OMG StarCraft

"The StarCraft II beta-test period is coming in the months ahead," said RTS community rep. Xordiah. But registration for it starts now ... again.

Ok, so I realize that I already told you how to sign up for the StarCraft II beta weeks ago, but apparently Blizzard has changed their policies and now you need to go back into your battle.net account and follow some new instructions.

Basically Blizzard is going to have you download an application that will "upload a snapshot of your system specs" to your new beta profile, which you can view a screenshot of, as well as read a FAQ with additional instructions after the jump.

There are unconfirmed reports across the Web that the StarCraft II beta test will start Tuesday. Some fan sites have started countdown timers that seem to expire March 31 at 6 p.m. PDT or April 1 at 12:00 a.m. EST, suggesting that they know or think something is up.

In addition to this, starcraftwire.net is reporting that some of their members have received emails from Blizzard telling them they have been selected for the StarCraft II beta that is set to begin Tuesday, March 31 at 6 p.m. PDT.

As most of you know already, the new Battle.net finally launched. With this comes the new beta opt-in process where you can choose have your account entered into a random selection for upcoming Blizzard betas including the StarCraft II beta. If you've been waiting eagerly for the SC2 beta you should head to http://us.battle.net/ right now and get an account if you don't already have one.

“We will let you know when beta starts and when invites go out — still some waiting to do unfortunately,” said Karune.

Fans including myself are growing inpatient and edgy at the thought of getting our hands on the StarCraft 2 beta.

Yesterday Blizzard updated the Web page that www.blizzcon.com/beta redirects to and fans drooled at the mouth some more at the prospect of actually playing SC2.

To all you fans: Calm the hell down.

With daily talks and constant rumors flying around the interwebs about the StarCraft II beta test, lead developer Dustin Browder took some time to create his own FAQ to try and put fans at ease. In the FAQ Browder also touches on the progress of the next Battle Report before moving around the battle.net boards to answer a few other questions about Protoss shields and multiplayer modes.

Enjoy!

I see lots of questions about timelines. Here is a little FAQ.

Question: “Why hasn’t Blizzard released the Beta?” or “WTF have they been working on, I played it at Blizzcon last year and I thought it was done!”

Answer: Solo campaign is under heavy construction as is Battlenet. When these things have enough work done that we know when our release date is going to be with strong confidence we will announce the Beta. Unless something crazy happens, the Beta is going to happen this year.

Question: “Why don’t you just give us your target dates if you don’t know the final date? We promise, we won’t get mad if Blizzard misses target dates.”

Answer: Let’s be realistic. Our target dates are not something we hit more than half the time. Putting those out there would be pretty close to lying to the fans. We are not going to do that. We want to be able to give good info, not info that we know is suspect. We’ll give target dates when we think it is very likely that we will hit them.

More after the jump...

I had a chance to speak with RTS Community Manger Kevin Yu (Karune) recently and he assured me that there will be plenty of chances for players who weren't at BlizzCon '08 to get involved in the upcoming beta test.

When will this beta test be exactly? Well in a recent post I alluded to March being the month we've all been waiting for. However, some on the interwebs have tried to debunk the Captcha rumor as being a fake photoshopped image and aren't sure if March is the month or not. While it may be fake, there was never any doubt that it was exactly that, a rumor. So the answer is, no one knows and Blizzard isn't leaking anything...yet.

 "The number of these (beta) keys has not been determined yet...there will be a Beta opt in process, similar to what we have done in the past for Blizzard titles," said Yu.

"There will be several activities for beta participants to get involved in, mostly competitive in nature.

"Furthermore, there will be more opportunities arising too in the form of contests for players to win beta access to StarCraft II as well, including the Vespene Laughs StarCraft II Comic Contest."

A questionable source spoke with Blizzard's European RTS community manager and says that Blizzard has a beta date scheduled but isn't ready to inform the public of it just yet.

When will we finally get to sink our teeth into this juicy game? Well if you believe in ghosts, zombies, vampires or this rumor than I'd say March.

This was found on battle.net's StarCraft 2 forum and is
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The letters and numbers kind of spell out "beta in March." Is Blizzard sending its fans a hint?

Read on to see what else this German SCII fan learned from the Blizzard rep. while attending the ESL in Vienna recently.