There are many games out there who have been awarded the, “Greatest
Game of All Time,” title, but I don't think any other game deserves it
as much as StarCraft. It practically birthed competitive gaming, and
took it to the extremes; countries like South Korea have TV channels
dedicated to people playing StarCraft. With the release of StarCraft 2
in a few months (hopefully) time, I decided to let you guys know my
opinion on this wonderful game.
The story is spread out over 3
campaigns, each of which follow the 3 factions in the game. Each
campaign has 10 missions, which range from about 20 minutes to one hour
plus play times each. The first campaign follows the Terrans, which are
humans. The Terrans are the most convoluted of factions in this game;
even with fighting off the Zerg and Protoss, they are fighting civil
wars amongst themselves. You have control of Jim Raynor, a Marshall
under the Confederacy, who doesn't like the way the Confederates do
stuff, so he joins up with the rebel group known as the Sons of Korhal,
who want to bring down the Confederates. They eventually do, but Raynor
isn't that happy with how things went down, so he leaves the Sons of
Korhal and starts his own group, Raynor's Raiders.
Now the
second campaign starts, which lets you control the Zerg. In the first
few missions you have to protect a chrysalis which contains one of the
series key characters. During those missions, you start getting the
idea that the Zerg want to be the best race around, so they start
attacking others, particularly the Protoss; the Zerg want to take over
the Protoss' main planet, Aiur.
After that you get to control the
Protoss in the last campaign. I won't say much about this since it
wraps up the story pretty damn well.
The game controls like any
other RTS game. You start out with a fairly small base, and a few
builder units to help build it up. Most of the time you will be telling
your worker units to harvest you some Minerals and Vespene Gas, those
being the resources you use in the game. You use the resources to build
buildings and train units at the various buildings you may use. Of
course, with your growing army, you will need something to support
them. Terrans use Supply Depots, Zerg use Overlords, and Protoss use
Pylons. The Terran Supply Depot just sits there; the Zerg Overlord is
an air unit that you can use to transport other units, and the Protoss
Pylon have to be placed strategically over your base, because the
Protoss buildings have to be in the vicinity of your Pylon, as the
Pylon powers your settlement. Each race also has drastically different
worker units; the Terran sport SCVs, which are guys in suits that build
stuff, they build buildings; the Zerg use drones, which have to mutate
into different buildings, which means sacrificing your drone for a
building; and the Protoss use drones, which can warp in buildings and
go harvest some resources while the building is warping in.
With 3 factions, each one has different strategies. The Terrans usually
use lots of Siege Tanks, accompanied by a few Battlecruisers to take
care of any air units they may find in their way of ownage. The Zerg
will defeat enemies by sheer number of units, usually in the opening
rush of the match. If that match fails however, Mutalisks and Guardians
with some Ultralisks on the ground usually do the job done in the
following stages of the match. The Protoss are probably the most
strategic of the 3 factions. They will most likely use a group of
Dragoons to find the enemy base, then move in Carriers with Reavers in
them, which deal massive damage if micro-d properly.
Mission
structure consists of usually, destroying everything on the map.
Destroying everything is also the main premise of the multiplayer mode.
Once or twice in a campaign you will have a linear mission in which you
control a small group of units and take them through the map,
eventually finding more units to join them.
StarCraft looked
good, when it came out that is. It uses sprites, and is on a fixed,
isometric view. Each of the factions are easily distinguishable amongst
each other; the Terran's are gray and robotic, the Zerg are browish and
slimy, and the Protoss have their signature yellow armor, and
definitely look like guys you shouldn't be messing with. The
backgrounds look nice, although organized; the game uses a grid system
where your buildings take up a certain amount of squares on the grid.
The same system is also applied in the Campaign Editor which comes with
the game, which lets users create their own maps. StarCraft also had
really good looking CG cutscenes, which raised the bar for cutscenes in
game.
Audio in this game is outstanding. Every single unit has
different sayings and different voice talents. Eventually if you keep
clicking on one unit long enough, he'll say something weird, like the
Siege Tank singing Ode to Joy. The soundtrack is also really well done.
Each faction has its own unique musical score; the Terrans have a
rock-like music, the Zerg have dark-techno, and the Protoss have just
ambient music.
After many years in development, and first being
regarded as, “Warcraft in space,” StarCraft made a really deep impact
on PC gaming and gaming in general. With the impending release of
StarCraft 2, players will still be playing StarCraft before and after
the sequels release. It is really a gem that shouldn't be missed by
anyone, and since it has been 10 years since the games original
release, it will run on mostly every computer.
