Last Friday at Blizzcon ‘08, Blizzard dropped a bombshell about their upcoming, highly anticipated sequel: Starcraft II. Straying from the classic RTS release strategy that most, if not all, games to date have followed, executive VP of game design Rob Pardo announced that the initial release of the game will contain only the Terran campaign and that the Zerg and Protoss campaigns will be split into their own, separately packaged games to be released sometime later. The initial installment of the game is cited to be Starcraft II Terrans: Wings of Liberty followed by Starcraft II Zerg: Heart of the Swarm and finally Starcraft II Protoss: Legacy of the Void.

When questioned about release dates, Pardo likened the development time to that of Halflife 2 — with each episode being about a year apart. Apparently, only the Terran campaign is anywhere near completion, and the team at Blizzard is focusing on creating each campaign to be as full and in depth as the entire original game. Obviously, this announcement has raised many questions in both the development and gaming communities, and I have a few initial thoughts of my own.

Blizzard has always been a company that has imbued its fans with somewhat of a love/hate relationship by producing some of the most highly anticipated, well designed and amazingly detailed games available while making their fans wait inordinate amounts of time for the release — in some cases, years. Starcraft II seems to be no different. From first visuals, game play reviews and information that has been presented, I for one can’t wait to see how the finished product stacks up. Having been a huge fan of the original Starcraft, I definitely have high expectations, and the idea of having to wait — possibly years — before I can see the full product is somewhat disheartening.

On the other hand, if Blizzard is able to pull off their goals and make each of the three releases as feature rich and in depth as the entire original game was, I will be thrilled. Remember that the original had 30 missions: 10 for each of the three races. Blizzard intends that each race will have in excess of 30 missions for its campaign. More solo game time is a huge plus to someone like me, but the idea that the campaigns will be released a year or more apart scares me a bit, as does the idea that the Zerg and Protoss campaigns will be viewed almost as expansions to the original.

Now, let me go on the positive for a moment. Many people with whom I have played games over the years have enjoyed Starcraft for its multiplayer capabilities and fun — to those players: rejoice! Even the original release (Starcraft II Terrans: Wings of Liberty) will have all three races playable in multiplayer mode, so there will still be a huge drawing for that aspect; however, there will be some units that are playable only in campaign mode, so there will definitely still be some secrets kept until the future release of all three campaigns.

Suffice to say that, as a Starcraft — and even more generically, Blizzard — fan, I am definitely looking forward to the release of this game. While others seem to be going out of their way to find fault with Blizzard for their decision, I must admit that part of me is excited at the prospect. Having a bit of development background myself, I know how much additional content could be added to a game if it were split out into episodes like this. Yes, I am aware that it is quite possibly a campaign gimmick to bring in endless revenue over the course of the game’s release, but I prefer to try and look on the positive: perhaps they really are going to be giving us significantly more bang for our buck!