StarCraft II is still headed for a release in the first half of the year, according to production director Chris Sigaty.

"We were targeting three to five months for the beta, we're really at a three month period of time for the beta at this point," Sigaty said during the BlizzCast podcast.

"We are still targeting the first half of this year, so with that in mind, it really shortens the window of time with our major content patch coming out pretty close to the end whether it's even worth it putting out the map editor at that point."

Dustin Browder, StarCraft II game director, emphasised the importance of the beta process.

"The beta is what builds a lot of our quality," he explained, adding: "We can only take it so far before we can take it to the community and then they can add a lot more to it as well."

"So, it's really critical for our success, it's very key about who we are as a studio and as a team that we do these kinds of betas so we're really geeked up to get this out in front of people and see what they think and to really give us the feedback we need to be successful."