Game Debate #84: Starcraft

[Reed Rothchild | 9,682]

[Tanooki | 4,973]

Guess I'll be the not really for or against one on this game early on.  I don't love it, I don't hate it.  It's good, but most definitely not great or excellent, yet it's far from bad, far far from it.

The thing is it's divisive as hell even if some don't realize it, it is.  The game *IS* the start of the shift of making RTS games more about being online competitive in general, but also as the driving force for the genres continued existence decades ago.  Up until that time the campaign took the forefront or very well kindly shared the space with equal care, effort and love put into the total package.

This game does not do this.

It was sold due to how Blizzard is as a creation to drive a hell of a lot of personal competition, personal battles, and just overall non-solitary play.  It may seem strange saying this given the total of campaigns, even the added one N64 got beyond where it stopped on PC with the expansion pack.  Pre-SC your RTS games, even their own with Warcraft 1 and the still beloved sequel gave the game player in campaign time and freedom, time to develop, freedom to develop and how to approach the enemy to suppress then destroy to move to the next stage. Starcraft innocently starts out as such, for a few hours, but eventually the game has this shift that stays until the end... lack of time, a push towards expediency, and grossly so being forced to do scripted battles, scripted not just in speed bu what units to use, when to use them, where to use them, and how fast to develop your base to accomplish it.  If you do not do this, you die, it will end as a slow death of a thousand cuts or pretty swiftly.  Thought was removed, maybe because they cared about multiplayer more, or maybe because they had finally made put out a licensed strategy guide to sell millions of dollars worth of profitable books.  And because this worked between gimping the brain from campaign and pushing multiplayer so well, anyone else out there largely did the same, Age of Empires I'd call the exception to that rule.  For me, SC is fun and fucked, it ruined RTS gaming to me because I largely only cared about the story and the campaign, I'd play a little multi, usually just with a friend.

So that's why I gave it a 7.  It's a good game, but not great, it's not a bad game but if fucked up how RTS games have been designed ever since, a precursor to other genres that went into the multiplayer cesspool of stupidity over campaign that has been a plague for years since.  Maybe I don't seem fair, but it's not wrong either.  Killing a fun campaign entirely or making it a window dressing junk bin to sell books and push multiplayer into mass profitability wasn't a bad move, profits show it, but it was bad for gamers who want some time alone to enjoy the story and the mechanics with freedom to think.

[Kguillemette | 1,570]

I was pretty absorbed with AoE II when this was hot, so I never did get around to it. Always wanted to try it though.

[Hammerfestus | 3,974]

I was more of an Age of Empires guy.  Fun but I sucked.  7.

[WhyNotZoidberg | 590]

8/10

 

as a counterpoint to @Tanooki’s extremely accurate points about the game, I spent way more time on battle.net playing custom BGH games which did give me all the time needed to gather all the ressources and build shit tons of every unit and just send immense armies marching/flying down the map to kill the enemies.

[G-type | 2,672]

Loved the campaign mode, and many fond memories playing on Battle.net, and on my friends LAN.

not only was a major RTS but this was also the game that introduced us to tower defense games.

[Jeevan | 9,100]

Used to use dialup 56k modem to play with friends, pretty good game!

[Gloves | 11,998]

Never played it.

[DoctorEncore | 3,691]

10/10. One of the best and most influential games of all-time. It shipped with an amazing single player campaign and an extremely competitive multiplayer component. Balancing three disparate factions is a monumental task and they absolutely nailed it. Each of the factions feels wholly unique while still providing limitless options for countering the opposing player.  The Brood War expansion somehow made it even better. This is the game that really pushed E-sports and competitive RTS play into the mainstream. 

Edited January 13, 2022 by DoctorEncore

[AstralSoul | 506]

I am not an RTS fan typically but out of the ones I've played StarCraft is easily my favorite. Specifically the campaign mode as I always sucked at playing against other people. I also liked Warcraft 3 and Age of Empires. But for StarCraft, a solid 8/10

[RH | 5,058]

I marked "Never played it but interested" which isn't entirely true.  I vaguely recall giving it a try.  Possibly downloaded it in college and never got around to get past the first campaign?  Maybe.  Played it at a friends once? I guess?

Whatever it was, I wanted to play more.  I liked RTSs but I somehow missed the big ones of the late 90s.  Specifically Warcraft and Starcraft.

This is definitely a game on a really, really long backlog of games I'd like to pick up one day and play, but it's a low ranking just because my list is probably 3,000 games long and I don't PC game much.  There is the N64 version.  If it's any good and if I ever pick up that cart, there's a fair chance it will bump it up much higher in my queue.

[B.A. | 1,140]

I've only played StarCraft 64, but I played it A LOT!.  My roommate and I at the time would play for hours, set up 2 TVs with a splitter and cover half of the TV so we couldn't see what the other was doing. 

I will still play it once a year or so now, I gave it a 7.  

[Reed Rothchild | 9,682]

4 hours ago, Tanooki said:

This game does not do this.

I'm not sure I follow completely, but I would say the StarCraft campaign absolutely wrecks early RTS campaign stuff like Warcraft II or C&C.  And Warcraft III was a stellar campaign too. 

I haven't played most modern RTS games, so I cannot comment on whether or not these games eventually influenced some sort of death of the single-player mode death, but they absolutely did bring it with their own campaigns.  That's indisputable.

[Tanooki | 4,973]

What stands out in my mind is a (human campaign) early into it stage where it pivots in required style to handle it.  You have this stage where you're on this platform slightly recessed into a wider platform with like 2-3 teeny staircases into it and the enemy can breech from 2 points.  Up until that point in the game you can take more time, approach attacking in various ways of creativity.  That one though, you can't, I read up on it enough and further stages after having similar issues (as to not ruin them immediately.)  It boiled down to, do this and this fast getting these units, structures, defenses, and tech rounded out within like X minutes or basically it's predetermined failure roughly speaking.  It spit in the way the old games worked where you could be a total pokey or a speed demon and both can win depending on tactics.  Critical thinking got sucked out of the game and genre largely since in campaign mode.  AoE2 was a stand out for me not pulling it, so that's where my money and time went, also made me largely appreciate Warlocked on GBC which was a WC1 clone.

[Reed Rothchild | 9,682]

So, a defensive-minded mission, early in the campaign, before most of the units and techs have been rolled out.  Specifically designed to first showcase the "Zerg rush."

See, that's what you want.  You don't want a series of samey open-ended missions that all play out the same, like generic skirmishes.  

Warcraft II did that.  Total Annihilation did that.  Age of Empires did that.  Those are piss poor campaigns that feel like playing multiplayer against a bot.  Blizzard went the opposite direction with Starcraft and especially with Warcraft III.

[Tanooki | 4,973]

Well I know from years of comments I read I'm not alone, a good many people loathe that your idea of bad design was taken away from RTS games.  I'll play and replay those piss poor campaigns that make Warcraft II and Command and Conquer so utterly awful because I'd rather have freedom of choice than scripted canned abuse to memorize or buy a guide to get by.  That's just sad.

[Reed Rothchild | 9,682]

I'd be curious to see others' thoughts (ie Warcraft II campaign vs StarCraft campaign)

Obviously we both have our own preferences.

[MrWunderful | 2,927]

I loved starcraft, and probably would still if I tried it today. The first “pc game” i actually played alot. 
 

loved zerg rushing on battle.net and playing custom games. Super fun campaign too. 9/10

[DefaultGen | 5,569]

9/10, easy 10/10 if historic significance was involved. I think Starcraft 2 is the best RTS of all time, so it's very hard to not compare SC1 to it at this point as "Kind of like Starcraft 2, just with a worse UI and unit selection caps". The unit selection cap sure forces more tactical army management and increases the skill ceiling to nutty levels (although I'm a dumb dumb and definitely like F2 > right click in SC2 to send my whole army somewhere at times).

I love watching high level Brood War. I can appreciate the skill that goes into being world class as CS:GO or Street Fighter, but the high number of things to manage, reactive decision making, and dexterity in Starcraft (or SC2) by far makes it the most engaging competitive game to watch for me.

My favorite Starcraft story is that I work with a Korean woman and we were talking about video games and she's all "Nah, I don't play video games". Then some time later Starcraft comes up and she joins the conversation. We're surprised because she said she doesn't play video games and she says "Well Starcraft, everyone plays Starcraft".

[Bearcat-Doug | 5,105]

Never played it. 

[Jfreakofkorn | 284]

Took me awhile in locating the game n finally found a decent copy at a fair price ( at 45.00 )

Yet to hook up the console n give it a go at it 

Besides that , used to play it on the PC back in the day . . . 

 

[G-type | 2,672]

20 hours ago, Reed Rothchild said:

I'd be curious to see others' thoughts (ie Warcraft II campaign vs StarCraft campaign)

Obviously we both have our own preferences.

I like Starcraft better than warcraft II. 3 balanced but unique factions > 2 factions that are basically mirror images of each other. Although if we're talking Starcraft vs Warcraft 3... that's a tougher call.

[DoctorEncore | 3,691]

On 1/14/2022 at 11:41 PM, DefaultGen said:

9/10, easy 10/10 if historic significance was involved. I think Starcraft 2 is the best RTS of all time, so it's very hard to not compare SC1 to it at this point as "Kind of like Starcraft 2, just with a worse UI and unit selection caps". The unit selection cap sure forces more tactical army management and increases the skill ceiling to nutty levels (although I'm a dumb dumb and definitely like F2 > right click in SC2 to send my whole army somewhere at times).

I love watching high level Brood War. I can appreciate the skill that goes into being world class as CS:GO or Street Fighter, but the high number of things to manage, reactive decision making, and dexterity in Starcraft (or SC2) by far makes it the most engaging competitive game to watch for me.

My favorite Starcraft story is that I work with a Korean woman and we were talking about video games and she's all "Nah, I don't play video games". Then some time later Starcraft comes up and she joins the conversation. We're surprised because she said she doesn't play video games and she says "Well Starcraft, everyone plays Starcraft".

I agree with pretty much everything you said here. I give the original StarCraft a 10/10 due to it's significance and more interesting story, while the sequel gets a 9/10 for it's amazing multiplayer and added complexity.

From a purely modern perspective, StarCraft 2 is definitely the better game and it's the only eSports game I watch. The high level competitive play is insanely complex, so I appreciate the really detailed analyses on the official GSL broadcasts. I can't go back to watching the original game anymore.

This thread is making me want to go back and play all the campaigns, but man, that's a hefty time investment.

[Nintegageo | 582]

9. Great game that I used to love playing online. 

[Mega Tank | 994]

On 1/16/2022 at 10:15 AM, DoctorEncore said:

From a purely modern perspective, StarCraft 2 is definitely the better game

The best part of Starcraft 2 is the trailer. Maybe it's the fact I don't have tons of time to sink and learn the builds, strats and other new aspects of the game etc, but Starcraft 2 looks like a decent enough game and maybe one day I'll enjoy it more than playing vs computers. I don't have the confidence to go into matches on SC2 since I don't "get" the new units, strats and everything that goes along with it.

SC and SCBW are both easy enough to pick up and I like their layout as I've dropped a lot of time in them. I don't recall all the details as to which version had what, but the SC is a game people have to play at least once. I'm rating SC a 9 as I prefer the added units on SCBW, which add more to the game. SCBW has the ability to run multiplayer games at 2x the speed, which helps keep things interesting.

I'd be down to run games on SCBW/SC 2 if anyone ever wants to.