| When Blizzard Entertainment,
a small game development company out of Irvine, California, released Warcraft, they helped
create the new genre of real-time strategy games. When they released Warcraft 2 a short
time later, they revolutionized that new genre. Warcraft 2 was a gorgeous and engrossing
game of mythical combat between Orcs and Humans. Many still hail it as the greatest real
time strategy game of all time. Almost as soon as Warcraft 2 was out the door, Blizzard
announced that their next RTS game was already in the works, called StarCraft. After 3
years of development, numerous delays and possibly the most hype ever surrounding a
computer game, StarCraft was finally released to stores on April 1st. The wait was over.
The question is, was it worth it?
The Known Galaxy?
The story that drives StarCraft is one of the most interesting and developed of any
computer game I have played. Human society has been on a steady down slide since the
formation of the United Powers League on November 22, 2229. The new order cracked down on
the people of the Earth and slaughtered hundreds of millions in "purifications."
A brilliant young scientist took 40,000 prisoners and put them on board massive sleeper
ships, sending them to the fringes of the known galaxy. A horrible malfunction destroyed
the ships navigation systems and the ships traveled without direction for 28 years. Some
60,000 light years from Earth, the 4 ships crashed and humanity was forced to develop from
there. Eventually, several of the new colonies banded together to form the Confederacy.
When the ruthless confederates annihilated the planet of Korhal with a massive nuclear
barrage, the son of the leader of the rebellion, Arcturus Mengsk, rallied the various
militant groups together to form the Sons of Korhal. Soon some of the Confederate's border
colonies came under attack by not one but two alien races. The fractured Confederacy
struggles to fight off the ever increasing tide of alien invaders making their way towards
the heart of the Terran Sector.
Driven to perfect their science of proto-genetic evolution, the ancient, enigmatic race
known as the Xel'Naga traveled to the distant fringe world of Aiur. The vast jungles of
Aiur had produced the most advanced race that the Xel'Naga had ever seen. Believing that
they could steer the race's evolution to the pinnacle of physical perfection, the Xel'Naga
began to conduct their proto-genetic experiments. The race that the Xel'Naga would
eventually name 'Protoss' advanced rapidly and gained what their creators termed a
distinct purity of form. Unfortunately, the Xel'Naga pushed their experiment too far, and
bitter strife broke out between them and their failed creation. The Xel'Naga abandoned
their children and launched themselves into the void.
The Xel'Naga eventually settled upon the volatile ash-world of Zerus, where they planned
to continue their Grand Experiment of evolution. The Xel'Naga were more successful with
this venture than they could possible imagine. They advanced the evolution of a race of
small insectoids known as the Zerg. The Zerg learned to parasitically merge with their
host creature. The Zerg manipulated more and more host creatures into their fold,
assimilating their various genetic strains, and soon gradually were able to supercharge
and steer the latent evolutionary process within their host creatures and steered them to
one unified appearance. The Xel'Naga, to try to combat the Zergs' growing independence,
structured the collective sentience of the Zerg under a unified 'Overmind'. The Overmind
gained sentience and autonomy, and quickly started unifying the Swarm under his control
and turned them on their creators. Within hours, the millions and millions of Zerg had
annihilated the Xel'Naga. The Overmind sensed a extraordinary presence though, that of the
Protoss, and realized that the two races would eventually be caught in an inevitable
apocalyptic conflict.
This is the background story which drives the game. Written with much greater detail as
well as full unit descriptions, building descriptions, special abilities and other
gameplay issues in the excellent manual that accompanies the game. Just reading the manual
made me want more of the story.
Revolutionary or
Evolutionary?
That has been perhaps the most frequently asked question surrounding StarCraft. Does it
merely improve on the genre or does it set new standards by changing it. StarCraft does
both.
The three races that make up this game are one of the most unique aspects of StarCraft.
Many people expected each race to be simply different looking variations of each other
with analogous units and perhaps a few different abilities as in Age of Empires. Well,
naysayers beware. Blizzard has completely changed the whole idea of species development
with StarCraft. Each species is completely different from each other. They not only look
impressively different, but there are few, if any, analogous units among them. Each of
them have different innate advantages and disadvantages. Each of them have a different way
of building and developing and each of them require a completely different strategy to
play with, possibly the most important of all the differences.
For example, the Terrans are, as usual, in the middle. They build medium strength units,
which take medium length time to build. They have the typical armor and weapon upgrades
available to all species, yet their major buildings can lift off and relocate! Some of
their units can even develop the ability to cloak.
The Protoss build slowly, the units they do build are expensive and enormously powerful
and come with intrinsic shields that can be upgraded but they cannot repair their men or
their buildings, though their shields repair on their own. The fearsome Protoss Carrier
has no weapons of its own, but manufactures small interceptors inside it, which you must
pay for.
The Zerg can only build on a slimy substance named 'The Creep'. They don't build units
like any other race ever has. The main hatchery produces Zerg larvae which you mutate into
any other unit you want. The Zerg produce multiple units quickly but they are very week.
Zerg units also have the innate ability to regenerate if left alive after battle.
These are only short rundowns of the many, many differences between each race. Each
species only has a rather limited amount of upgradeable units but in all honesty what you
have is plenty. It is still exciting and to have many more units would make it extremely
hard to manage developing them and using their special abilities to their fullest. Still a
few more units each wouldn't have hurt the game at all.
Overall, you are provided with land and space/air units. There is water in the game but it
plays such a small role that it is inconsequential and sea units would be useless. This
part of the game is well balanced. A squadron of fighters can wreak as much havoc as any
ground unit and I am positive a Battlecruiser or Carrier can hold their own against even
the heaviest of ground units. All in all, you are given the opportunity to play this game
as you feel is tactically best.
In terms of gameplay, the interface is as intuitive and easy to get in to as ever. The
game plays out in three campaigns: Terran, Zerg, and Protoss. They recommend you finish
each in order, because each campaign is progressively more difficult. At the start of the
Terran campaign a tutorial is offered, which explains the way the game works and gives a
basic introduction to base building and combat. The game has built in tips you can cycle
through providing valuable assistance. These helped me figure out a few things I wasn't
too clear on. The learning curve is pretty gradual if you follow the campaigns in order.
Pretty much regardless of your skill you can jump in and learn how to play quickly. Most
importantly the game is very fun and the interface is often as simple as point and click.
There is something for everyone in terms of game strategy, depending on which race you
play with and what type of unit you like. Gameplay is also affected by the terrain. You
can gain a height advantage, units are slowed down by rough ground and you can hide behind
trees to avoid the enemy. It adds a great deal to the game.
One of the most impressive aspects of StarCraft is the three campaigns. The story is
definitely not tacked on. After finishing each mission, I found myself wanting to play the
next one to find out what was going to happen in the short animated sequences that were
full of plot twists and give this game more atmosphere and story than any other RTS game
that I have come across. You simply want to keep playing.
The games graphics are superb. Beautiful translucent explosions erupt as units are
destroyed, blood splatters everywhere as men die, and the Protoss go up in balls of
Psionic flame. The high resolution SVGA graphics are gorgeous and each unit looks
wonderful with accompanying voice, picture, and wire-frame representation of the damage
they have taken. The maps are varied with many types of terrain, different elevations and
gorgeous graphics, whether in space or in the jungle. Perhaps my biggest complaint with
the game, as a whole, is the 3D model. While the game is 3D, and line of sight and height
advantages are a factor, the perspective of the game is such that you do not get a true
feeling of 3D terrain, climbing up mountains and the like. The weakest part of this
product is that terrain modeling but it still looks good and is varied and fun to play on.
The AI in a RTS game is always vital and with the exception of Sid Meier's Gettysburg
(which is very different from StarCraft), it has some of the finest AI I have seen in a
RTS game. The computer is often much more challenging and interesting to play than a human
opponent. Routing problems have been reduced and I have only once or twice had a unit get
stuck or lost and even that is rare. The computer will surprise you and keep you on your
toes. I have heard of one computer beating 4 good human players playing together against
it. That is impressive, to say the least, and it seems StarCraft has again set a new
industry standard.
Overall, the game's sound is impressive. Each unit in each Species has a different voice
and a series of different replies. The music is excellent with some wonderful tracks that
fit the mood perfectly for each race. Infrequently, the music feels out of place and a
little goofy but this is rare. The sound adds even more atmosphere to StarCraft and while
not flawless, it is superb.
If everything that Blizzard has given you is not enough for you, they also decided to
include a campaign editor. It comes with an on-line help manual that explains its use in
great detail and makes it easy to use. The maps can be completely customized, terrain can
be mixed in pretty much in any combination and units and bases placed anywhere, in any
amount. Individual missions or entire campaigns can be constructed, sounds and speech
customized, unique heroes can be made and your own storyline incorporated. The campaign
editor offers almost unlimited replay value and is easy to use. Again Blizzard has given
us what we wanted and done it in a way as good or better than anyone out there. [Editor's
Note: They don't give away those nifty temporary tattoos though :( ]
Multiplayer Mayhem!
StarCraft can be played against other humas through modem play, TCP/IP or direct
connection. The easiest way to play is to log on to Battle.net, Blizzard's free online
gaming site started for their smash hit, Diablo. Entering Battle.net was simple and there
were multiple chat forums where you can go to discuss game or other issues. Finding a game
is not very difficult in peak hours where over 10,000 users at a time can be logged on.
Each game can support up to eight players and lag is usually not a concern. Battle.net
provides a small bar next to each players name in the chat rooms, showing the stability of
their Internet connection. As long as you stay with players in the green or low yellow
range, there is little lag and a game can be played in 15 minutes on a small map or
several hours with 8 players on the largest maps. All in all, multiplayer gaming is a ton
of fun and really easy to get into. I must honestly say that I am disappointed with the
style of play on the net so far. Even though this game has changed how a RTS game battle
should be fought, most people still use the narrow minded rush of whatever unit they can
find. 40 Arclite Siege Tanks rushing a base can be devastating but Blizzard accounted for
this and it can be defeated much more easily than the Command and Conquer tank rush. It
takes away some of the fun of multiplayer but people will most likely evolve their tactics
to meet the new options available in StarCraft. Still, I highly recommend visiting
Battle.net and finding a multiplayer game. It is a lot of fun to play a four against four
game.
All Good Things…
Well, this is it. All good things must eventually come to an end and it is time
to pronounce my judgment on StarCraft. Is the game evolutionary? Most certainly. The game
clearly evolves the style of RTS games found in Warcraft 2 and Command and Conquer. Is it
revolutionary? Definitely. I believe that StarCraft has now redefined the standard for
this genre. It presents so many fundamental differences and options that no other RTS game
ever has, as well as everything that made Warcraft 2 a hit and bundles them together in a
package that emerged with surprisingly few bugs and problems. Simply put, StarCraft is a
finished, developed game that does things no other RTS game has ever done. It should
probably become the standard by which the upcoming products in this genre measures
themselves. The King is dead, long live the King.
-------------------------------
Additional information
Publisher: Blizzard Entertainment
Developer: Blizzard Entertainment
OS: Win95 or NT 4.0
CPU: Pentium 90 or better
Memory: 16mb of RAM or more
80MB availale HDD
CD-ROM: 2x CD-ROM or faster
Video: Local buss SVGA graphics
Mouse
Direct-X compatible sound card
Multiplayer options: 2 players: 14.4 Kbps Modem (or higher) or Null Modem Cable; 2-8
players: IPX Network or Battle.net
Rating: ***** (5 of 5!)
Courtesy : GamerzEdge |
