StarCraft II launch party rocks Brisbane, Southeast Asia client unlocked

It's almost 1am here on the East coast of Australia, July 27th. I've just come back from Brisbane's StarCraft II launch party, 2000 fanatics strong, featuring producer Kaeo Milker. The hardest of the hardcore flew in from interstate, and there were even a couple of noteworthy cosplayers in the mix too. Check out the full-article view for a heap of photos from the event.

The midnight countdown kicked off with an apt "nuclear launch detected", the crowd chanting unceremoniously, and wound up with an even more fitting "hell, it's about time." There were less cheers than you might have hoped for after such a build up, but that's simply because everyone proceeded to flood the EB Games stall gates to grab their copy as quickly as possible.

If strangely, like me, you picked up a boxed copy but do not have a DVD-ROM in your games machine, you'll be pleasantly surprised to find out that the downloadable Southeast Asia client will now let you install the game - yes, that's contrary to Blizzard's "3am, July 28 local time" stipulation. Just register your retail box key on Battle.net, and you're away! Do keep in mind you still can't digitally purchase the game yet, and likely can't until that time.

Don't get too excited too quickly though, as there's a patch to download straight after installing. Delightfully, mine has just finished, so it's time to get stuck in. Enjoy your night of StarCraft II!