Starcraft II: Heart of the Swarm Has Shorter Single-Player Campaign

Blizzard has revealed that the next chapter in the Starcraft II trilogy, Heart of the Swarm, will have a shorter single-player campaign, cutting down the number of missions to just 20, as opposed to the first installment, Wings of Liberty, which had 29.

Starcraft II is among the many great projects that Blizzard hopes to unleash on the market next year, shedding some light on the Zerg faction of the game and its own story, after the first chapter of the trilogy, Wings of Liberty, focused on the Terran side.

Speaking with Kotaku, Starcraft II senior designer Jonny Ebbert shared some interesting details about the single-player campaign of the next game, including the number of missions from the single-player campaign, and how it was reduced as opposed to the first title, largely because of the vocal outcry from the community.

"We actually got a lot of complaints that it [Wings of Liberty] was too long," Ebbert said, causing my brow to furrow quizzically. "Like a lot. We looked at the achievement data, and the completion rates just went [straight down]. We got a lot of heat internally about it as well. People on other teams were just 'It's too long!'"

The decision to reduce the number of missions won't affect the overall campaign, as Ebbert is quick to point out that, "We're always talking about concentrating the cool, so we decided to compress it from 29 to 20 missions. We've played through it and we've been 'Yeah, this feels pretty nice.'"

As for the last chapter in the Starcraft II trilogy, Legacy of the Void, the number of missions will be decided according to the feedback gotten from Heart of the Swarm. Still, Ebbert highlights that Blizzard knows there are still quite a lot of players that are focused more on single-player than multiplayer.

"We have ideas for the next one that we're hoping will reward [this] type of player a lot more...people who aren't online hardcore that want something they can sink a lot of time into in a single-player way. That's definitely at the forefront of our minds."

Starcraft II: Heart of the Swarm is scheduled to be released next year, exclusively for the PC and Mac.