Now that Heart of the Swarm has a release date (March 12, 2013 in case you missed the news) hardcore real-time strategy players have plenty to look forward to. But in an official announcement made on Blizzard’s homepage, the company gave gamers a new feature to look forward in the meantime—well, not a new feature per se, but an old one as of yet missing from StarCraft II that opens up many possibilities for multiplayer.

It’s not LAN support, but it might be just as good: Starting at the next patch, players will once again be able to connect to any regional server they want, just like back in the Brood War days. Like the classic, players can select a server as they log in, playing anywhere in the world while retaining their preferred regional UI settings, such as their game’s language.

“It’s easier to smurf on other regions,” says  teNu, a progamer of MYM’s own StarCraft II Academy.  teNu, who is a Grandmaster on the European server, will be able to safely try new strategies and tactics on other servers without risking his prestigious rank.

“It’s better to play clan wars on other servers,” the German Terran player added. When teams are playing against one another in different parts of the world, lag can give a literal home field advantage.

teNu provides an example. “Mousesports vs. Empire.  MaNa is in Korea and he is playing vs.  Happy [in Europe]. So they will play one or two games on the North American server, and the others on Korean/Taiwanese or German.”  

Your ladder ranks, stats and achievements will be unique to each region. For example, if you are in the Platinum league in North America and switch to Korea/Taiwan, you will have to play your original five placement matches and get placed without regard to your North American rank.

“Cross region would be awesome, just like Brood War," says Keanu Parker, a gamer who lives in Australia but currently owns spare accounts for playing on North America and Korea/Taiwan. With the Global Play system, players like him can meet people from around the world for a game without having to fork over cash for multiple accounts.

This will soon be more important, as the upcoming expansion means extra accounts could cost as much as $100, depending on how and where they're bought.

As Blizzard’s article details, Global Play also comes with other perks that can enhance multiplayer. For example, not all regional servers undergo maintenance at the same time. If you can’t log in to your home server because of maintenance, you may be able to play anyway by switching servers.

In addition, custom maps are usually region-specific, meaning switching servers can expose you to new maps in both standard custom games and the arcade.

In giving a release date for the patch, Blizzard have only said that the update will happen “in the coming months.” But with the expansion being released near the end of Q1 2013, most gamers are expecting it to come well before then. Until then, have fun tearing it up all around the world. ㅊㅊ!