StarCraft. A strategy game from Blizzard. Now, I've gone into a little detail about some other games I've played in these pages, so why am I making a big deal about this one?

Well, first of all, you should understand that prior to this game, I'd only played the original Dune 2 (Amiga and PC), and Command and Conquer, the original, in this genre. Like the latter StarCraft has a storyline which is viewed from the side you are playing. Only in StarCraft, there are three sides. Namely Terran (that's us that is), Zerg, and Protoss, and you play those sides in order to build up the whole storyline complete with brilliant cut scenes as you go along.

The other thing which I'd not come across before was the concept of having 2 things to mine in order to produce units, gas and minerals, although I understand that isn't unusual... What is interesting is that you're not fighting tanks with tanks, or marines with marines. Not all the time anyway. No, you're fighting tanks with armoured Zealots who have psionic blades, or Hydralisks that fire spines. And you might well have all three mixing it up. Variety, y'see. For each unit there is a roughly equivalent one on the other side and if your opponent gets it right you can find your best offensive attempt repelled with embarrassing ease.

When I talk about opponents in this context I'm talking humans, and that means Battle.Net. This mutiplayer service was set up by Blizzard and is FREE (although you have to connect to it). I was around in its infancy, and while it was shaky initially, and slows when the US comes on-line, it's now pretty damn stable, and very kindly sticks you into a chat room with other British connectors. Now, for muggins here who was used to staying up until ungodly hours playing Netmech with Americans, this was great news, and a great laugh. Which is really why I've chosen to pull my finger out and share some tactical thoughts with you. Well, let's face it, if you're reading this you're probably either a Battle.Net newbie or thinking about getting the game. If you're the former, you may well find you're getting your backside kicked by experienced players, if you're the latter, hopefully it'll give you an idea of how the game plays and encourage you to shell out for it.

Oh, and there's also a campaign editor to mess around with, which has given birth to maps such as Starship Troopers and Godzilla. New maps are constantly being made available by Blizzard, and a new expansion pack is imminent.

So, have a browse through the tips sections and let me know what you think. Oh, and for the curious, I go by the name =Excelsior= on Battle.Net although I'm not on as much these days. You'll find me on StarCraft GBR-1, or by typing /whois =Excelsior=. Good hunting to you!

Since I first put these pages together, the official Brood War expansion has come out. This added new units to the original game and extended the storyline beyond the original game. It's somewhat late in the day, but I'm going to add brief details of the new units and potential tactics into the relevant sections. It's certainly extended the life of the game, and I imagine another similar pack will turn up one day. BTW, I play with the Brood War expansion and my name for that is =Excelsior=BW.

Last updated 31 January 2002