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STARCRAFT 2 SPOILER INCLUDED (kinda)

To start this off, this is NOT a what is better thread. This is a did Starcraft rip off Warhammer thread. So to begin, this has always bugged me, and I'm not sure if this has been covered, but has anyone besides myself noticed the EXTREME similarities between Starcraft and Warhamer 40k?

I brought this up with my local GW manager, and he explained to me that back in the day all of the Warcraft guys used to play Warhammer. They came to GW one day and asked if they could make a game, GW being the old crabby man that it is refused and then Warcraft came out, Starcraft soon to follow.

Similarities:

-Weird Protoss guy that's trying to destroy the universe (Chaos)
-Zerg, crappy versions of Tyranids
-Space Marines, well.. Space Marines
-Protoss, Eldar/Tau things

Besides the obvious similarities in the races there are many similarities in the story line as well. It seems to me that things were just shifted around to make it slightly different.

For example:

Raynor and Mengsk being pals, then Raynor realizing Mengsk is a huge ****** and leading a crusade to over throw him. Emperor's plight backwards
Zerg raging across the universe constantly threatening the Protoss and Terran munching down on planets and stuff. Same thing as Tyranids

For those of you who say "NU HUH, THERE'S NO HUGE BETRAYAL!!!!111onelevenone!!" Well, they saved that tidbit for Warcraft, Arthas = Horus. He goes on a Crusade, comes back evil and oh noes kills the king.

That's my two cents, and I want to hear what Dakka thinks. I personally believe they did completely rip off of Warhammer(both genres), but let's hear your thoughts!

You have know idea what you may have unleashed.

Haha indeed..

Yep, GW not only missed the boat with that, but when the boat was leaving, the rope snagged it by the leg, pulling it in the water so that it got dragged behind, then nibbled upon by bottom-feeders only a distorted skeleton remained, the empty-sockets of it's skull staring out into the blue nothing at what might have been.

Massive missed opportunity? Would GW now be an all-conquering worldwide mega-company if they had run with those concepts? Would that have been a good thing?

We will never know

Pixelpusher: /thread

Please god someone put this thread out of its misery.

^It's funny because it's true!

No really, it’s like bringing back the ash trays so you can have your prefrontal lobotomy.

At the end of the day you are still going to spend the full ninety days at the mental healthcare ward.

pixelpusher wrote:

I present the petition that every post henceforth must include this strip.

To be honest, 'Space Marine's have been around forever. Seriously. Even Heinlein was getting a bit of the action back in 1959 (and look! Bugs *coughnidscough*! Skinnies! *coughaliensingeneralcough*)

pixelpusher wrote:

Hehe I own that hoody and the last time my friend brought up this topic I smacked him with it and made him read the back. Also oddly enough a couple of kids who sat behind me last semester now look at me weird and think I'm emo... wonder why

"Ta-daa!"

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/321938.page

Marzooky wrote:
Similarities:

-Weird Protoss guy that's trying to destroy the universe (Chaos)

Someone trying to destroy the universe is hardly a rare concept in SciFi. Chaos weren´t the first to do so, and won´t be the last.

Marzooky wrote:-Zerg, crappy versions of Tyranids

Well, that might be the case, but again: Somewhat Insectoid Aliens that overrun planets are not unique either. Starship Troopers (the novel) did it 1959, way before either ´Nids or Zerg were thought of.

Marzooky wrote:-Space Marines, well.. Space Marines

Again, to use Starship Troopers: Soldiers in Power Armor go back to 1959 at least. And the name "Space Marine" is not really imaginative.

Marzooky wrote:-Protoss, Eldar/Tau things

Well, first of all: Protoss 1998 if I´m not mistaken, Tau 2001. And the similarities between Protoss and Eldar are because both use the same old Tropes: ancient race, mental abilities, high tech level. This combination is, again, one of the most used in SciFi.

Marzooky wrote:Besides the obvious similarities in the races there are many similarities in the story line as well. It seems to me that things were just shifted around to make it slightly different.

For example:

Raynor and Mengsk being pals, then Raynor realizing Mengsk is a huge ****** and leading a crusade to over throw him. Emperor's plight backwards

Again, an overused plot point. Pretty much every fictional revolution in a story is this when told from the PoV of a good guy.

Marzooky wrote:Zerg raging across the universe constantly threatening the Protoss and Terran munching down on planets and stuff. Same thing as Tyranids

See Starship Troopers.

Marzooky wrote:For those of you who say "NU HUH, THERE'S NO HUGE BETRAYAL!!!!111onelevenone!!" Well, they saved that tidbit for Warcraft, Arthas = Horus. He goes on a Crusade, comes back evil and oh noes kills the king.

Seriously, it´s becoming quite hard not to sink into sarcasm here.
Hero turned Villain, overthrows (or tries to) King is older than dirt. That´s pretty much what Luzifer tried to do in the BIBLE. That´s what the whole Horus Heresy thing comes from in the first place. The first of the Angels (Horus of the Space Marines) tries to overthrow God (Emperor).

Marzooky wrote:That's my two cents, and I want to hear what Dakka thinks. I personally believe they did completely rip off of Warhammer(both genres), but let's hear your thoughts!

Both used the same old aspects that have been told numerous times. None of your points are in any shape an indicator of Blizzard ripping of GW or the other way round, only that there are no new stories but old ones retold time after time.
The only sign that there MIGHT be some connection would be the similar look of the Orcs of Warcraft and Warhammer. Then again that can easily be a coincidence or both using a similar inspiration I´m not aware of again.

So: Only a rumor, and noone could ever bring any evidence beyond stuff that is shared between countless of stories anyway.

I thought it was common knowledge that Warcraft Orcs vs. Humans was originally destined to be a GW licensed game?

From the blizzard-wiki (sorry this was the most authoritative quote I could find )

Blizzard struck a deal with Games Workshop to create a a PC version of the "Warhammer" table top miniatures game. After completing work on the game, the deal fell through, and Blizzard, left with unfinished and unpaid work on Warhammer, created "WarCraft". WarCraft's factions of Orcs and Trolls versus Dwarves and Elves bears many similarities to the Warhammer factions. In "WarCraft III", if you repeatedly click a griffon rider he will say "This Warhammer cost 40K", 40K being a shortening of 40,000.

Vimes wrote:

So: Only a rumor, and noone could ever bring any evidence beyond stuff that is shared between countless of stories anyway.

...Not really just a rumour. It's known fact that starcraft was going to be a 40K game, but GW pulled out at the last minute, and Blizzard just renamed everything.

Personally I don't think 'toss have much in common with Tau but OK.

Honestly if you want to get seriousliez Raynor/ Mengsk has absolutely nothing to do with Warhammer in fact if you want to look at it that way, it is how Starcraft differentiates itself Zerg/ Terran obviously being similar to call it Space Hulk. Starcraft Terrans of course (prison conscripts) being far different from the Adeptus Astartes.

The other thing you are skipping over is Kerrigan, which is definately a "90's thing" as Warhammer has, like, no (for lack of a better expression) chicks. Warhammer doesn't even have Dark Templar, really except for maybe Harlies.

I mean the closest Warhammer has to Kerrigan is the WHFB Khorne special character and she is a minor note. Unless you want to count Morathi, who is a pointy-ear. That would be xenophobic evil-Protoss bitch-queen in Starcrafterverse. So, no.

It is true the Zerg draw obvious parallels from Tyranids in fact I would not be surprised if the original Starcraft designers didn't even maybe play a game or two of 40k before designing the game. As well as power armour, etc.

Now as is often pointed out in these threads, or was, the "original" power armour vs bugs was actually Starship Troopers in the late 60's.

As for the Hybrid... honestly I don't even remember where that thing came from. If it is analogous to chaos I would consider it to be something like a rogue Harlie rather than say a Rogue exodite, which is what the Protoss antagonists in Starcraft 2 compare to.

So basically if Starcraft 2 is the story of a rogue Harlie going crazy, and an alliance between a Genestealer-Tyranid-Queen and Human forces (possibly involving some sort of conflict between Inquisitors say, or else a Marshal vs a local Imperial representative) then you have a Starcraft 2 thing going on.

But otherwise, no.

Ketara wrote:

Vimes wrote:

So: Only a rumor, and noone could ever bring any evidence beyond stuff that is shared between countless of stories anyway.

...Not really just a rumour. It's known fact that starcraft was going to be a 40K game, but GW pulled out at the last minute, and Blizzard just renamed everything.

Less "GW pulled out at the last minute" more "Blizzard made the product, without license, and then came to GW expecting them to license it out and pull out of their existing licenses".

One thing that always seems to be glossed over and make it seem that "Oh, GW completely screwed the pooch" is that, at the time, Blizzard was an unknown entity. GW had licenses existing with a known entity that had been doing them right--SSI. SSI, at that time, was also a giant in the turn-based strategy game market.

Vimes wrote:Well, that might be the case, but again: Somewhat Insectoid Aliens that overrun planets are not unique either. Starship Troopers (the novel) did it 1959, way before either ´Nids or Zerg were thought of.

You know what's funny? The "aliens" in Starship Troopers were hardly bugs. They were given the moniker because they resembled them, sure. But the way they were described links them far more with humanity than 'bugs'. They had a humanoid figure, wielded guns and other weapons(not grafted into their being, mind you--just wielded them pow pow the same way we humans do), and used tools the same way we do.

The early Tyranid Warriors were far, far, far closer to the Starship Troopers' ideal of the Bugs than the movie ever got.

Kanluwen, we don't really have any way to know what transpired between GW and Blizzard though. SSI were a big company, but nothing they were doing was pulling in anything like the popularity of C&C and the other real time strategy games back then, so in any case if it was GW's decision to pull out/not to run with it, it was a missed opportunity of monumental proportions.

Kanluwen wrote:

Vimes wrote:Well, that might be the case, but again: Somewhat Insectoid Aliens that overrun planets are not unique either. Starship Troopers (the novel) did it 1959, way before either ´Nids or Zerg were thought of.

You know what's funny? The "aliens" in Starship Troopers were hardly bugs. They were given the moniker because they resembled them, sure. But the way they were described links them far more with humanity than 'bugs'. They had a humanoid figure, wielded guns and other weapons(not grafted into their being, mind you--just wielded them pow pow the same way we humans do), and used tools the same way we do.

The early Tyranid Warriors were far, far, far closer to the Starship Troopers' ideal of the Bugs than the movie ever got.

I think you guys are talking at cross-purposes there. The novel starship troopers had 2 aliens mentioned. One was the 'bugs' from the movies, the arachnoid type aliens who provide the final battle of the book when they are tunnelling through the ground. The other was the 'skinnies', pink skinned and humanoid with a kind of snout. At the start of the book, it's pointed out that the 'skinnies' world is part of the human hegemony.

The Skinnies hadn't been paying their dues, or there was some kind of disagreement going on with humanity (whose government is essentially a systems-wide fascist regime, Heinlein was using SF/fantasy for social and political commentary), and so the Mobile Infantry - a small handful of them, thats all that were needed - were sent in to remind the skinnies who is boss. That sequence consisted of them leaping from area to area, dropping various munitions (all of them hugely destructive) and destroying industrial complexes while the Skinnies tried ineffectually to stop them.

On a side note, anyone reading the book will be amazed at how dissimilar it is to the film. Although Verhoeven's movie was kind of fun, in some ways I think it was a massive missed opportunity.

Pacific wrote:Kanluwen, we don't really have any way to know what transpired between GW and Blizzard though. SSI were a big company, but nothing they were doing was pulling in anything like the popularity of C&C and the other real time strategy games back then, so in any case if it was GW's decision to pull out/not to run with it, it was a missed opportunity of monumental proportions.

Of course we don't "really have any way to know what transpired between GW and Blizzard". GW doesn't spout its business all over the place like Blizzard does.
To say that "SSI wasn't pulling in anything like the popularity of C&C and other real time strategy games" is silly though.

Kanluwen wrote:

Vimes wrote:Well, that might be the case, but again: Somewhat Insectoid Aliens that overrun planets are not unique either. Starship Troopers (the novel) did it 1959, way before either ´Nids or Zerg were thought of.

You know what's funny? The "aliens" in Starship Troopers were hardly bugs. They were given the moniker because they resembled them, sure. But the way they were described links them far more with humanity than 'bugs'. They had a humanoid figure, wielded guns and other weapons(not grafted into their being, mind you--just wielded them pow pow the same way we humans do), and used tools the same way we do.

The early Tyranid Warriors were far, far, far closer to the Starship Troopers' ideal of the Bugs than the movie ever got.

I think you guys are talking at cross-purposes there. The novel starship troopers had 2 aliens mentioned. One was the 'bugs' from the movies, the arachnoid type aliens who provide the final battle of the book when they are tunnelling through the ground. The other was the 'skinnies', pink skinned and humanoid with a kind of snout. At the start of the book, it's pointed out that the 'skinnies' world is part of the human hegemony.

No, I'm not. There's a mention from Rico that the 'bugs' liked to hide their warriors, who you "wouldn't spot among the crowd of their drone workers unless you saw them holding their weapon".

The Skinnies hadn't been paying their dues, or there was some kind of disagreement going on with humanity (whose government is essentially a systems-wide fascist regime, Heinlein was using SF/fantasy for social and political commentary), and so the Mobile Infantry - a small handful of them, thats all that were needed - were sent in to remind the skinnies who is boss. That sequence consisted of them leaping from area to area, dropping various munitions (all of them hugely destructive) and destroying industrial complexes while the Skinnies tried ineffectually to stop them.

The Skinnies had been actively funneling weapons to the bugs. There was nothing to do with 'dues'.

On a side note, anyone reading the book will be amazed at how dissimilar it is to the film. Although Verhoeven's movie was kind of fun, in some ways I think it was a massive missed opportunity.

Because the film wasn't meant to be Starship Troopers.
It was originally to be titled "Bug Hunt", but someone found out Starship Troopers was available to license and did so.

I miss SSI's turn based 40K and Epic games...

...anyway...

Stay polite in here!

I know if may be difficult, but it is also mandatory!

Must read the book again, I completely missed that bit

No worries Alpharius, I've been on the forum for just a short time but long enough to know what kind of response to expect.

I'm not going to start looking around the web for sales figures of C&C and the host of clones of that game that came out around that time. Suffice to say, I don't think anything that SSI did came even came close to the popularity of that game, and GW might have been sensible to jump on that particular bandwagon when it passed through.

Pacific wrote:Must read the book again, I completely missed that bit

No worries Alpharius, I've been on the forum for just a short time but long enough to know what kind of response to expect.

I'm not going to start looking around the web for sales figures of C&C and the host of clones of that game that came out around that time. Suffice to say, I don't think anything that SSI did came even came close to the popularity of that game, and GW might have been sensible to jump on that particular bandwagon when it passed through.

"Shadow of the Horned Rat" is the earliest GW game I can find reference of, and that was 1995. It had apparently "very high sales". Final Liberation, etc all did pretty dang well for GW and SSI/Mindscape both.

It's kind of interesting though. Those two companies were bought out by EA, who GW now has a pretty good working relationship with.

Everyone copies everyone else. Space marines were copied from another sources, and so on. Instead of being ignorant and trying to figure out who ripped who off we should just look at the end result. One is an excellent tabletop game, the other is an excellent pc game.

Edit: also someone has never played starcraft 1. This proves you are only looking at the present and not the whole picture. Otherwise you would know that the marines in starcraft are actually closer to the first marines from GW than the current marines GW puts out in both look and flavor. Truth.

Everybody knows Starcraft takes things wholesale from 40k. Everybody has always known this. Considering Warcraft was going to be a Warhammer Fantasy game, it's kind of obvious Blizzard still wants to make GW based games.

Also, Andy Chambers wrote most of Starcraft II. Sorry OP, but you're treading very, very familiar ground.

And with that, we're locking this thread before the name-calling starts.

(And by that, I meant that I was going to start calling people names).