- You're grounded. Fixed an exploit that allowed SCVs and Drones to fly over obstacles if their order queue size was exceeded in a specific way. This also fixes some existing mineral hack exploits.
- Launch at startup. Added an option to launch the ShieldBattery client at system startup (defaults to on). You can change this in the 'App' tab of the settings.
- Ladder table fixes. Fixed some issues with the ladder rankings table when users had particularly long names.
- HD graphics fail to work even when purchased/turned on. Blizzard requires the game to be launched from their launcher once every 30 days to keep premium features enabled. We'll at the very least add a warning for this case in the future (or better yet, automate re-authing), but for now, try to launch the game from the Blizzard launcher at least once a month.
- Observer mode missing. We're still getting our lobby code to work with the newer ingame observer things, this will return shortly!
- Off-center screen starting position. For some users, generally in positions on the right side of the screen, the starting screen position may be slightly off-center from where it usually is.
- Replays sometimes crash on startup. With newer versions of SC:R (9651+), replays occasionally crash as soon as they load. This is a transient issue, and not specific to any particular replay, so relaunching the same replay should work.
- Support for new SC:R version. We're now compatible with 1.23.8.9588. If you'd like to play on this version and actually have autoscrolling chat, we've got you covered!
- More visible notifications. Notifications now pop up in the client when they're first delivered, so you can actually notice they've arrived. More notifications for useful things, as well as OS-level notifications are coming soon!
- More interactive buttons. Buttons should appear a bit more dynamic and fun in this release.
- Ya blue it. We've moved to a blue-ier color scheme in this release, to bring out a more "cool sci-fi" vibe and less "trendy office app". We're sure you'll feel right at home.
- More visible hotkeys. Activity buttons on the main screen now underline the character that matches their hotkey, for easier discoverability. Just add alt!
- No more idling. The ladder rankings now display when a user last played a game, so you can get a better idea of who you're likely to catch in the queue, and who's just sitting at the top hoping not to lose their rank.
- Chat improvements. We've fixed a bunch of bugs related to scrolling and loading more messages in chat and whispers, and added a message when days change between messages (no more getting confused replying to that whisper from a week ago!)
- Load time improvements. The game now loads a bit less unnecessary data, which should bring the game start time down on slower systems.
- Beefier fonts. We've fixed some issues with font rendering, so a number of components should have thicker fonts as intended.
- More efficient menus. We know SC players love efficiency, so we've changed our small overlays (menus, profile popups, etc.) to allow you to click things behind them while they're open. This should make it a bit less annoying to navigate things with a lot of menus.
- Crash fix. We've fixed a rare crash that could occur with some hardware/software configurations on Nvidia graphics cards.
- Can you hear me now? Application sounds are now 150% louder, as they were a bit quiet relative to other application's volumes. You may want to double-check your settings to ensure they sound how you'd like.
- Replay filenames. Auto-saved replays from ShieldBattery now contain the correct map name instead of just 'map'.
- Calm down, minerals. Minerals and gas geysers should no longer vibrate in replays. Sorry, they were just a bit excited.
- Au revoir. We made a change to ensure the game never tries to talk to the Bonjour service, which may have been stalling some users' game initialization in rare cases.
- Blink. blink. The application will now flash its taskbar entry when someone joins your lobby.
- Longer load times. We've doubled the allowable game load times (to 60 seconds) since some users were hitting this timeout when they would have loaded successfully. We have some plans to improve this system to not require such long timeouts, but these players should no longer be hindered by it for the time being.
- Ping pong. We've revamped our system for dealing with game servers, allowing us to add and remove servers on the fly, as well as improving the consistent and reliability of clients calculating their ping to the various regions. This should improve ingame latency a bit (more work on that front coming soon!).
- HD graphics fail to work even when purchased/turned on. Blizzard requires the game to be launched from their launcher once every 30 days to keep premium features enabled. We'll at the very least add a warning for this case in the future (or better yet, automate re-authing), but for now, try to launch the game from the Blizzard launcher at least once a month.
- Observer mode missing. We're still getting our lobby code to work with the newer ingame observer things, this will return shortly!
- Off-center screen starting position. For some users, generally in positions on the right side of the screen, the starting screen position may be slightly off-center from where it usually is.
- Faster auto-update. Our updates are now served from our global CDN and support downloading just the parts of the app that have actually been updated. Basically, these should download a lot faster now.
- Smoother fullscreen. We've tweaked how the game handles fullscreen mode to work better with multiple monitors and removed some legacy code it was still using. If you're on Windows 10 and have been using Fullscreen (Windowed) mode, we highly recommend checking out normal Fullscreen now: it should work nearly the same as far as program switching goes, but with improved performance and input latency. This change has some potential to cause problems for users on older graphics card, so if you see any weirdness, please let us know!
- Browse maps in less clicks. Our map browser now lets you view details about a particular map by clicking on its tile, rather than needing to go through menus. In addition, there should be less things jumping around as the map images load in (we'll try to work some click accuracy training back into the client in some other way 😏).
- HD graphics fail to work even when purchased/turned on. Blizzard requires the game to be launched from their launcher once every 30 days to keep premium features enabled. We'll at the very least add a warning for this case in the future (or better yet, automate re-authing), but for now, try to launch the game from the Blizzard launcher at least once a month.
- Observer mode missing. We're still getting our lobby code to work with the newer ingame observer things, this will return shortly!
- Off-center screen starting position. For some users, generally in positions on the right side of the screen, the starting screen position may be slightly off-center from where it usually is.
- Vibrating mineral patches. You're not going crazy, I promise. Those mineral patches really are vibrating. This is an unintentional side-effect of our fog of war change for some users, we're working on it!
- Skins! Our settings dialog now has options for selecting the various types of skins in the game (both console + building/unit ones). We have no way of verifying what you have or haven't purchased so they're all shown, but if you select one you don't have access to, you'll get normal graphics. (Same known issues apply as with HD graphics here: you must launch SC:R with the Blizzard launcher every 30 days to refresh your purchase information.)
- Links and stuff. We've added a menu containing links to our various other web presences (Discord, GitHub, Patreon, etc.). Access it by clicking on the ShieldBattery logo in the top left of the client.
- No more feedback. Society has progressed past the need for feedback. We've removed the link to the feedback form in the app. ShieldBattery is already perfect! Just kidding, we just prefer that you direct your feedback and bug reports to our Discord so we can more easily collect additional information when necessary (check out the link to it in our snazzy new menu if you're not already there!)
- Various fixes and polish. The standalone client should no longer put links underneath the window controls where you can't click them, our map browser tabs are a bit less redundant, standalone web clients will go to the login page by default if logged out, and probably more small things!
- HD graphics fail to work even when purchased/turned on. Blizzard requires the game to be launched from their launcher once every 30 days to keep premium features enabled. We'll at the very least add a warning for this case in the future (or better yet, automate re-authing), but for now, try to launch the game from the Blizzard launcher at least once a month.
- Observer mode missing. We're still getting our lobby code to work with the newer ingame observer things, this will return shortly!
- Off-center screen starting position. For some users, generally in positions on the right side of the screen, the starting screen position may be slightly off-center from where it usually is.
- Vibrating mineral patches. You're not going crazy, I promise. Those mineral patches really are vibrating. This is an unintentional side-effect of our fog of war change for some users, we're working on it!
- You're bad. Or maybe you're good, now you can find out on our new ranked leaderboard! Find the Ladder button or hit Alt+D on your keyboard to bring it up and check out how you stack up against the rest of the server. More information like main races, game history, and in depth user profiles coming soon.
- More counting! We now have a snazzy counter for the number of games played on our home page. If you've ever wanted the privilege of making a counter go up just from clicking a few buttons, come play a few games!
- But also less counting! We've turned off the counter showing how many people are currently queued for matchmaking. We found it made people less likely to queue and overall gave them incorrect expectations for how long finding a match would take. We're working on some better ways to give people realistic expectations here, and should have some more to share soon.
- Notifications. We've added support for in-client notifications. At the moment there aren't very many of these, but you'll notice a new button in the bottom right to access them. The settings button is still there as well, just a little smaller than before (please don't talk about it, wouldn't want to embarrass the button).
- Another round of UI polish. Our client got another round of UI polish changing the look of... just about everything really. Tweaks to text styles, larger click targets, adjustments to chat layout and more!
- Rare launch bugs squashed. We fixed some more issues that we saw happen to a few users on game launch. If you were having trouble before, try again, it might be better now! If not, we'll keep working at it.
- Like small windows? Well, now you can use them, I guess? The client should behave more reasonably at small sizes now, no more losing important buttons outside the visible area.
- Pesky high ranked players. We've made some more tweaks to how our matchmaker finds potential opponents for high ranked players to try and keep queue times a bit more reasonable.
- HD graphics fail to work even when purchased/turned on. Blizzard requires the game to be launched from their launcher once every 30 days to keep premium features enabled. We'll at the very least add a warning for this case in the future (or better yet, automate re-authing), but for now, try to launch the game from the Blizzard launcher at least once a month.
- Observer mode missing. We're still getting our lobby code to work with the newer ingame observer things, this will return shortly!
- Off-center screen starting position. For some users, generally in positions on the right side of the screen, the starting screen position may be slightly off-center from where it usually is.
- Vibrating mineral patches. You're not going crazy, I promise. Those mineral patches really are vibrating. This is an unintentional side-effect of our fog of war change for some users, we're working on it!
- We learned to count. The lobby count should be a bit more accurate now and stop telling you about lobbies that have already started.
- Emails, emails, emails. Email verification should be working again (try your existing emails again, but resending emails should also work).
- Some random changes. Or, well, changes for Random players. Players who have selected Random will no longer be able to choose an alternate race. This didn't really work how most people expected (it picked the alternate only if your opponent was also playing Random), so we fixed the glitch.
- Stacks on stacks on stacks. Buildings and resources that are stacked on top of each other (for instance, stacked neutral buildings or stacked mineral patches) now display a stack count in their unit card.
- We heard you liked numbers. The matchmaking and lobby buttons will now display a count of active players or lobbies, so you can figure out how badly you want to join. (Really badly, I'm sure).
- More selective matches. We fixed a bug in the matchmaker that was letting it pick matches that only one player was happy with. Now you all have to be happy about every match you're given. I do not make the rules. The matchmaker does, but it's been super benevolent so far...
- Anti-anti-virus. ShieldBattery will now alert you if someone or something has deleted important files (I'm looking at you, anti-virus makers). This can often be remedied by reporting it as a false positive or removing the file from quarantine.
- Bugs bashed. Fixed a game crash that could occur if you hadn't launched SC:R once after installing it. Fixed our chat channels and whispers showing notifications for non-existent messages. Improved the performance of chat channels with large numbers of users.
- HD graphics fail to work even when purchased/turned on. Blizzard requires the game to be launched from their launcher once every 30 days to keep premium features enabled. We'll at the very least add a warning for this case in the future (or better yet, automate re-authing), but for now, try to launch the game from the Blizzard launcher at least once a month.
- Observer mode missing. We're still getting our lobby code to work with the newer ingame observer things, this will return shortly!
- Off-center screen starting position. For some users, generally in positions on the right side of the screen, the starting screen position may be slightly off-center from where it usually is.
- Vibrating mineral patches. You're not going crazy, I promise. Those mineral patches really are vibrating. This is an unintentional side-effect of our fog of war change for some users, we're working on it!
- Game loading... or not. We've fixed a number of issues around players leaving or getting disconnected during game loads/countdowns in both matchmaking and lobbies. Previously these could leave the server in a pretty weird state and potentially prevent you from joining more matches in the future.
- tec27 has come online. tec27 has gone offline. tec27 has come online. We've turned online and offline messages off in chat for the moment, as they were being pretty obnoxious. In the future we might make this a configurable option (although depending on how this feels, this might just be how it is! Feedback welcome!).
- Zombies eradicated. StarCraft should do a better job of exiting if it failed to launch a game, no more creepy zombie clients hanging around in the background.
- Logs. The text kind, not the wood kind. Accessing our clients log files for reporting issues is now a lot easier! Right-click the icon in your system tray and find that shiny, new "Open Logs Folder" action. We've also added a bunch of other diagnostic logging around connections and game launching and such, so hopefully we can track down a few more of those pesky launch issues. (And if you are having launch issues, sending us your logs in our Discord would be very helpful!)
- HD graphics fail to work even when purchased/turned on. Blizzard requires the game to be launched from their launcher once every 30 days to keep premium features enabled. We'll at the very least add a warning for this case in the future (or better yet, automate re-authing), but for now, try to launch the game from the Blizzard launcher at least once a month.
- Observer mode missing. We're still getting our lobby code to work with the newer ingame observer things, this will return shortly!
- Off-center screen starting position. For some users, generally in positions on the right side of the screen, the starting screen position may be slightly off-center from where it usually is.
- Vibrating mineral patches. You're not going crazy, I promise. Those mineral patches really are vibrating. This is an unintentional side-effect of our fog of war change for some users, we're working on it!
- Wow, it's been a while. Sorry about that. The hurdles involved in supporting a game that was actively being worked on were unexpected and large. But we figured it out! And we're here again! And we're ready to bring you the best gosh darn StarCrafting Experience you've ever seen!
- StarCraft: Resupported. We now support StarCraft: Remastered installs. In fact, that's all we support. RIP 1.16, we'll miss you a bit. As a result, you'll notice that our Settings dialog has changed quite a bit, and we directly map to settings you'd find inside SC:R now. The big missing feature there is hotkey configuration. For now, you can launch SC:R through Blizzard's launcher and any hotkeys you change there will be maintained for ShieldBattery.
- We're open for business! No more invite process, this is now an open beta. Tell your friends, children, parents, pets... Get em all in here.
- Matchmaking making matches. Matchmaking is finally here! For 1v1. Without visible ranks yet. More modes (teams!) and visible ranks are coming real soon, but we wanted to roll out a simpler version first to work out all the kinks. It'll be available on weekends only for the first couple weeks, and we'll play it by ear after that. The client will let you know if it's down (and also let you know when it'll be back if it's currently disabled)! We look forward to your feedback on our unique race and map selection systems, so let us have it!
- DeMapcracy. Remember that cool new maps backend we mentioned 3 years ago? Honestly I wouldn't blame you if you didn't, although I mean, it's like, two versions below this one and you could just go look... Okay you don't have to, really it's fine! The important thing is, you can now upload all those maps you have sitting in your BW directory. And you can make lobbies for them too! Currently these will be in your private collection, usable only by you. Features for publishing and managing publicly available maps are Coming Soon™.
- Fog of War: Now With Slightly Less Fog. The starting fog color is now slightly transparent in non-UMS settings, so you can see the location of terrain and resources without exploring. We believe this will make playing new and unfamiliar maps slightly less intimidating, and just feels right. It may be 2021, but we can still teach Brood War some new tricks 😎
- WHAT'S THAT? I CAN'T HEAR YOU OVER THE COUNTDOWN BEEPS! We added a volume slider for our in-app sounds, just in case you didn't want to blast your whole neighborhood with incessant beeping every time you start a game. Weirdo.
- Donation station. Much requested: we now have some ways you can contribute to the maintenance and hosting costs of all of this. Check out our FAQ page for the links.
- More server locations. Speaking of donations, thanks to some generous contributors we've already been able to expand our game server locations. In addition to the already existing EU Central, US East, and US West servers, we now have servers in Korea (Seoul), Australia (Sydney), Brazil (São Paulo), and Sweden (Stockholm). Hopefully that brings a few more of you into a nice, low-latency experience.
- HD graphics fail to work even when purchased/turned on. Blizzard requires the game to be launched from their launcher once every 30 days to keep premium features enabled. We'll at the very least add a warning for this case in the future (or better yet, automate re-authing), but for now, try to launch the game from the Blizzard launcher at least once a month.
- Observer mode missing. We're still getting our lobby code to work with the newer ingame observer things, this will return shortly!
- Support for newer game installs. We can now handle installs of newer versions of StarCraft than 1.16.1! We're of the opinion that 1.18 would be a downgrade for existing ShieldBattery users, so we won't actually be using that yet, but we do support transparently converting newer installations back to a pristine 1.16.1 copy automatically (without affecting your installation in any way). Feel free to point things to your updated copy in the settings, and/or stop having to maintain two separate installations just to use our service.
- When did you join this channel? Now you can easily see! There is now a line in chat that indicates when you connected to the channel, so you can easily see how people change their demeanor when you're around.
- In your face, user. If you try to launch the app when it's already running the background, the original app will actually be brought to the front now.
- B̈étte̋r character support. Users with non-latin characters in their Windows usernames should have a 1000x better time launching games now. As in they'll actually work again. Whoops.
- FAQ accuracy. The FAQ has been updated to be more accurate towards our actual requirements, as well as to provide a link to the (Now free! Now working with ShieldBattery!) Brood War download.
- Maps. Again. But better. We've been hard at work implementing a new maps backend that can be used to upload and play any maps during lobby creation. It's not quite ready for use by everyone, but it now backs all of our official maps (you'll probably notice that map thumbnails look nicer and are more consistent, and that some maps have different titles between the selection and lobby screen). Expect this upload ability to come in a near-future update! Along with this, we've added a few more requested maps: Camelot (from ASL), Judgment Day, and Mizu de Chaud.
- Lobby actions. Adding computers just wasn't enough, so we finally threw in some more options for all you lobby enthusiasts out there. Try not to get too into it as you close slots, or kick or ban players from your lobbies, you do need some opposing players to start the game.
- UMS. If you've ever wanted to trade freedom of controlling your own settings for the thrill of playing a completely different game inside of Brood War, do we have exciting news for you! Use Map Settings maps are now supported on ShieldBattery! The maps we provide for now are: BGH 3.0 (a version of BGH that randomly assigns teams), Micro Tournament, Mini-Game Party, Monopoly, Poker D NovaX2, Random Micro Arena, SoG - Random, TMA Legends, i S k U Bound, Dhoom 2 Bound, and TriX Bound. This is all backed by our new maps backend, as well, so you'll soon be able to play whatever UMS maps you want. These won't currently display the pre-game briefing screen, but we're working on that as well.
- System tray icon. Our standalone client has one now, and will go there when you hit the close button. If that weren't enough, its icon will also change when you've received a new message (it's still pretty unintelligent though, better notifications with nickname highlighting and sounds and other such niceties are coming very soon!).
- Saved window position. We installed some additional memory modules in our windowed mode mainframe, meaning it can now save and restore your Brood War window's position between games!
- Username and password recovery. No longer will you have to PM an admin to recover your lost or forgotten account info! It's 2017, so we've built this functionality right into the login form. Please don't PM admins any more. Please. I mean, unless it's about something more interesting than resetting TamponZerg's password for the 15th time.
- Window titles. We made our window titles differ from stock Brood War, so that it's easier to configure streaming programs to work specifically for ShieldBattery. You may have to adjust your streaming configuration, depending on how you had it set up. The window title will also change between game initialization and actual gameplay, to help avoid switching scenes before things are ready.
- OpenGL full screen fixes. Some previous updates introduced a bug that caused the task bar to never get hidden in OpenGL full screen mode. It seems some people actually like using the bottom part of their screen or something, so we fixed that. We still recommend DirectX for everyone who can use it, but if you need to use OpenGL for compatibility reasons, it should work a bit better now.
- Chat scrolling fixes. Our auto-scrolling code used to be a bit picky about who it would work for, but we gave it a nice, stern talking to. It should be cool with everyone now.
- Enhanced game launch failures. If your game is failing to launch (should be incredibly rare!), we've implemented some additional logging. If this is happening to you, please reach out to an admin so we can collect this data and get some proper fixes in.