BlizzCon: StarCraft 2 To Release As Trilogy Of Games

Blizzard plans to release its upcoming RTS sequel StarCraft II as a trilogy of games, each focusing on one of the franchise's playable races. The company made the surprising announcement during its BlizzCon event in Anaheim, California. The first of the three releases will focus on game's Terran faction, and will be subtitled Terrans: Wings of Liberty. The second and third, which executive VP of game design Rob Pardo likened to expansion packs, will be respectively entitled Zerg: Heart of the Swarm and Protoss: Legacy of the Void. An overarching storyline will spread across the titles. Pardo revealed the strategy during BlizzCon's opening ceremonies, according to reports by Shacknews and Joystiq. He explained that using a standard development mentality would have resulted either in a necessary reduction of content or a prohibitively long development cycle. Multiplayer, a crucial component of the original StarCraft (and the basis of a national competitive gaming market in Korea), will apparently be handled more traditionally. Pardo said that while the second and third releases "will be like expansion packs," the company doesn't plan to skimp on the content. We really want them to feel like standalone products," he said. Since 1995's WarCraft II: Tides of Darkness, Blizzard has released one expansion pack each for its real-time strategy games. Blizzard has yet to reveal a release projection for any of its StarCraft II titles.