StarCraft II Beta Report Part 1: Battle.Net 2.0

It has been over 12 years since we saw the release of StarCraft and now in 2010 it is time again to revisit the franchise. StarCraft II is the sequel to one of the most known real time strategy game that turned a world upside down. It became the worlds number one e sport game and also a national sport in South Korea. From a fantastic and intresting campaign to a famous multi player. During that time Blizzard used a service called Battle.Net as a platform for multi player experience. It was the first ever service that would provide a community that would play games together. Battle.Net itself launched as early as back in 1996 with Diablo, an rpg that was made to be played together but it was StarCraft that put Blizzard on the world map as the leading developer for high quality gaming.

Now 12 years later the stakes are higher and Blizzard is no longer allone in the industry. With the launch of StarCraft II beta last month we got to see their latest invention. Battle.Net 2.0 For a multi player oriented game it is important that the new Battle.Net is faster and stable. So how does it hold up?

When you enter for the first time you will see the latest news and what is happening in the community. On the upper left side you have your multi player option and under it you can see the ladder button as well as replays. On the right side you can see my avatar and clicking on it will show you your current stats and which league you belong to.

Here we see the main ladder screen. you can join or create a game and under it you can choose if you want to go with 1vs1 2vs2 and so forth. Under it is your current rank. I am at 47th place in silver league which is not that great but i am an beginner. So if i press the button "find the game" to the far left the Battle.Net will auto search an opponent that is closest to my rank but not too far off. In that case i will never face an opponent that is overpowered compared to myself. Blizzard have decided to do this becouse to keep a game that is fair to your level. Modern name for this system is of course "Matchmaking".

Personal opinion

Going from desctop to the game is the process of seconds, from starting a game to join one. Matchmaking only takes seconds to find you one equal opponent and loading times on the choosen maps is a process of seconds. In other words this new service works wonders. The only main thing that concerns me is that it is region locked so that you cant play against someone from the US or other continents which is bad and also a bad decision from Blizzard. I dont know if this is for the beta allone but it needs to get fixed or it will hamper the game as a E sport champion.

Stay tuned for part 2.