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Blizzard Co-Founder: We Failed With The StarCraft Marketplace
Speaking candidly at the Blizzard press conference at Gamescom today, company co-founder Frank Pearce was open about one area in which he thinks the successful developer has unequivocally failed: the planned StarCraft marketplace.
Pearce was asked by an audience member to address ways in which the triple-A studio has not succeeded, and he did not hesitate to bring up StarCraft marketplace as an example. This Battle.net addition was originally announced years ago as a way for StarCraft II custom map creators to sell their work for real money.
According to Pearce, the marketplace was part of a solution to one of Blizzard's biggest problems: Players inevitably experience content at a faster pace than the developer can create it. As such, he had hoped for it to be ready in time for the launch of StarCraft II.
At this point, though, Pearce seemed unsure that the marketplace will even be ready in time for Heart of the Swarm, StarCraft II's upcoming first expansion pack. He confirmed that Blizzard is still working on it and that pieces of it will likely be in place in Battle.net updates with Heart of the Swarm.
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