On May 19th, 2007, Blizzard Entertainment unveiled StarCraft II; an epic sequel to the single most-successful RTS title of all time launched nine years earlier. Now, thirty-three months later, the beta phase for StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty has officially begun. Contest winners, top competitors from Battle.net ladders, World Wide Invitation attendees and BlizzCon attendees have a set-in-stone advantage of having the chance to play the game months in advance. The first wave of emails for the beta opt-in from last spring will be going out, as well.

The system requirements released earlier today emphasize the easily-obtainable hardware required for at least the beta phase. However, the actual download is 1.64 gigabytes and for the average machine, should take approximately an hour to an hour and-a-half to download. Battle.net users who have been randomly selected to participate in the beta will already have the game listed under their profile and will be able to download it without consulting their emails.

Following the tradition with past Blizzard games, we can expect to see the full retail version of StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty being released in four to six months following the initial beta release.

Source: StarCraft II Beta Minisite, StarCraft: Legacy, TeamLiquid