Blizzard dropped the bombshell none of us have been waiting for and all of us have been praying would never come: StarCraft II officially delayed until the first half of 2010.
A few weeks back, financially driven speculation that the long awaited sequel would fail to meet its proposed 2009 release date started to spread around the internet worse then Swine Flu. At the epicenter of the viral speculation was a financial analyst's comments on the Wall Street Journal's Web site claiming he thought it was unlikely that Blizzard developers would meet their self imposed deadline and fans would begrudgingly be forced to wait until 2010. It was at that point when fans got on their knees, clasped their hands together and began praying to Zeratul, Kerrigan, or perhaps Mike Morhaime himself that this long awaited sequel would still release this year -- but no one was listening.
I know what you're thinking: So why was it delayed, what's happening to the beta and is BlizzCon really in 2 weeks because I haven't heard anything about it yet? Read on to find out the answers.
StarCraft II Wings of Liberty has been delayed until the first half of 2010 primarily because the new Battle.net is not yet ready.
“Over the past couple of weeks, it has become clear that it will take longer than expected to prepare the new Battle.net for the launch of the game,” said a representative from Blizzard Entertainment. “The upgraded Battle.net is an integral part of the StarCraft II experience and will be an essential part of all of our games moving forward. This extra development time will be critical to help us realize our vision for the service.”
The beta, naturally, has also been quietly delayed and we can attribute that to Blizzard's Battle.net woes as well. The next time we will get our hands on SC2 will likely be at BlizzCon '09, which is in nearly two weeks in Anaheim, Calf.
It was over a month ago when Blizzard representatives started to reach out to the larger gaming outlets to get their writers registered for the much anticipated beta test. Since then Blizzard has gone virtually radio silent, which rightfully worried most gaming journalists. The odds are no longer in our favor that the beta will take place this summer and fans will now need to dig deep and muster up all the patience they can as we make the long and arduous journey into 2010.
However, not all enthusiasm is lost, BlizzCon '09 very well could be full of surprises not to mention more in-depth answers as to what's wrong with Battle.net and why it's stalling SC2's release.
omgStarCraft, omgRPG and GamePro will be live at BlizzCon '09 to bring you all the news as it breaks.
Things to keep in mind:
- SC2 is not the only game being delayed to 2010, Activision's Singularity is also being pushed back.
- We know Diablo III is releasing after SC2 and although Blizzard's President Mike Morhaime had no comment when asked if D3 would be delayed as well, we can assume it most certainly will be.
- OmgStarCraft confirmed earlier this summer that Blizzard's new MMO will be a completely original franchise, but we don't know any more then that. Expect an awesome announcement at BlizzCon '09.
