Starcraft II Ask CDev:

In my last post, I talked about Brian Kindregan slowly trickling out answers to the Starcraft II Ask CDev. I’ve enjoyed his answers, but I think he hasn’t necessarily picked the best questions. Most of them are common sense things you could have inferred just by playing the game.

However — at the risk of exposing just what a narcissist I am — my opinion of his choice of questions changed the other day when he answered not one but two of my questions.

Needless to say, much nerdgasming was had on my part.

The first question dealt with Kerrigan, and specifically her fatalistic attitude in the cinematic in which she battles Zeratul. It struck me as very out of character that the self-described Queen Bitch of the Universe would “embrace” the end when it came.

His explanation — that thinking yourself all-powerful and then discovering something more powerful and evil than yourself would be crushing — makes perfect sense, and I find it very satisfactory.

Still, there was no hint of this in-game. I don’t share most of the complaints about Starcraft II’s story — I find Raynor’s attitude towards Kerrigan in perfect keeping with his character — but this was one area they did drop the ball, if you ask me.

The second question was more nit-picky, but filling in the little blank spots in lore has always been one of my favourite parts of Ask CDev.

My question was based on the blurb for the Umojan Protectorate in the manual for the original Starcraft, which said that Umojans sought a cultural exchange with the Protoss because they believed that humanity had a lot to learn from the more advanced species. My question was whether this is still their goal, and if they’ve had any success.

The answers were, respectively, yes and no. The Protoss simply don’t care about Terrans — excepting a few special individuals like Raynor.

Still, I’d like to see this plot developed in the future.

Actually, I just want more Umojans in general. I find them fascinating. For one thing, they’re the Terran culture we know the least about. They also seem to be the only Terran culture that isn’t nightmarishly corrupt.

True, we don’t know much about them, and they might be just as bad as the Dominion or the Kel-Morian Combine, but there is the Shadowguard to consider. Like the ghosts, they are telepathic assassins, but unlike the ghosts, they’re not enslaved or mind-controlled.

Isn’t there some quote about the best way to judge a society being how it treats its minorities? Based on their treatment of telepaths, the Umojans seem much nicer than their neighbours.

But now I’m off-topic. The point is, Blizzard answered my questions, and that makes me happy.

In case anyone doubts my word, here’s a link to my original questions. They didn’t answer them all, but two out of four isn’t bad, and there’s still time for them to tackle the others.