The release of Starcraft 2 is getting closer. When the beta opt-in started a couple of months ago, everything pointed towards a beta test during the summer and a probable release before the end of 2009. This speculation has now been confirmed by Blizzard's top guy Mike Morhaime. He stated the following during the Activision-Blizzard "E3 Investor Remarks" webcast on Sunday afternoon;

So there you have it - Starcraft 2 coming in 2009, assuming no unexpected delays or epic fails with the beta. As official as it is going to get until there is a firm date, probably only a couple of months before actual release.

Mike Morhaime also made some remarks about the dominance of World of Warcraft. To summarize, with the massive subscriber base Blizzard can uniquely take advantage of economies of scale, allowing them to invest heavily into development of new content. It is obviously one thing to invest money to a game that has around 11 million subscribers when compared to the competition that is making investments to games that have just a few hundred thousand.

Of course those who are addicted World of Warcraft still claim that Blizzard releases far too little content and there is nothing to do before the next patch - which is never coming soon enough.

Comments

	Igloo3dO 2009-06-03 #1 OMGBBQ!
	Unregistered 2009-06-05 #2 OMGWTFAFK
	Unregistered 2009-06-05 #3 pfft.....u obviously didnt read Mike's comment properly...although mentioning that he aims to get it out before the close of 2009, he also mentioned they wont release it until it's just about perfect...ie which could be anytime after 2009. who cares about possible release year...i want an actualy OFFICIAL RELEASE DATE.
	Jarnis 2009-06-05 #4 Quote: Originally Posted by Unregistered pfft.....u obviously didnt read Mike's comment properly...although mentioning that he aims to get it out before the close of 2009, he also mentioned they wont release it until it's just about perfect...ie which could be anytime after 2009. who cares about possible release year...i want an actualy OFFICIAL RELEASE DATE. This is the closest thing to a release date one can get out of Blizzard before the boxes are in manufacturing. Having watched Blizzard's development cycles multiple times, I'd say it will come in 2009, pending any unexpected issues with the beta. Exactly the same way I could say that Wrath of the Lich King would make it's late 2008 release already when the closed beta started in the summer. Six months before release the uncertain bits are mostly out of the way, it is all final polish, tuning and testing for the last six months or so at Blizzard - and before they are at that stage, they never talk anything about a release date or possible release date or anything. If the closed beta of SC2 starts by the end of July, it will come this year assuming the beta doesn't uncover anything completely unexpected that takes a long time to fix. Mark my words. They had the damn game already playable back in 2007 in trade shows and Blizzcon! Other developers make complete games from start to finish in two years. Worst case scenario - it might slip few months into 2010. No later than Jan-Feb 2010.