I was discussing 'the difficulty' argument 10 years ago in one of my essays on teamliquid. The game is as difficult as the players you are facing, so the difficulty localized not in the game but in 'the player'. In fact, the UX and UI of sc2 is so polished that the game is actually extremely accessible, which makes the 'human' aspect of it shine much more prominently as you do not fight the interface - just yourself and the player
Something like Age of Empires 2 isn't more accessible because it's slower (which itself depends on how you define slower, they have similar APM requirements but AoE2's matches have slower pacing because more setup is required). I wouldn't say it's more accessible at all, and frankly, I prefer the complexity that comes with that. SCII is one of the most accessible RTS games on the market thanks to its comparatively limited builds and counters, arcadey map design, good faction balancing, reliable unit behavior and drastically simplified economy compared to a lot of other RTS games. Anything in the Age series being a prime example. In something like Age of Empires 2, since that's the example mentioned here, you not only have to put more effort into getting your economy up and running and into properly defending yourself, but any mistakes you make are much harder to correct and much more punishing because everything takes so much longer to do and any losses you suffer will hurt you more in the long run. Add onto that the fact that almost any enemy faction can and will use any strategy available in the game, and it means you need a much greater level of game knowledge to predict what the enemy will do and how to effectively counter it. This is before we get into map design, which I think is incredibly important. AoE leaves many more valuable assets in exposed areas and makes it much harder to defend yourself from attack. Both on the homefront and when seeking out advantage through things like gold deposits, relics, etc. None of this comes without similar APM, either, as AoE 2 can be and typically is played very quickly at high levels with APMs of 3-400. Same goes for SCII. SCII demands less in terms of strategy and game knowledge while having faster paced matches with similar micromanagement. It's a mechanical game. It demands fast rather than well considered execution, and speed is much easier to train than strategy. When I introduce people to RTS games this is the game I usually show them because it's free, easy to grasp at the basic level, and has a decently high skill ceiling for those that want to push themselves. It is not, however, nor has it been since its inception, the "hardest game in the world" as some people (who almost exclusively play Star Craft) like to tell themselves. There are many RTS games that present greater challenges when it comes to strategy and execution. The Age series (almost as a whole), Empire Earth (I and II), etc. All have universally higher skill floors, similar skill ceilings, demand more game knowledge at higher levels, and force you to put more effort into planning out your strategy. They're less popular (though that's changing with AoE2), but that does not mean that they are less difficult, or somehow paradoxically more accessible as some people want to suggest. There are also other games that take one or two aspects and make them essential to master in order to achieve success, which SCII doesn't. Warcraft 3, for example, has an almost absurd emphasis on force composition and correct rather than fast action. There's no faking your way to victory through good macro in that game. Homeworld, similarly, has very strong counters that need to be accounted for and also introduces entirely new concepts with its true 3D map design, which takes a lot of getting used to.
aoe2 is the game that got me to actually play rts tho, its a lot less stressful and a lot less bs and a lot less volatile its hard to describe but i was never really able to enjoy sc2 until aoe2de came out, i put hundreds of our into that and afterwards i was able to understand rts games and was able to enjoy sc2 more as well, still aoe2 is my most played rts game i would say that sc2 is definitely harder to get into and harder to enjoy than aoe2, primarily because of how much faster sc2 is but not just because of that, team games are also a lot more enjoyable in aoe2 usually which is one of the other important parts
@@dj_koen1265 I think that's less a question of accessibility than of taste, which, there's nothing wrong with that. I like AoE2 more and it's what I grew up with, and yes, SCII is a faster game in terms of its match pacing, at least as far as skirmish goes. That in and of itself can be a bit overwhelming. And that's fine. But that's a lot easier for most people to get past I've found than the more complex economies and tech trees found in AoE2. In Age games, it's not always obvious to a beginner where their resources are, what kinds of drop sites they should put down or where, how to age up, so on. I've had multiple first time players try AoE2 with me and spend the first hour stuck in the dark age. Yes, the game gives you a little more breathing room to figure things out, but not as much as you'd think, and it does very little to give obvious direction to a new player outside the tutorials. Meanwhile in SCII, the most guidance I've ever had to give someone to get their feet off the ground is "build some more workers to collect resources faster," or "try building some troops or walling off that ramp so you don't get rushed as easily." This is largely because they made the foundational elements of the game so damn simple. One of the best examples of this is the economy. They went through so much trouble to dumb it down as much as possible compared to other conventional RTS titles. Instead of 4 resources that I have to balance and learn the special use cases for along with a wide variety of drop sites that need to be placed correctly, I have two resources, and those are always right next to where I build my workers in a convenient semicircle, the same structure also serving as the universal drop off. So, expanding and growing my economy is reduced to the simple task of mashing the Q button with my nexus selected every so often (yes, I use grid). This same philosophy of "dead simple but also really fast" permeates the rest of Star Craft aswell, from teching up to army compositions and base building. The only exception to this that I can think of is Zerg, and even then while I find them a little clunky to use, they aren't actually all that much more complex than the other two factions. It might not be approachable for everyone, as it is a very different type of game to what a lot of people enjoy, but I wouldn't say that's the same as it being inaccessible in any way. In my experience, it's very easy for people to learn and achieve a base level of competency with. AoE2 is a more chill experience in some ways, but I would argue it's harder to get a grasp of for most people, and exponentially harder to learn enough about the game to play competitively. Sidenote: I completely agree on team games. They have always been way more interesting in AoE2, and I honestly can't think of many RTS games that do them quite as well. The only potential exception that pops into my mind if the Command and Conquer series, but again, that is a very different style of RTS.
@@leftwardglobe1643 thats a fair take, although i still think the volatility of sc2 and the amount of things that require much more effort (and scouting) to defend makes it harder to play in ways that will make the game less enjoyable on a lower skill level which is imo part of what makes it harder to learn but it depends on how you look at it i think the fact that i wasnt able to enjoy sc2 before i played a significant amount of aoe2 is also because aoe2 taught me how to manage production and economy which imo sc2 doesnt really teach you in a natural way. this is all just based on my personal experience ps: i also use grid
Well, as an AoE2 convert from SC2, aoe is a fraction as accessible in every single department, so SC2 wins hands down there. But it's still way more fun than SC, so it isn't everything. From master league to 1200 ELO, I get crushed now but the game is way deeper. While the game is slower overall, combat is actually faster in AoE2, a 40 min game can be decided with a single shot. It has a lot of single player and coop content however which is very very accessible.
I gotta say, and I know it's not related to the topic, but I seriously love your channel. I really wish you had more views and I have no idea why you don't. Please keep it up.
it's so cool that you're making videos again! I love all your commentary on SC2 and also I've watched every video you made on the comparisons from SC2 to the Age of Empires series as I play both frequently. I was inspired by that series and made an Age of Empires 2 Mod (No Age Total Conversion) as a way to see what AOE2 would be like if it played as a more fast paced game like Starcraft. I really tried to push the speed of building up and make it more asymmetric, but would be curious to know your thoughts on it and wether it makes AOE2 more interesting or breaks the core game. Anyways you always have great quality videos!
One interesting change around accessibility for a RTS is currently being done by the team at Immortal: Gates of Pyre. I'd be curios if you have played the game and you have some opinions about it.They have made something similar to what Axiom was trying to do, but in another context. It feels just a tiny bit slower than SC2, but the accessibility is done in a different context. We don't know about its future success, but I think its the closest we'll get to an "accessible" competitive RTS.
Great to see you back on youtube! I think you're right that this is the biggest mistake that the RTS and SC2 communities make about SC2. Love your substack and looking forward to watching more videos from you in future.
have you considered that starcraft 2 is not the most popular rts because of it's faster speed but in spite of ? The more likely reasons to me are polish, sci-fi setting, flavor, nostalgia, modes like coop and arcade, balance, gameplay loop and length or even that it's made by blizzard.
coop wasn't part of sc2 until lotv so like 5 years after the game released, arcade was also not finished on release, wc3 and sc1 also had similar average game length and are both made by blizzard. And we are not just talking about people who tried the game out, the setting the flavor, nostalgia does not make people stay with a game for 13+ years.
I agree, SC2 is not inaccessible, and I find the argument that "units die too quickly so it's inaccessible" pretty puzzling. You can play the campaign on easy or compete in low bronze league and your skills will meet adequate challenge, and in competitive play you'll find people who struggle just as much with their army dying quickly as you do. Take piano playing, is it extremely hard in the beginning? Yes. Is it inaccessible because of that? I don't think so. You just need to start on a low level and accept that it's a long journey to near the skill ceiling. Also, it's not that hard to right click your army back even if you're slow. Just don't a-move without looking at your army if you're slow and it won't get melted offscreen. (to be safe, move your army back a bit before looking elsewhere) I think people are just frustrated that they can't do flashy plays like the pros. In a Moba, you can basically do anything a pro can do (visually). In SC2, you probably can't get and micro a huge army while dropping 2 places at once if you're in bronze league. But that's ok. So, what does it even mean that SC2 is inaccessible? I don't know. A game with a high skill ceiling can't not be hard.
Also, if two armies a-move against each other, the better/bigger army is still likely to win, whether units die quickly or not. (unless you are spell caster-heavy perhaps, but you can a) avoid that and b) it's not that hard to a-move + cast a few spells) So again, it's just a matter of the better player winning the fight, and you'll find opponents with just as bad macro, micro and unit comp as you, if need be in low bronze.
I think strategy is the opposite of what's sacrificed in coop, though I may be talking semantics. To me coop is doubling down on the strategy compared to multiplayer. Very few games in multiplayer do you need to think. It's 99% execution and practically just an action game. Meanwhile, coop, especially harder difficulties is about managing your more limited setting and creating strategies around it. In lower levels people tend to have similar approaches even though its possible to brute force it with execution. Coop takes away the execution barrier and management skill floor that multiplayer has by reducing variability because you don't have to worry about cheese or your opponent doing something unexpected.
One thing I'm surprised I haven't seen you (or anyone to my knowledge for that matter) point out is that StarCraft 2's fast paced fights *are* an accessibility feature, particularly at the advanced beginner and intermediate level. It's a similar design paradigm as what's been going on in the past few years with fighting games, where a lot of newer fighting games have ramped up the damage a player can get off of one interaction, so that players don't have to win as many interactions to win a match. I see the same thing play out in SC2 compared to other RTS games, especially compared to both Brood War and the upcoming games vying to be its successor. Having a lower time-to-kill means that, outside of complete newcomers, winning a game means only having to really win one, maybe two, fights, and winning a fight can often just mean using the splashy abilities once or twice, which allows a generally weaker player to beat a stronger player sometimes. With a higher time-to-kill, fights are longer, mistakes pile up more on the side of the weaker player, and the stronger player more consistently wins. That being said, the tradeoff as I see it is whether the focus is placed on making players feel progress through wins and losses, or finding some way to present their progress more granularly, even if they lost 10 games in a row (which I find fighting games do naturally on account of having a health bar showing you how close the match was). I think the coarse-grained results you point out bias players strongly towards viewing wins and losses as the only thing that matters, with the quality of the match leading up to that point being secondary, hence my argument that low time-to-kill is an accessibility feature. The other tradeoff I find with SC2, with its lower time-to-kill, is that it causes the "game" to feel much more split between the playing of the game to execute what you think you know, and the not playing of the game to actually develop and adapt to opponents, sorta like gridiron football. Games with a higher time-to-kill feel better in the moment to learn, adapt, and generally feel fully engaged with while playing; removing or reducing that sense of a split between playing the game and somehow being engaged with it while not playing.
Love your thoughtful content! Your postscript on the substack article was about writing more about SC2 co-op's seamless multiplayer through strong implicit incentives to cooperate. Did you ever get a chance to write that article?
I think GiantGrantGames said it best: "If more people knew that most starcraft II matches were more like two drunk toddlers fencing with pool noodles, I think the intimidation factor would be significantly lower."
sorry chief but I have to call bullshit on this one No other game requires you to learn 3 different types of keyboard combinations and memorizing 4 minutes of actions to play mediocrely
![OsamaSon - ik what you did last summer [Official Music Video]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/4DIQDnu3mr4/mqdefault.jpg)
I much prefer the video format but your articles are also a lot of fun to read! Keep up the good work!
Great video! I enjoy your written articles but will always have a soft spot for your video essays.
I was discussing 'the difficulty' argument 10 years ago in one of my essays on teamliquid.
The game is as difficult as the players you are facing, so the difficulty localized not in the game but in 'the player'. In fact, the UX and UI of sc2 is so polished that the game is actually extremely accessible, which makes the 'human' aspect of it shine much more prominently as you do not fight the interface - just yourself and the player
Something like Age of Empires 2 isn't more accessible because it's slower (which itself depends on how you define slower, they have similar APM requirements but AoE2's matches have slower pacing because more setup is required). I wouldn't say it's more accessible at all, and frankly, I prefer the complexity that comes with that.
SCII is one of the most accessible RTS games on the market thanks to its comparatively limited builds and counters, arcadey map design, good faction balancing, reliable unit behavior and drastically simplified economy compared to a lot of other RTS games. Anything in the Age series being a prime example.
In something like Age of Empires 2, since that's the example mentioned here, you not only have to put more effort into getting your economy up and running and into properly defending yourself, but any mistakes you make are much harder to correct and much more punishing because everything takes so much longer to do and any losses you suffer will hurt you more in the long run. Add onto that the fact that almost any enemy faction can and will use any strategy available in the game, and it means you need a much greater level of game knowledge to predict what the enemy will do and how to effectively counter it.
This is before we get into map design, which I think is incredibly important. AoE leaves many more valuable assets in exposed areas and makes it much harder to defend yourself from attack. Both on the homefront and when seeking out advantage through things like gold deposits, relics, etc.
None of this comes without similar APM, either, as AoE 2 can be and typically is played very quickly at high levels with APMs of 3-400. Same goes for SCII.
SCII demands less in terms of strategy and game knowledge while having faster paced matches with similar micromanagement. It's a mechanical game. It demands fast rather than well considered execution, and speed is much easier to train than strategy. When I introduce people to RTS games this is the game I usually show them because it's free, easy to grasp at the basic level, and has a decently high skill ceiling for those that want to push themselves.
It is not, however, nor has it been since its inception, the "hardest game in the world" as some people (who almost exclusively play Star Craft) like to tell themselves. There are many RTS games that present greater challenges when it comes to strategy and execution. The Age series (almost as a whole), Empire Earth (I and II), etc. All have universally higher skill floors, similar skill ceilings, demand more game knowledge at higher levels, and force you to put more effort into planning out your strategy. They're less popular (though that's changing with AoE2), but that does not mean that they are less difficult, or somehow paradoxically more accessible as some people want to suggest.
There are also other games that take one or two aspects and make them essential to master in order to achieve success, which SCII doesn't. Warcraft 3, for example, has an almost absurd emphasis on force composition and correct rather than fast action. There's no faking your way to victory through good macro in that game. Homeworld, similarly, has very strong counters that need to be accounted for and also introduces entirely new concepts with its true 3D map design, which takes a lot of getting used to.
aoe2 is the game that got me to actually play rts tho, its a lot less stressful and a lot less bs and a lot less volatile
its hard to describe but i was never really able to enjoy sc2 until aoe2de came out, i put hundreds of our into that and afterwards i was able to understand rts games and was able to enjoy sc2 more as well, still aoe2 is my most played rts game
i would say that sc2 is definitely harder to get into and harder to enjoy than aoe2, primarily because of how much faster sc2 is but not just because of that,
team games are also a lot more enjoyable in aoe2 usually which is one of the other important parts
@@dj_koen1265 I think that's less a question of accessibility than of taste, which, there's nothing wrong with that. I like AoE2 more and it's what I grew up with, and yes, SCII is a faster game in terms of its match pacing, at least as far as skirmish goes. That in and of itself can be a bit overwhelming. And that's fine.
But that's a lot easier for most people to get past I've found than the more complex economies and tech trees found in AoE2.
In Age games, it's not always obvious to a beginner where their resources are, what kinds of drop sites they should put down or where, how to age up, so on. I've had multiple first time players try AoE2 with me and spend the first hour stuck in the dark age. Yes, the game gives you a little more breathing room to figure things out, but not as much as you'd think, and it does very little to give obvious direction to a new player outside the tutorials.
Meanwhile in SCII, the most guidance I've ever had to give someone to get their feet off the ground is "build some more workers to collect resources faster," or "try building some troops or walling off that ramp so you don't get rushed as easily." This is largely because they made the foundational elements of the game so damn simple. One of the best examples of this is the economy. They went through so much trouble to dumb it down as much as possible compared to other conventional RTS titles. Instead of 4 resources that I have to balance and learn the special use cases for along with a wide variety of drop sites that need to be placed correctly, I have two resources, and those are always right next to where I build my workers in a convenient semicircle, the same structure also serving as the universal drop off. So, expanding and growing my economy is reduced to the simple task of mashing the Q button with my nexus selected every so often (yes, I use grid).
This same philosophy of "dead simple but also really fast" permeates the rest of Star Craft aswell, from teching up to army compositions and base building.
The only exception to this that I can think of is Zerg, and even then while I find them a little clunky to use, they aren't actually all that much more complex than the other two factions.
It might not be approachable for everyone, as it is a very different type of game to what a lot of people enjoy, but I wouldn't say that's the same as it being inaccessible in any way. In my experience, it's very easy for people to learn and achieve a base level of competency with. AoE2 is a more chill experience in some ways, but I would argue it's harder to get a grasp of for most people, and exponentially harder to learn enough about the game to play competitively.
Sidenote: I completely agree on team games. They have always been way more interesting in AoE2, and I honestly can't think of many RTS games that do them quite as well. The only potential exception that pops into my mind if the Command and Conquer series, but again, that is a very different style of RTS.
@@leftwardglobe1643 thats a fair take,
although i still think the volatility of sc2 and the amount of things that require much more effort (and scouting) to defend makes it harder to play in ways that will make the game less enjoyable on a lower skill level which is imo part of what makes it harder to learn but it depends on how you look at it
i think the fact that i wasnt able to enjoy sc2 before i played a significant amount of aoe2 is also because aoe2 taught me how to manage production and economy which imo sc2 doesnt really teach you in a natural way.
this is all just based on my personal experience
ps: i also use grid
I was literally just thinking about you and your well thought out videos. Keep making them you magnificent man.
Well, as an AoE2 convert from SC2, aoe is a fraction as accessible in every single department, so SC2 wins hands down there. But it's still way more fun than SC, so it isn't everything. From master league to 1200 ELO, I get crushed now but the game is way deeper. While the game is slower overall, combat is actually faster in AoE2, a 40 min game can be decided with a single shot. It has a lot of single player and coop content however which is very very accessible.
I gotta say, and I know it's not related to the topic, but I seriously love your channel. I really wish you had more views and I have no idea why you don't. Please keep it up.
it's so cool that you're making videos again! I love all your commentary on SC2 and also I've watched every video you made on the comparisons from SC2 to the Age of Empires series as I play both frequently. I was inspired by that series and made an Age of Empires 2 Mod (No Age Total Conversion) as a way to see what AOE2 would be like if it played as a more fast paced game like Starcraft. I really tried to push the speed of building up and make it more asymmetric, but would be curious to know your thoughts on it and wether it makes AOE2 more interesting or breaks the core game. Anyways you always have great quality videos!
I was just thinking about rewatching your sc2 vs AOE videos, guess it's time!
Nice video, interesting examples
Hell yes, another Brownbear video
i forgot how much i loved your videos, great video
One interesting change around accessibility for a RTS is currently being done by the team at Immortal: Gates of Pyre. I'd be curios if you have played the game and you have some opinions about it.They have made something similar to what Axiom was trying to do, but in another context. It feels just a tiny bit slower than SC2, but the accessibility is done in a different context. We don't know about its future success, but I think its the closest we'll get to an "accessible" competitive RTS.
Great to see you back on youtube! I think you're right that this is the biggest mistake that the RTS and SC2 communities make about SC2. Love your substack and looking forward to watching more videos from you in future.
This stuff was so beautiful, i shouldn't have invested my whole life into it
have you considered that starcraft 2 is not the most popular rts because of it's faster speed but in spite of ? The more likely reasons to me are polish, sci-fi setting, flavor, nostalgia, modes like coop and arcade, balance, gameplay loop and length or even that it's made by blizzard.
coop wasn't part of sc2 until lotv so like 5 years after the game released, arcade was also not finished on release, wc3 and sc1 also had similar average game length and are both made by blizzard.
And we are not just talking about people who tried the game out, the setting the flavor, nostalgia does not make people stay with a game for 13+ years.
I agree, SC2 is not inaccessible, and I find the argument that "units die too quickly so it's inaccessible" pretty puzzling. You can play the campaign on easy or compete in low bronze league and your skills will meet adequate challenge, and in competitive play you'll find people who struggle just as much with their army dying quickly as you do.
Take piano playing, is it extremely hard in the beginning? Yes. Is it inaccessible because of that? I don't think so. You just need to start on a low level and accept that it's a long journey to near the skill ceiling.
Also, it's not that hard to right click your army back even if you're slow. Just don't a-move without looking at your army if you're slow and it won't get melted offscreen. (to be safe, move your army back a bit before looking elsewhere)
I think people are just frustrated that they can't do flashy plays like the pros. In a Moba, you can basically do anything a pro can do (visually). In SC2, you probably can't get and micro a huge army while dropping 2 places at once if you're in bronze league. But that's ok.
So, what does it even mean that SC2 is inaccessible? I don't know. A game with a high skill ceiling can't not be hard.
Also, if two armies a-move against each other, the better/bigger army is still likely to win, whether units die quickly or not.
(unless you are spell caster-heavy perhaps, but you can a) avoid that and b) it's not that hard to a-move + cast a few spells)
So again, it's just a matter of the better player winning the fight, and you'll find opponents with just as bad macro, micro and unit comp as you, if need be in low bronze.
I think strategy is the opposite of what's sacrificed in coop, though I may be talking semantics. To me coop is doubling down on the strategy compared to multiplayer. Very few games in multiplayer do you need to think. It's 99% execution and practically just an action game. Meanwhile, coop, especially harder difficulties is about managing your more limited setting and creating strategies around it. In lower levels people tend to have similar approaches even though its possible to brute force it with execution. Coop takes away the execution barrier and management skill floor that multiplayer has by reducing variability because you don't have to worry about cheese or your opponent doing something unexpected.
One thing I'm surprised I haven't seen you (or anyone to my knowledge for that matter) point out is that StarCraft 2's fast paced fights *are* an accessibility feature, particularly at the advanced beginner and intermediate level. It's a similar design paradigm as what's been going on in the past few years with fighting games, where a lot of newer fighting games have ramped up the damage a player can get off of one interaction, so that players don't have to win as many interactions to win a match. I see the same thing play out in SC2 compared to other RTS games, especially compared to both Brood War and the upcoming games vying to be its successor.
Having a lower time-to-kill means that, outside of complete newcomers, winning a game means only having to really win one, maybe two, fights, and winning a fight can often just mean using the splashy abilities once or twice, which allows a generally weaker player to beat a stronger player sometimes. With a higher time-to-kill, fights are longer, mistakes pile up more on the side of the weaker player, and the stronger player more consistently wins.
That being said, the tradeoff as I see it is whether the focus is placed on making players feel progress through wins and losses, or finding some way to present their progress more granularly, even if they lost 10 games in a row (which I find fighting games do naturally on account of having a health bar showing you how close the match was). I think the coarse-grained results you point out bias players strongly towards viewing wins and losses as the only thing that matters, with the quality of the match leading up to that point being secondary, hence my argument that low time-to-kill is an accessibility feature.
The other tradeoff I find with SC2, with its lower time-to-kill, is that it causes the "game" to feel much more split between the playing of the game to execute what you think you know, and the not playing of the game to actually develop and adapt to opponents, sorta like gridiron football. Games with a higher time-to-kill feel better in the moment to learn, adapt, and generally feel fully engaged with while playing; removing or reducing that sense of a split between playing the game and somehow being engaged with it while not playing.
Quality stuff
WHERE DID illiteracyhasdownsides GO? IT WAS HERE JUST RECENTLY.
hey beautiful!
Glad to have you back.
wtf ur back! fantastic video
Welcome back 😊
Can you talk/write about Forged Alliance Forever?
Love your thoughtful content! Your postscript on the substack article was about writing more about SC2 co-op's seamless multiplayer through strong implicit incentives to cooperate. Did you ever get a chance to write that article?
I think GiantGrantGames said it best: "If more people knew that most starcraft II matches were more like two drunk toddlers fencing with pool noodles, I think the intimidation factor would be significantly lower."
Link your substack on your YT channel page.
starcraft content in 2024 wow
come back to aoe3 parfait
sorry chief but I have to call bullshit on this one
No other game requires you to learn 3 different types of keyboard combinations and memorizing 4 minutes of actions to play mediocrely
Last time you uploaded, I had a house. 🥲