They will continue the story, add / upgrade units, introduce more maps, introduce more Battle.Net features, and so on. Therefor, expansion.

There's nothing wrong with that per se, I just think that the demo sucked, and that it would've made a lot more sense to just make an e-sport edition and then just worry about balancing that for e-sports so that the much larger base of players that are more casual don't have to worry about their playstyle being nerfed.

I've had my playstyle nerfed in other games and it doesn't add anything, especially since I'm never a top tier player.

Not really. Everybody can make a tournament, just write to Blizzard and make a request about it. Blizzard doesn't take any cut.

Also, I see people bitching about how the game is so much eSports in the multiplayer. Exactly what defines the so much masturbated for "casual multiplayer RTS"? :)

And why exactly can't Starcraft 2 be played casually on multiplayer?

The DRM was put there because all you have to do is buy the game, install it to a friend's PC, log in, and you can have the game running without even your friend purchasing it.

The single player is free when you know how to get it, after all. ;)

It can be played casually, it's just that they made decisions which led to it being less fun. I've been through that on other games, and quite frankly it sucks. It might lead to things being a bit lopsided at times, or for some strategies being more strong than others, but casual players don't generally care about that. If they did care about that, then they'd be making decisions based upon spread sheets and taking the game very seriously. For the most part people focusing on enjoyment rather than competition would be considered casual.

I take it you disagree, but the fact is that it's really not fun to have to play the way that the developer wants because failing to do so might result in a competitive problem in high level play. It's one thing to have to play the way that the developer wants because it advances your game, and quite another because it affects somebody that you're not likely to ever actual play against.

And you're probably right about the licensing bit, last I heard any discussion of that was previous to the release, IIRC.

Custom maps allow map makers to do anything. That's where the true fun of SC2 lies for me. The single player campaign was great too. Playing plain MP is enjoyable, but stresses me out way too much.

It's academic to me as well, since they took out LAN play I won't be buying it. I don't care what sane sounding reasons they can come up with for this, it's of net 0 benefit to me and actually makes it worse for people like me in several situations.

It's like the decisions they have to make for balance. Anyone who didn't know competitive play affects people who don't play for high end competitive play did not play WOW pre and post arena. They finally had to go the route of making some skills behave differently in PVE play but they still have to balance their raiding content (or did, I quit when I saw how shitty the 3.0 patch drop was) based on arena (well, and vice-versa I suppose, though WOW launched with raiding, arena came a couple years later on).

So I guess my point is, balance in single player SC2 obviously gets affected by the eSports aspect and some of the effects are not fun for anyone not into the eSport area of the game. They want both types of players to play their game but one type or the other becomes the second class citizen.

Again, this doesn't mean that you, personally, shouldn't like SC2 or can't possibly find it fun. Clearly you know if you do or don't. I just found the lack of belief that balancing for eSports couldn't possibly hose those uninterested in that aspect to be a bit unbelievable. I also find it refreshing for the lead designer on SC2 (who admits he couldn't put in a lot of features he wanted to add) to come clean on this. It's much more honest and more fair to those deciding if they want to invest in said game.

Any game without LAN play should have been disowned by the eSport community immediately. They're a bunch of fucking morons for letting the game in its current state become an eSport success. This is the kind of thing that should have resulted in a massive strike forcing Blizzard to implement LAN functionality, but I guess the Blizzard fanbase thought playing StarCraft II in its crippled state was more important.

God damn it, guys.

For all the hue and cry over this I actually thought there might be a viable drop in sales. Either the hue and cry was really from a very vocal minority or people just really need their SC2 crack. Of course all your friends are playing it and there's a lot of value in that.

The lack of LAN play was a terrible implementation, and competitive tournaments have already been affected by this. Non-competitive gamers are hurt just as much by this, too, I imagine. They did this to prevent piracy, if I'm not mistaken, but I'm dubious as to how effective it could be. Even if it was effective, it's still hard for me to understand the justification for removing LAN.

On topic: I think SC2 makes for a fantastic spectator sport. Heck, I don't even own the game (comp can't run it) but I enjoy watching matches. I think SC2's very large and active community owes much to how the game is balanced around being competitive, but I can see why some would not find that fun. It can work the other way, too. A game that has tons of "fun" units in it may not have what it takes to be an engaging competitive sport.

Consider a real-world example. I think soccer is the most accessible and enjoyable sport to play, but it's an utter bore to watch on TV. American football isn't the funnest sport to play, but I love watching it on TV.

Bah, I sound like a fanboy. Sorry. :D Just loving every game Blizzard have ever made. :)

@ Orcish

I really don't think anyone is getting to be a second class citizen because singleplayer and multiplayer are 2 different segments of the game that do not interfere with each other.
Multiplayer balance fixes do not change singleplayer.
Singleplayer with its cinematic story, research upgrades, more units (all original units from previous games) is a seperate game all together.

Non-pro gamers can enjoy multiplayer also becaue it has a big playerbase and the most solid match-making system I have seen. 1v1, 2v2, 3v3, FFA, Custom games, editor for modders, take your pick.
The point of the article if you ask me was how different it is working for Blizzard from EA, because when they set out to make SC2 they knew what they were making.
Bowder said: "look at that neat cover mechanic from COH, we could do something like that" and Blizzard "said hell no! This is old school rock-paper-scissors".

The dude made C&C: Generals and look at that how putting fun stuff in turned out.

How?

Pull up the Jolly Roger and go sailing the interwebz.

Get a guest pass.

Find a guest pass. Most people that have bought the original received two guest passes. Also, people that buy new released boxes of old Blizzard games can sometimes find guest passes too. And, people that bought Cataclysm can also find guest passes in their boxes.

Once you have one, go to your Battle.Net account (register one if you don't have already), add the key there, download the full game, install and log in.

It will unlock you the full game for exactly 7 hours, but the offline mode will also be unlocked for 30 days, which provides you the full single player experience. :)