?
@@Jimboquacks Probably less. Unless they can find additional capital. But I can't imagine investors would be scrambling to throw money at a game with such few active players. Not to mention their StartEngine campaign heavily diluted share value since they valued the company at $150M if you can believe it.
Honestly the biggest RTS games that stick with me strived to be more than just esport spiritual successors. Warcraft 3, OG Starcraft, AOE2, AoM, the CNC series up to 3, all of those could stand on their own without even an internet connection. And there are many more titles out there that are way more memorable than whatever Stormgate is trying to be.
Games that "chase" the esports scene are like people who want to become famous authors -- not like people who want to write a book.
@@MrGatonegroish I completely agree. The ONLY good thing to come out of forced esports wannabe games is that they will attempt to adhere to a certain standard of pace or quality of input>output latency minimization otherwise it wouldn't be acceptable as a competitive game at all.
That doesn't mean they get it right either, but it does mean that somewhere in their mind they care about it being "playable".
The downside to this is that such a fear leads to cloning existing titles from top to bottom so as to avoid criticisms of this nature.
Some of my favourite games of all time have been confusing to get into, because usually it's "why did they devs do this like this ugh it's so weird" that becomes the charm of a game whose focus wasn't streamlining an experience but delivering a fun time
I don't see rts esports going anywhere at least for the next 5 years . When the fortnight kids grow up and their critical thinking develop maybe we will haave a mass big enough to have a good esport in rts .
Aoe 2 have 4 people that live off that game , all the others pros have a job , aoe4 have 2/3 people , aom 0 , starcraft 5-6 but all in korea , i think the main reason for that is the old graphics , gameplay wise is hard to catch the generation that boast his lack of attention as a perk .
What about C&C Generals?
Yep, also Rise of Nations stood amongst the giants you mentioned.
I think it wins the award for worst art style in game that will need to sell cosmetics in its store.
Genius business model to make base unit models ugly to sell skins.
@@hypers829 5Head
"Buy skins for these ugly ass models"
lmao.
@@hypers829 It is, but first you need to actually attract people to sell the game so you then can sell skins. They failed on the first part.
Also really bland campaign with terrible character as the face of the game when they plan to monetize the PVE.
Fans from the very beginning: "The art style looks like shit"
Frost Giant: "We're not changing it"
Why would anyone play this game?
Exactly. And, lo and behold, practically nobody is. They have a lower concurrent player count than during Steam next fest.
It reminds me of AOE4. They defended their graphics for a year before release, and a few months after release, more were already playing AOE2. Then Relic got dropped and had to lay ppl off.
And AOE4 is somewhat successful, but I think a shell of what it could've been. It clearly didn't meet sales expectations when they had to drop the price so soon.
I've played and enjoyed lots of games with poor art styles. It's not always a dealbreaker.
@@blackomega34 There are exceptions, but Stormgate is bad in nearly every way.
it feels like we still just want to play starship troopers or lord of the rings, and if you do not cater to that you cater to no one.
Funny how you have to use WC3 and SC2 to show stormgate devs how their game should feel
Stormgate is made by a small team of no-name indie developers who have never worked on RTS games before, in fact they don't even know what SC2 or WC3 are, give them some slack! /s 🤣
I guess they are aware of all of these. It's easy to say: "you should have a world editor like in SC2 that allows players to make their own games!". It's extremely hard to do such tool and it takes thousands of hours to implement and test it. Making games is hard, making games at SC2 level is very hard.
@@Olagfighno it dont just takes delayed game lunch
@@SchemingGoldberg Wow I thought they were Blizzard veterans who working on Warcraft 3 and Starcraft.
@@Olagfigh The problem is: They suck at EVERYTHING.
Their campaign is a bad joke. He main char is horribly unlikable. The story is a bad copy of Warcraft. The dialogue is bad. There is 0 chemistry between the characters.
All of this has nothing to do with money - but they fked it up big way too.
I still have no idea how they could turn 2024 UE engine to look worse than an over 10 years old game.
Maybe, if they were novices or something, you could forgive alot of the design blunders.
HAHAHA heros looks like tourchlight 1 models
Unreal engine engine.
Age of Empires III, original version. When that awful mid 2000s Bloom effect is disabled that game looks amazing for 2005 release and it still looks better than most RTS games that came after it. I wonder how many people didn't know how amazing that game looks just because they didn't figure out to turn off Bloom.
@@Broformistlmao what was the deal with bloom back then. Same issue in RCT3.
The style looks like edgy funko pops
Oh no.
Yeah, i am not a fan of the artstyle. Reminds me of Overwatch's.
@@bigger_mibber6029 Overwatch, but you need an eye exam. Badly.
Looks like a mobile game
@@svsv1191 Thats what i thought it was the first time i saw it on steam. lol
They put so much money into expensive named composers and VA for subpar performance when other games like Tempest Rising used less famous composers to have might be even better OST...makes you think.
Its like FGS tried to throw money at everything in hope it would work.
There are expensive voice actors there? Like main character is simply awful for instance, pretty objectively, she just doesn't have that great enunciation overall.
I'm not as critical for some other aspects of Stormgate, even if I'm not fan of graphics those can fly by after some final polish but VA performance is just so damn bad so it's weird to hear that a lot of money went into that.
@@andrzejnadgirl2029 Matthew Mercer at least.
Lmao Tempest Rising isn't much better, especially how many Ls 3DRealms has been getting
Tempest Rising has Frank Klepacki as a composer. Less famous he ain't
> used less famous composers
Klepacki (Bless his soul) still working on Tempest Rising and Tempest Rising has VA problems... because they are using AI 💀💀💀💀💀💀💀💀
If studios don't want critical feedback and negative comments on a product, then they shouldn't have "early access". I see "early access", "alphas" and "betas" for digital products as a doubled edge sword: the more negative side - make as much money as possible on an unfinished product and bail, and the more positive side - allow the community to beta test, discover bugs, give feedback and ideas on how to improve.
Also, streamers with large audiences will withhold a lot of obvious criticisms, and be overly positive to a degree that is insulting to the people watching, and to the people who paid for the game. People are also repeatedly told to hold their criticisms until after the game is released, which makes absolutely no sense.
Bingo. The whole point of early access is so they can get feedback and criticism from the players, so they can improve the product before it's released. If they don't like that feedback, then they shouldn't have an early access.
Its not that the Art Style is bland or ripping of Starcraft/Warcraft. Its that the Concept art is low quality the artist doesnt understand the basic fundamentals of design. The Director doesnt understand the basic fundamentals of Racial Fantasy. Just take a look at the 2 headed Beer Bellied axe Wielder WHO WANTS HIM ON THEIR TEAM? Buzz Lightyear Mech Who wants to be caught dead playing that? Its infantilzation of gaming by FunkoPop collecting Manchildren Redditors
Bro went off on the devs like they owe him money.
Let's not forget the Paw Patrol
Finally, this man is getting his RUclips Playbutton. I am glad I was part of this wild ride. Thank you Mr. Wtii
I'm sorry, but a game with a 40 million budget from allegedly experienced developers in the RTS genre should have not looked so lacking in literally every aspect. Making fun of it is completely fine.
Stormgate is showing us that people got fired from blizzard for a reason
xD Aren't those all people who left around 2020? The creators of Starcraft 1 and Diablo 2 left before 2010 down to the last man!
How should I put it... Stormgate doesn't look fun or interesting to me, and I think I'm part of the targeted audience of RTS in general.
I watch gameplay of Dawn of War, Dawn of War 2, Company of Heroes, Company of Heroes 2, Men of War - and I feel instantly interested and want to install to play.
I watch gameplay of Warcraft 2, Warcraft 3, Starcraft, Starcraft 2, Age of Empires, Age of Mythology - and I feel relaxed and wonder if I should reinstall to feel some nostalgia.
I watch gameplay of Sins of Solar Empire Rebellion, Empire Earth, Red Alert 1/2/3, Hearts of Iron... I simply startup the game as they're never uninstalled on my machines.
Stormgate simply doesn't resonate with me at all, which is absolutely rare. The game looks very plastic, stiff, as if the design isn't aligned to be played as it is. Like a puppeteer doing a show with a few less strings attached - something's missing that I can't put my finger on. I dislike my own thinking like that and I haven't even tried Stormgate yet, but I refuse to play what I've been watching from content creators. In the future I'll surely give it a go and I hope I'll have a good time by then.
Edit: I think I know what's feeling iffy for me, anyone played old league of legends? Know that feeling you got on the old map (2009~2010) while the newer champions came out with seemingly 3 generations ahead graphically? After they updated the map a few years later, all those 'new' champions felt just right - this is a world of league of legends. Then came the issue of the old champions looking like someone put Heroes of Might & Magic 2 heroes in Heroes of Might & Magic 5, as if they didn't belong anymore. Now that reworks have been made the entire game looks flawless (graphically). Stormgate has the same flavour of discrepancy, in my opinion.
Graphically Stormgate isn't finished yet. Like overall character designs can be criticized as those won't change by much at this point but sure thing it feels off - there is a lot of details still missing as well as not even all shaders are already in play.
No idea of you seen Dota 2 late alpha version compared to open beta version - graphics looked almost identically in both. But lighting, shaders, terrain textures being improved, just dozens of small improvements gave completely different feeling. If that's the main concern I would just wait for proper release as I'm sure those will be fixed by then.
@@andrzejnadgirl2029 I haven't seen that dota comparisson, but I'm sure it must've been a stunning improvement.
I felt the same way about Dawn of War 2's closed beta stepping into open beta, and release. My old Gtx 580 at the time essentially burped after the updates haha.
Closed beta: "Well, it's clearly placeholder, zero shadows, no shiny colours to the armies."
*580 whirrs at peace*
Open beta: "Oh, there's shaders in the game, and some ridiculous 'metallic' types of colours that sparkle a lot?"
*580 whirrs with stress*
Release: "Oh my lord, there's even corpse and debris rendition that's lasting! How amazin... Why did I bluescreen?"
*580 is melting with a whimper*
Oh yeah, league. I started playing just around season 4 and later they downgraded league to that horrible mobile map, old one had charm and just looked better overall.
@@Thugblader92 your 580 will be happy with wc3 which looks miles better than stormgate (and won't melt btw)
Empire Earth? Based alert
They focused on the 1v1 and neglected the campaign. You know, the thing that the good Blizzard games were praised for and which half the player base for Stormgate spent most of their time. These people who bragged about their veterancy in game design didn't understand the fundamentals of the only genre they know and botched the entire development of this game as a result.
Now, damage control is the operating term and there's not gonna be any more hype. This game can't survive in its present state and the bad decision making of Frost Giant's leadership means they won't have the money to continue operating long enough to fix it. In all likeliness, this game will be sold for a few million to EA and then they'll try to fix it. But there's nothing to salvage. Starcraft is still the better 1v1, the story and the characters are unlikable and boring and unmarketable and the co-op is nothing special. Stormgate is a game with no value despite a 40 million dollar investment.
This entire thing was a joke.
I knew a guy that donated like $200 to the kickstarter, and little did he know it went into the Tim's next trip to Malibu, because they're getting paid like 250k each
If you ever hear the words “spiritual successor” and “made by the guys who made ___” assume it’s 3 of the interns who got the boot from the OG company because they were wankers.
@@thedude4840 Yes exactly. This "looks" like SC 2 and WC 3 but it is built LIKE THEY DID NOT UNDESTAND THOSE TWO GAMES. Who are these people?
I don't even like Starcraft but it's crazy how good the game looks compared to whatever Stormgate is supposed to be.
You know, i could probably swallow alot of the issues. But nobody seems to talk about the pricing model, witch just wreak of greed and exploration. Theres no barrier to entry, but once inside you get squished like a ripe juicy peach. The value per dollar is just horrendous and these devs should know about it. The left a greedy dev house, but took every wrong lessen with them.
12 year old chad videogame made by people with love and care vs modern alpha, battle pass, fortnite graphics game made to keep the lights on.
It's almost like it had five more years of development before it came out
@@KingsNJenssons SG has been in development for 3.5 years and can use Unreal Engine to fall back on which sc2 did not. That would cut development time of sc2 down from 7 years to about 5 years. So your 5 years is really 1.5 years.
I feel the same. I always adored wc but just accepted sc, but sc was always able to immerse me, stormgate makes me feel nothing.
I was shocked when on Day9 stream some people were saying "its okay that there is no save-load in this mission and that you've been soflocked and have to restart, its an early access". Not an excuse. Brushing off any critisism is just insultingly stupid. I thought about playing it, but the sound alone pissed me off. Feels like some characters are 50% louder than others.
RTS fanboiz gonna fanboi. Stormgate could kill their dog and grandma and they would somehow claim that it's a good thing.
for me, it should be a design choice, if anything. These days I try to play without save-load as much as possible, and every single game is more fun for it. Some games are too much not designed for it though.
Day9 rated the game a 1-2/10 lmao
@@Shmandalf ooof, i thought he kinda liked it, but critisized its raw state. I was expecting 5 out of 10
@@snuffeldjuretthat's you, most people like to save/load
Stormgate currently makes Reforged look good by comparison, and I don't have much hope for it clearing that bar.
bullshit reforged is still worse than this
stormgate is bad rn but reforged is much much worse
@@user-yt1jg7ks4xI'll take reforged models any day over this. Just take human villager vs stormgate villager.
klepacki is a total legend btw. i once reached out to him to just let him know how epic i considered hell march back in -96 when RA1 was released, and the dude sent me a god damn vinyl with his music.
absolute stellar 10/10 dude, and makes amazing rock-style soundtracks to games that are very unique. ive always wished klepacki would be hired for a doom game to hear his interpretation of that music, because i bet itd be absolutely fucking rad
Sorry but almost every single visual design choice is wrong. Every unit design is insultingly non-harmful and without grounding. Nothing makes logical sense for the universe they want you to believe in, so you really just cant suspend your disbelief at all
Agreed.
Every design looks like it's the bastard child of Warcraft, Starcraft, and Overwatch, but without any originality, and with all the edges sanded down into a mass markatable mush that looks like a rushed out chinese gotcha game.
@@Simmons8519 This is exactly how I feel about it, as well. I think they put artwork of Warcraft, Starcraft and Overwatch in an AI art program and used the output as the basis of the final designs. They look painfully generic.
Exactly this! Where is the mighty tank? The awe inspiring ship? The agile looking lady? The strong looking guy? Where is the scifi tech that makes you want to build it as soon as you can to play with it? Where is the demon that makes everyone quake in fear?
This art style does nothing for me, so sad.
First of all I want to say that your edits are really good, funny and just for that it's worth watching the entire video, great job!
Second and last thing (and I will probably stir a hornet's nest here) is that 35-40 million dollars for 4 years of game development for 8 people, even after accounting for voice actors, renting studios etc. AND adding day one microtransactions for an EARLY ACCESS version... it's just a bit too rough after the quality of the product presented here. And I am not saying it's greed, it might as well be mismanagement of funds. Heck, It might as well be a horrendous payckech the voice actors took. I don't know, I don't blame anyone in particular. All I say is that something seems off.
Also, the game should BE somewhat popular, should have a sizeable player-base in the first place. Only then you can have enough free2play enjoyers who buy your stuff / only then you can have enough free loaders that keep the game populated so you can sell humongous amounts of bull shit to whales.
If you go in with MTX first, while nothing is polished, who is there to sell it? This is just ripping off your loyal (to be) fans, who would market the game to other potential buyers for free.
This is my quarrel with art today in general; look at Acolyte, Rings of Power etc. how much money they spent and how shait and far removed from lore and fansbanses the final product is. You are asking the right question. How did CD Project Red make Witcher with pretty much no money? These days we seem to overpay for lack of quality and interest (not saying this is the case here, but it can be if they are not careful). Wtii's edits are famous, his Reforged review vidoes are something out of this world too
dw half of these 40mils went into pockets, not into a game.
The devs built their own engine with Unreal only doing the graphical burden, which costs a lot of development time and resources. Frost Giant also invested into having a full on studio with a bunch of game development equipment and office appliances, which are not cheap either.
Most indie studios do not start off with the kind of capital that FG did. Most indie studios also don't have the money to hire the kind of people behind this project and put them under one roof to develop games.
That a lot of money is being spent on starting the studio is not surprising considering that it is often expensive to start a business. It is a risk that all parties involved are taking to get the return of that investment further down the line. The question is if they can sustain it through its live service or until their next project if the first one fails. We will likely only know for sure once 1.0 launches, but it is definitely off to a rough start.
To be pretty brutal frostgiant started hiring extremely experienced persons. These experienced persons didn't take states though they took salaries. People underwsti.ate how badly management slaalries weight down a company. In this case the salaries to some larger actors may have been the real problem.
the graphics.... I used to think Dota 2's graphics looked washed-out and too cartoony.... but here comes Stormgate, holy sh....
I never felt like Dota 2 looked cartoony, best examples are some well anchored heroes in real looks like Broodmother. If people with arachnophobia had issues with her looks that meant that they nailed it IMHO. Only recent heroes from Dota 2 look properly cartoony, like Mars or Snapfire - those have that Pixar vibes but original Dota 2 designs didn't felt cartoony at all.
When dota was ported to source 2 it changed a bit and started to look more "cartoony" but really it's just more washed out, source 1 dota was king in terms of gritty atmosphere
yeah, dota 2 was on the edge of what I could stomach. I think it looks good though, which is why I was able to play it. But that style when it looks bad, eww..
Dota 2 is cartoony? What? Have people forgot what cartoony means?
The thing that bothers me how much copycat is it. It's not a problem if it was inspired by SC2 or Warcraft 3, but it's interface is literally a carbon copy of SC2. Where the icons are, coop commander selection screen, the top ability bar is literally spear of adun interface etc.
Playing Vanguard feels like playing Terran. The voicelines for the worker are the same. Also a medivac but less cool. Marines. Melee marines. Medic. Cyclones. Battleship carrier.
13:30 I did not know I needed to hear dev updates in the voice of Arnold. Thank you! 🤣
I really dislike the games artstyle it just looks cheap and crappy. It has no texture and shading and it just makes it looks like plastic
I'll just copy my response to the heroes journey excuse in the steam forum:
"This is nonsense. You've not built up your characters. You've not created them in a way that feels real and relatable. You're just a couple of missions in before the "Frostmourne plot" kicks in and the characters have basically gone through zero character development. Lets compare it with the Human Campaign in WC3. You've seen Arthas go from high-spirited, friendly and reliable, to desperate and pragmatic, to vengeful and obsessed, to finally losing his humanity. Frostmourne doesn't even appear in the story line before you're 9 chapters in. By the time Arthas claims it, he is at his wits end, both mentally and physically, and he snaps. Amara throws herself at the McGuffin from the very beginning, and the cursed blade in question appears in the second chapter.
Also while Amara is a bad character, she's not the worst one. That medal probably goes to the "treasure hunter", who is basically just an (self?) insert for a cali girl."
monetization in early access is something I'll never patronize, even if it was from pre-activision blizzard putting out sc3 - present me with a finished product first, then I'll get my wallet out
Stormgate should monetize every single aspect of the game from the UI to the music to the models, EVERYTHING!. Stick it ALL in the store and then charge 60-70$ to unlock everything at once.
FG should pay the players who tested it during early access.
Only $60? Nonsense, in order to install the game you must sign a binding contract that gives your soul and first born child to Frost Giant Studio. You should be grateful to even have the opportunity to play such a... wonderful game. Just consume product and get excited for next product.
The biggest problem people have with the game is the subversion of expectations. In WC3 and SC1/2 there were cinematics that grounded the games in reality and made it relatable in your head while at the same time the cartoony, very legible game was a design decision to make the gameplay more digestible. Do orcs need burrows to increase pop cap? Not really, but functionally they're better than the pig farms and are more fun and unique when compared to the farms from the human faction. The races aren't different because they ARE different, they're different for game reasons and the cinematics give you a window to look into their world and see that everything is grounded in some for of reality. Thrall and Grom VS Magtharedan still lives rent free in my head to this day.
"Thrall. *wheezing cough* The blood haze has lifted. The demon's fire has burnt out in my veins. I have freed... myself..."
"No... You have freed us all... RAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH"
Prior to that I spent 15 minutes trying to figure out why I couldn't kill grom and he kept telling me "Ha, you'll have to do better then that, little brother" because I was a stupid kid that couldn't micro thrall.
If the game was literally just the same as the IP "Small Soldiers" then this wouldn't be an issue because they cinematics would be from the perspective of these very stylized things, but it's not and that shatters your disbelief that this could be in anyway realistic.
Disagree
So true
Omg you confused Magtheridon with Mannoroth it's like you don't even care.
Sorry mate, you got the wrong Pit Lord. It's Mannoroth, not Magtheridon. The former being the one who actually gave it's blood to the Orcs turning them into Fel Orcs, while the latter is
the Ex-Lord of Outland.
The fact they didn’t know how shite their game was on release and instead replying “we are listening to your feedback” to help fix their game is insane. These devs are so out of touch it’s crazy Lmao. 😂
"on release" - game not releasing for another year or two
It won’t be releasing at all at this rate. Keep up the cope.
@@lukex1337 At what rate?
@@RancorSnp only fully funded til early access release. This EA is shite. Good luck.
They're almost out of money, are burning $1M per month and they needed the EA launch to be a massive success in order to earn enough money for them to keep developing. So far the launch has been an abysmal failure.
The graphics are blurry, low contrast and uncannily smooth. I'm not a fan
The free-to-play model I am personally neutral on. But I will say this, I am long, long past any compulsive desire to own everything or buy something just because I see it and it looks cool. I don't have the money for that. So I'm going to look at what people say about things like the campaign or co-co characters and assess whether I think it is worth the money or not. Right now, I'm not convinced of this for the campaign. For co-op, I have not played it much yet so I can't say. The current price could be ok, but that kind of depends on whether or not I think Blockade specifically gives a lot of value for the time I use him while he is free.
As they add characters though, I advise they add a free one for each race. As is, Vanguard is really the only race that is easy to jump into.
It's free2play, so you can just download and play it. No need for a credit card ;O)
I was excited, but it just doesn't look fun. It looks soulless. I feel that the "made by ex-Blizzard to make a spiritual successor to WC3/SC2" is just a pitch to garner sympathy. They said they were funded, but constantly ask for more funding, and charge people to test the game for them. It just feels like a nostalgia bait cash grab.
Stormgate really makes us realize what a gem SC2 was, huh? 😅 I don't know...I find it weird that they already start charging for things, when nothing is certain or finished. It just feels...wrong? Or that's just me. That's understandable that they want to earn some money, but for now, i'd just give people a few random missions for free, so that they could try them out and give feedback. And when the full campaign is finished, charge for it. I'm also a bit worried about this roadmap. There's a lot of new features (especially the one you'd have to pay for), yet the things that are already in game, needs to be improved. I hope they take that into account
I don't even like StarCraft 2, but man, this game made HEART OF THE SWARM look competent.
and that's saying something :/
@@KaiserMattTygore927 SC2 best rts ever made
Shame that Blizzard abandoned it because it couldn't make hundreds of millions of dollars like Overwatch does. The RTS world has to move on, we can't just stay still forever, no new players play SC2 anymore, only the old ones.
@@KaiserMattTygore927 Heart of the Swarm's campaign isn't THAT bad.
That's the thing, as I was working on this & doing research for it by spending some time with Starcraft 2 it made me remember just how darn good that game is & how brutal it is to compare it with Stormgate
This review was done with an insane amount of detail and suggestion. Wtii's map breaking skills come in very handy when game testing! Personally, I cant care enough about this game unless it makes a major turnaround and fixes many of the things the community pointed out. I cant shake the feeling of looking at an overpriced Warcraft Reforged. I hate the way characters look, too cartoonish. But that's just me. Bonus points for the Overclocked Easter Egg and amazing breakdown of how a spell should look and feel like (i.e. Warden blink). Thoroughly enjoyed the review, Mr. Wtiinarius.
Am I tripping or does the UI look MASSIVE ? Like it's easily taking 25 % of the screen
They're expecting the player base to be filled with geriatrics because RTS isn't hip with the young audience.
@@shellshockedgerman3947 What, I thought that's why they went with fortnite graphics - to appeal to the kids.
@@allanshpeley4284 Trust me buddy, that's not Fortnite graphics. All you guys keep saying Fortnite/Mobile game graphics to attract kids, but kids usually don't play these kinds of game.
@@shellshockedgerman3947 That's why they chose the fortnite kiddy graphics, chief.
@@shellshockedgerman3947 As a geriatric 33 y/o RTS enjoyer, true
Why was set in a sci fi setting anyway? They should have definitely picked some other setting.
Near futuristic humanity army vs. Demon horde (+ robotic angels) works as a setting with no problem. Look at Doom series, Quake series.
It is just bad implementation.
@@mustardjelly1813 The problem is we've seen this setting already in StarCraft and it looked great there. Atleast make it so that its a distinguishable theme.
@@el33tkrewWhat do you suggest? Historical setting?
A billion strategy games that have done that.
Fantasie setting? Warcraft III
Sure they could have picked a less represented architecture and are style and had a clash of the world's, but let us not kid ourselves that isn't the problem.
Iron harvest was rather unique in their setting with a alternative WW1 setting with advanced and at the same time experimental technology. But that didn't carry over to extreme financial success.
People complain about the graphics design and yeah they should have just gone with the realistic style SC2 is known for but the worst offender is gameplay. We got Tankivacs, snow balling infantry, psi storm 9000, immoral units that explode after a short time and so much more. At the end of the day an RTS is defined by its mechanics and the only impressions they leave is pain
@@gabrielreinalter2269 fantasy setting
fantasy is so much richer than sci-fi
a sci-fi can only be like sc while fantasy can be so muhc more than just wc3.
@@mustardjelly1813 I think that is a massive issue. This game needs like 7 factions, not 3.
I find the concept of humans fighting demons who are actually aliens really uninteresting.
I don't think adding AI voices to the campaign will do the terrible reputation of the voice acting already in the game any favors.
Just makes it sound unprofessional, ESPECIALLY for a studio with millions in their budget.
Considering the low quality of California voice actors... honestly, I think the AI can do a better job.
@@SchemingGoldberg yeah I don't mind it, especially not during development
I kinda want to replay the SC2 campaign now.
I didn't even play hots or lotv, but I might by sc1 remastered and replay the campaign for the first time since I did it the last millennia :P.
@@snuffeldjuret Heart of the swarm is awesome. I highly recommend it ^^
It was terrible. Stick to the SC1 campaign.
wanting Stormgate to succeed because "frostgiant seems like genuinely nice people" is awful reasoning
Well he has no interest in the game himself, so he's not invested in it at all.
Starcraft 1 launched will complete campaign in 1998, unlike this new game
As an old shool Blizzard fanboy. I can still remember how WC3 blew my mind as a child. It was just so magical, interesting and new.
It introduced fresh concepts. Like leveling heroes in an RTS. It was groundbreaking.
The cinematics where the best there were at the time. You couldn't get better looking stuff anywhere else than what Blizzard did.
When I look at Stormgate it's just sad. It is kinda a cheap copy whithout any vision. There is nothing new and exciting about it.
There are no interesting characters or lore elements. It's just as bland as it's art style.
I don't think this is likely to get salvaged. They are kinda locked in in too many bad directions already.
Best you can hope that it gets marginally less bad. The foundation is still rotten though.
The campaign looks like a joke, that first mission is just a rip of Human 01 from WC3, the art style is just repulsive, and their monetization system is skeevy AF.
Campaing is shit, cut scenes are shit, characters are shit, voice acting is shit, actual gameplay is "passable" but the difference between its "spiritual precursors" like wc3 and sc2, is night and day, like holy shit, i don't even think they can fix this, only smooth it out, but playing this is straight up painful, everything feels as wrong and as unintuitive and unsatisfying as possible. We might have been spoiled by wc3 and sc2, becuse some other rts dont feel as good, but storm gate is just next level shit. And yeah, models and artstyle, lightining, etc is horrible, looking at a fight is painful, its so hard to tell anything apart becuse it just all blurs.
And this all is just the actual "game" issues. The way they handle the game, 25$ for a glorifed beta test, where micro transactions are prioritrized over actual features, and how they went about responding to this criticism. Denying making many mistakes, and treating fans like we are stupid. Its honestly supprising its only mixed on steam, rather than straight negative.
"Mixed" review in Steam is kinda already bad tbh, even if it's ~60% positive.
@@ZeroChannalThe reviews since the full f2p release have been 37% positive (counted manually yesterday, there is a graph in the bottom).
- Adûnâi
@@ZeroChannal It's down to 55% positive now and falling.
@@angamaitesangahyando685 Oh wow, I didn't think to look at reviews just since EA launch. Man, that's brutal.
It's not just shit compared to sc2 or wc3, it's shit compared to all modern RTS.
BAR is free, made by part time devs and community, while being 10x this game
Congrats 100k well there it is! Hope you have a bundle of goodie videos for us
Free to play was a bad call. This is a great example of a 30 dollar middle market experience. Concerned about monetisation. Also, echoing negative thoughts on art style and game feel. I don't like what's here, how it looks or how it sounds. Its not just a lack of polish, i fundamentally disconnect from the basic vision here.
Final point, this story introduces the idea of a demon invasion across a human empire, and has the audacity to skip the first twenty years of it or so. Why couldnt this be the demon campaign? Awful. Personally I've emotionally moved on. Will look at this again in two years, but my expectations are abysmal. The focus is on the part of starcraft 2 I hated (hardcore sweaty PVP), and it shows.
Amara looks so annoying
I just hate that the campaign story and character designs are a blatant rip-off. They say that 'imitation is the highest form of flattery', but this feels like SG skinned WC3, SC2's faces, and wearing over it's own face like some grotesque abomination.
If they can't even get the Cutscenes right, what makes them think we'd be dumb enough to even give their game a try.
I gonna be honest with the art style. Why?
I mean warcraft 3 is cartoonish but remembers more a comic book (a good comic book btw), Starcraft gone directly to a more realistic vision (like gears of war, Bungie halo and half life 2) but stormgate... I'm just sick of this Pixar trending, a kid can play rts for sure but a kid playing rts wants battles and destruction. Not the next bootleg Pixar looking action Game where assets gonna be used mainly to extract your own essence
Rise of Nations (and later Cossacks 3) actually also had an AI "buddy", meaning you as well as an AI will control the same nation for better or worse.
Rise of Nations was awesome I miss it
@@VMUDream One of the most underrated RTS games ever.
Still remember those conquer the world campaigns
I used to play that game with my dad as a kid, he always rushed forts as romans and stole the map. Those were the days.
RoN was awesome in every way.
It had innovative RTS implementations to make the game fun, easy, but at the same time, epic.
Visual and sound design were so good, too. The music changing over age progression, building styles changing into modern era..
interesting to know!
What I like about Warcraft 3 is the unique RPG component it has, leveling up your heroes, choosing which skills to spend points on, getting items or buying items to improve your hero, improving your units. All this makes Warcraft 3, IN MY POINT OF VIEW, the best RTS.
Agreed. The devs for Stormgate are apparently going to add those mechanics to the campaign, which I am all for.
Would be cool if Co-op also had a mode where you need to level your Hero during the course of the match like classic WarCraft 3. Would add some additional depth to the gameplay where it encourages you to farm in-between objectives and such.
I think Spellforce Dawn of Order did the RPG RTS combination really really good.
I like that it's on steam, but I can't ignore that the devs COMPLETELY shafted the backers by not giving them full access, and the fact that it seems a lot of feedback wasn't listened to at all?
but the barebones of the gameplay are definitely alright for "free" as someone that does not care about campaign at all
Congrats on 100k WTII!! Much love for the best Custom Hero Survival player!
There Are So many problems, bugs, lags, it looks like SC2 in the main menu
Art style looks like plastic, And Story Is going towards arthas...
And the worst problem... They ignore most of the feedback, there was a bug that they didn't fixed... FOR MONTHS
FOR people who talks that it's early access, I played Songs of Conquest in Early access... And IT was better then Early Access then SG, I am sorry to say this
If they can't fix every problem it Will not work And they Will fail
Let's say the exact same sentence, but with positivity and constructive vibe.
"If they can fix every problem, it will work, and it will succeed"
See ? Not that hard hu ? Completly changes the feeling about your feedback and the game itself. Makes people want to believe and support a studio THAT NEEDS SUPPORT.
Why do you need to go the clown way ? You think it makes you look smart ? Calling for doom ? You have anything to prove ?
I don't get why it had to look so PLASTIC. Units look like they were made from play-dough. Overwatch uses a stylized approach too, but the models there don't look like someone ate lots of glossy paint and vomitted that onto plastic toys.
@@noquarter9700 i am giving critism, I want the game to succede but when the game looks like this, it's hard to say if the game Will be good
@@okguzelce yeah :(
Ah song of conqest as sesth put it best
"Idk when intented interactions end and bugs begin"
The aesthetics are the #1 reason I am not interested in Stormgate. It doesn't need "amazing graphics". But aesthetics matter. If steak had the consistency of snot, or Star Wars looked like Powerpuff Girls, they wouldn't have the same appeal.
Man, I really do not get the idea that Stormgate 1v1 is "generally solid". Very few of the units are like... Fun to use lol. The roster for every faction feels pretty anemic too. Like Infernals against Humans, half your units won't even be able to get into range to attack.
Making demons one of the factions I think was a mistake. Not only because it doesn’t fit the aesthetic at all, but because they’re evil. There’s no gray area there. There is plenty of games to compare this to, but since they’ve copied and pasted from WarCraft and StarCraft, I’m going to compare to that.
In WarCraft, the orcs and undead appear like their going to be the big bad villains, and they sometimes are, but then you get to know them and see that they’re just as varied as the humans and elves. They’re evil, good, and everything in between. You can still feel like your playing rad monsters, and relate to them at the same time. It’s good to have straight evil enemies also, but when 1/3 of your playable game doesn’t have any sort of variation, it’s going to be a less interesting story.
In StarCraft, you start off thinking both the Protoss and Zerg are evil, and you get the same thing when you learn more about them. They’re alien and very different from the humans, but there is a variety of personalities and morality. The Protoss would glass entire planets, but we’re doing that from what they believed was an honorable and good place.
both demons and celestials are a complete miss
I disagree about Zerg not being blatantly evil. Technically their goal isn't to kill, but to "survive" but they literally do that by consuming everything in sight and assimilating other species into their own. It's not something you can ultimately justify or call "morally grey" even. Also sometimes playing the bad guy is fun. The demons are just kinda generic and boring.
@@rh7474They saved the universe. So there’s that. They’re only as evil as their leader. The only evil leader they’ve had is Amon. Both the Hivemind and Kerrigan were just his puppets, but still fought against him. The Zerg are definitely not evil. They’re probably the least evil of the three armies, since they’re just animals unless someone controls them.
The very fact that the story to convert Kerrigan, then leave her the Swarm to control was possible was proof enough for the grey area. Kerrigan could be considered unaligned or even good at that point, before her nature came out and she started scheming, becoming more evil than Overmind ever could. Sc2 of course forgot about all of this, making Raynor touchy feely even after she killed his friend.
While the UI is not the worst part, but it makes me wonder. Does the UI of modern games designed by interns? Just like the UI for WC3 Reforged, it looks like a placeholder. It is just so simplistic that it does not feel like it is streamlined but just cheap and boring.
There's also just too much of it, but that's a problem with modern games in general.
I'm still a dinosaur and prefer the more contextual UI of StarCraft 64. :(
@@KaiserMattTygore927 I'm quite the opposite, but that's a completely different topic again. For me the old PC games are the norm, especially for RTS. And they had lots of UI space on the screen, which I like.
@@KaiserMattTygore927 Speaking about old RTS games. I really miss that feeling that you could only see a small fragment of the map on the screen at once (because of the limitations of the resolution). It has this cozy feeling that you are in that small clearing in the middle of darkness. Plus it made the fights more intense as well, you could not see the attackers that easily.
the GUI in modern games is so bad, i have noticed from quite some time about this bland ui design in modern games.
Take age of empires 2 vs the new modern version (definitive edition).
age2 main menu was a medieval street, and the icons said menu where the bilboard on the street.
definitive edition? just a generic, bland, run of the mill menu with buttons arrangerd from top to bottom.
they are more concerned on functionallity than style.
shout out to Majesty, its main menu is great.
Showing Sc2 is like putting more salt into the wound :D. (literally posted before you even said it in the video lol)
Btw did you know - most of the stormgate spell/upgrade icons are bought assets (so no uniqueness here too) - icons by A-ravlik
I didn't know that. What are the names of the assets by ravlik?
@@allanshpeley4284 you can look for them on his portfolio on artstation
@@allanshpeley4284 Just look on artstation for his portfolio - you can find all his resources over there - i believe is a icon spell pack.
Holy shit seriously?
I've been able to match a couple of icons by having a cursory look. Probably could find more if I took my time. Seems legit.
I feel like this is gonna be another "Back 4 Blood" being compared with Left 4 Dead.
Hey!! Back 4 blood was complete product when it was released!! I really enjoyed it (until before I hit higher difficulties with ridiculous rigged settings)
@@mustardjelly1813 yea Back 4 blood was lit when they finally fixed the game breaking bugs. The game metrics were polished at release, but it really lost most players between that difficulty scaling and the ridiculously tedious card system, but people still play it today and it IS a good game now when you get past the card hurdle.
Remember the philosophical intrigue of WC3's Arthas-analogous to seizing the one ring for your people-and StarCraft's original campaign-sacrifice at any cost for one's goals.
Yea, well, here's a sassy female protagonist (again) with male features. Have fun. She's sad sometimes.
Is anybody surprised? Frost Giant Studios is in California. And we all know that Californians hate beauty and love ugly stereotypical girlbosses.
Looks like she needs a burger.
With this game being demonstrated in this way, I can only come to a conclusion: Warcraft III was the best RTS that we humans could create and there will be nothing like it for the rest of our existence because the technology was lost a long time ago...
Lol
I raise you one
Age of Mythology and it's expansion, the Titans. Now THAT was a RTS treat
Starcraft 2 baby, greatest casual rts that will ever exist
Wow, they got the command & conquer doing music, such a waste for this bad game, the C&C music is legendary
20:40 Pillboxes changing according to who enters it is so creative we have never seen it. That is if you forcefully eject C&C: Red Alert 3 from your memory. Did you know that an allied soviet player could send his Tesla units into your bunkers to make mini Tesla Towers?
Here's the other special effects:
Allied infantry
Peacekeeper: Shotgun turret faster than the IFV
Javelin soldier: Heavy missile turret (6 Missile Launchers) but slower reload rate after all missiles are fired
Allied engineer: Short ranged repair crane
Attack dog: Sonic bark, stuns infantry. As of a recent patch, they can no longer garrison turrets, but can still enter Multigunner IFVs.
Spy: Sniper turret
Tanya: Supreme anti-infantry turret
Cryo Legionnaire: Cryo Turret that freezes units. Can also freeze air units, and when they are fully frozen, will drop out of the sky. Fires a cryo-beam (similar to a Cryocopter's) instead of liquid nitrogen.
Soviet infantry
Conscript: Heavy machine gun
Combat engineer: Short ranged repair crane
War Bear: Infantry stunning ability. As of a recent patch, they can no longer garrison turrets, but only Multigunner IFVs.
Flak Trooper: Bullfrog flak cannon
Tesla Trooper: Tesla gun
Natasha Volkova: Sniper turret (may shoot through multiple infantry)
Desolator: Toxin spray gun
Imperial infantry
Imperial engineer: Short ranged repair crane
Archer maiden: Anti-aircraft and anti-infantry bow
Imperial warrior: Heavy machine gun
Tankbuster: Tankbuster beam turret
Shinobi: Shuriken turret
Yuriko Omega: Psionic turret
26:10 Can't hold a candle to Warcraft III, released in 2002.
Troll Witch Doctor
"Someone call for de docter?" (reference to Desperados, the computer game)
"I hear de summons!"
"How may I serve?"
"You seek me help?"
"What you be cravin'?"
"Taz'dingo!" (A common warcry among trolls.)
"Righty way!"
"Dat be good choice, mon!"
"I do it, now!"
"Ahaa!"
"Eekum Bokum." (The quote Mumbo Jumbo says in the game Banjo-Kazooie)
"Do ya be feelin' well?"
"I may have somethin' for ya."
"We be jammin'." (The song "Jammin' " by Bob Marley)
"It's a cookbook. A cookbook!" (Reference to the short story by Damon Knight called "To Serve Man", or, better known, an episode of Twilight Zone of the same name)
"Soylent gray is made from TROLLS?" (A reference to the movie Soylent Green)
Ohta: "Fukui-san?"
Fukui: "Yes, go ahead."
Ohta: "What the Iron Troll is doing right now is putting heads in a pot. They have to boil for 20 minutes so the eyes can be used in a second dish, an eye and raspberry sorbet."
Woman: "Mmm! Sounds good."
My favorite would be the Tauren spiriitwalker though: _"Yes, the spirits are talking to me. _*_farts_*_ Oh yes, they´re coming in clearly. _*_fart_*_ Ahh, now they're forming into a gaseous material. _*_fart_*_ I can actually see them now. _*_fart_*_ The spirits are very powerful today."_
if they made this game more like the next Warcraft RTS and more slow paced, it would've been so much cooler (in my humble opinion ofcourse).
I would kill for a Warcraft that harkens back to WC1 (re-adds roads, gritty art style) as well as leveraging the town building aspect and granting depth and complexity to that rather than treating macro as a chore to be simplified.
Yup. I think too. Kind of a warcraft 4. This game is sc3 and its not for me
@@louis-oliviersimard3214if only it actually was SC3...
As a SC2 fan, I am not impressed by Stormgate at all.
it is kind of wild that they didn't go for fantasy theme when sc2 is still out there and fantasy theme being just easier to make and relate to.
@@snuffeldjuret but then it would be unfavorably compared against WC3, instead of being unfavorably compared against SC2.
The truth is the irrespective of the style and setting, it need not to be undercooked.
Different people have different deal breakers. I really don't like the free-to-play with cash store stuff.
But honestly, I feel like even I could have written a better story mode with the simplest 'demon war 1' kind of setting. The focus on the personal rather then the faction kinda kills it for me.
Man you’ve come a long way since the Captain Tryhard days when I discovered the channel. So happy for you and proud of you Richard ❤️ great informative video
I largely agree with everything you said but resonate hardest with the visual style, a knife edge for me, as I don't care for the art style of the current models, indeed, very rounded, cartoonish proportions, a lack of emotion from many of the faces. Even while SC2 and WC3 had sometimes more simplistic world models, the portrait models were usually more detailed.
Y'all got SCAMMED, and if you're still pre-ordering or buying into "Early Access" in 2024, one scam is too kind for you.
From the very beginning I was criticizing the lack of artistic direction. I could probably get over it but only if the single-player experience is good. I haven't played it yet, so I won't say anything about that, but to me this game looks like one of those many multiplayer-focused RTS games that usually fail pretty soon after release because most hardcore RTS players are dead-set on sticking to their current games. Even if people like Grubby go on to play AoE for a bit, they still go back to their main game in the end and that's just a fact. I miss smaller, unique single-player focus RTS games like Original War or Earth 2150.
My biggest issue with the game is the artstyle, i have been subbed to Frostgiant since the beginning and really crossing my fingers for a dark fantasy RTS. I realize that this artstyle might hook in younger gamers but for me this is too cartoony. SC2 had the perfect atmosfere and i was really hoping for that level of dark but i don't think thats something that they will change.
What makes early access useful is that developers can get feedback on what issues the players stumble upon frequently and gain an understanding on which order they should fix the issues. In some cases it can highlight new issues that the developers either hasn't noticed or just overlooked.
The argument "It's early access, so you shouldn't complain" ruins one of the essential points of early access.
It's biggest mistake is going more towards starcraft and less towards warcraft.
this is my biggest gripe with the game - and also the overall visual clarity and artstyle im not a fan of
Yup, starcraft was a very minority of their franchie games. Warcraft 3 was their moss well received game.
Issue is this is aimed towards a minority, and therefore the reviews.
Well, negatives reviews isnt towards the game, but the whole model around having to use $$$ to pay for ingame content and stuff like heroes. Honestly if they just had a "buy once" game it would be extremely positive in reviews.
@marcuspvxea I know it is f2p but you need to buy heros with money that is dump
Not sure if thats the case. It has the time to kill and engagement length of warcraft, with the unit designs of starcraft. The only mechanic missing is a hero unit that you need to level as well, and personally I never really liked that aspect of warcraft. They even retained the mining mechanics, and clearing forest in WC3.
You'd think the art direction is inspired by starcraft with its futuristic mech units and whatnot, but everything has a sense of whimsy, from the very curvy, relatively simple designs of faction buildings and units, the abundance of saturated colors, and just how the game comes off thematically that reminds me alot of the camp and whimsy in warcraft 3, you even command dogs as scouts and attack creep camps for christsakes. This game's first impression reads as the last bastion of humanity fighting off demons in a lush verdant forest. It just seems so goofy and unfocused.
I think its biggest mistake was trying to straddle fanbases of both games instead of being a more direct spiritual successor to either.
Imagine if it went full diablo
It's a 2024 game but it plays like a 2002 game and looks worse than a 2012 game....
visuals are a dealbreaker for me. everything else would be passable for me if the visuals could capture me. no hero units in 1v1 is also a bummer but like I said, visuals! or more specifically: art style! and at this point, there is no return from that. damn, I even hoped for the next marine level of iconic units. even heroes look bland. The blockade seems like a regular unit ffs.
I feel like the last point you brought up is the most important. Even if they fix all the other stuff there is still the question why I would swap from Warcraft to this Game , I don’t really do anything new, even with all the mistakes fixed it’s just a light version at best.
I am watching your Videos many years now and even played with you sometimes by random ocasions in Warcraft 3.
This is one of your best videos and i hope you achieve your goal!
Ty for all the nice content!
tyty~
....True to their words, even the spirit of blizzard is visible
Stormgate makes me want to play Reforged with Reforged graphics.
same here, and that shocked me. But I will probably do my 3rd ever play through of wc2 expansion instead.
Starcraft Rumble...
lol
Most of the shit that is wrong with the game is shit that was wrong in the alpha (and beta...and now in EA). It's shit they were given feedback about many times over and still haven't bothered to change. A lot of it is also shit they doubled down on and are adamant about it being the way it is.
Also, it's a massive kick to the face that they are trying to charge money via MTX for missions that they are admitting are not finished. Like my god. Preordering an entire game is one thing, but having MTX for unfinished tidbits of content is just insane.
Stormgate doesn't make me want to play it at all, it's predominantly aimed towards PRO players, but if I don't want to play competitive, I have almost no reason to play it.
Like the theme is so bland, space marines, with aliens, and angels, woah. Amazing. It's not like when I watch blizzard cinematics that makes me want to play WOW even though it sucks.
For me Stormgate clashes at a fundamental level before I look at anything else. It's scifi overwatch cartoony mixed with demons who look straight out of fantasy. I didn't see the angels yet since playtesting, but god damn they really just took too much inspiration from SC2. Angels remind me of the later campaigns where the story deviated from intergalatic content to gods and shit. And people I've spoken with don't like that.
The models when they're static portraits/main menu look like claymation too.
I had really high hopes Stormgate would be next big RTS that finally takes the spotlight from Starcraft 2, but from the little I've played of it it really doesn't seem like they're even following their own advise.
In early interviews they themselves stated that shockingly large portion of RTS players literally NEVER go on to any of the PvP ladder modes, and have only played the Campaign. They go on to say while the pros and hardcore RTS fans are all only interested in the competitive ladder and all the unique micro and macro mechanics, a majority of the people bringing the game money and popularity that are all essential to funding both the game and tournament prize pools only care about the campaign and other more relaxed modes.
Yet despite knowing and stating this publicly, they release into EA with a dinky and unpolished campaign with most of their focus on ladder, and then are surprised when the majority of people looking at the game aren't finding anything fun for them to do.
Obviously a solid pvp mode is necessary in the long-term competitive scene, but I think the priority should've been campaign first as they themselves knew and said multiple times that most people who play only care about that.
Aside from mismatched priorities, the looks are just absolutely awful. I've been in the early playtesting and at first I had hopes it was just unfinished, but after much more time has past it's clear the general artstyle is just wrong in many ways...
There is potential and a possibility that major changes are made, but the writing likely will not. I'm not really interested in the competitive aspect of it as that likely won't be the reason for longevity but if they can properly adapt from here based on the user's concerns then there is a path forward to success. Models and graphics are likely to receive updates or maybe I'm just expecting too much after Baldur's Gate III. As Wtii pointed out there are many early QoL changes that Starcraft doesn't have so that's an immediate plus and there's plenty to do around the map to keep players engaged.
edit: In general they must decide which direction they want to take the graphics because Diablo and Overwatch are completely opposing themes. They can't have it both ways! They understand how attractive and popular OW's cartoonishly light artstyle is, but want to retain the brutality of Diablo? I don't know how they can make that work
It's what they should focus on the most now - make the game impressive and more cinematic looking. All of the rest you can figure out down the line, but once this looks kick-ass, people will at least give it a shot. If you are making a Starcraft 2 successor 14 years after Starcraft 2, it needs to have a Wow moment.
10:00 "Stormgate has some great atmospheric moments and game cutscenes that immerse you, the player, into believing that these places exist."
I'm sorry but seeing those 4 story tall humans next to the ruined buildings absolutely shattered that statement.
The closest thing we will ever have to a Diablo RTS.
Well actually I just saw a new game in the works called Immortal: Gates of Pyre. Much better looking and closer to Diablo RTS, for sure. Those cartooney graphics in SG might look like D3, but definitely not D2.
I remember exactly my first time playing StarCraft. That first time I a clicked at zerglings with my marines. I remember thinking, wow those rifles sound awesome, and that splattered alien really sold it. Warcraft 3 too. The setting sucked me in, the 4 races were all so vibrant and different, I loved the heroes. Command and conquer I remember the soundtrack, and the first time I rolled a wave of tanks into my buddies wall of Tesla coils, it just felt awesome, almost visceral. StarCraft 2 sucked me in with its art style and smooth gameplay and the gameplay rhythm, inject, call down mules, do the probe thing. These games pushed things, they felt good to play, there was great feedback, you knew when you walked into a bad situation. It was akin to playing the latest shooter that was pushing graphics and gameplay.
Stormgate? I’m not sure. Felt no cool factor, nothing was like oh yea I felt that explosion. Even Warcraft 3 without many explosions, I still felt an orc grunt swinging that axe, so chunky…The first time I heard the “marine” shoot I was like ehhhh…I just see Terran with robot dogs, diablo3 guys, and Protoss with a mothership but no zealots? And the maps look like it’s a Sunday in a sun filled meadow? While earth is under assault by inter dimensional demons and space angel aliens floating around with some purpose? And I have these creep camps with no heroes in 1v1?
How could u ever care about the arch enemy when he looks like that? Super devil is a giant baby man
I really hope they take a look at this video and take it for what it is- honest feedback. This is extremely well put together WTii.