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Starcraft Publisher: Blizzard Developer: Blizzard Release Date: 1998 If Total Annihilation set the standard for technical achievement in a real-time strategy game, it took the hands of the old masters at Blizzard to create the artistic equivalent. Starcraft hit the shelves in the spring of 1998, and the world of real-time strategy hasn't been the same since. The storyline in Starcraft is more than just a series of scenarios moved along by cutscenes; it permeates every part of the game. The game portrays the characters as units, and they not only increase in power but also develop as characters. Your mission objectives can change in the middle of a scenario in concert with the changing storyline, and the atmosphere is greatly enhanced by the unit voiceovers and animations. Even Command & Conquer and Red Alert's story, slickly presented as it is through cutscenes, seems somewhat divorced from the actual goings-on in the game. In Starcraft, the game always feels like an organic whole and makes you feel far more involved in the story than any other pure strategy game has in the past.
Starcraft also has three completely separate and ostensibly balanced races. These three (the Terrans, Zerg, and Protoss) differ from one another far more than any set of races in any previous RTS game. The differences extend beyond mere units to method of play and even base-building. (Zerg buildings are restricted to placement on an expanding biomass called The Creep.) Starcraft reinforces these differences through the single-player campaign, which develops the story over three connected campaigns, with one per race. There are some questionable design decisions, like the inability to select more than 12 units at a time (presumably to combat the "rush" tactic), but in terms of presentation, the game has no equal.
Soon after had Starcraft been released, wave upon wave of polemic hit the Web, arguing for the superiority of either Total Annihilation or Starcraft as the best real-time strategy game ever released. This debate even continues today, and it's a testament to how differently the two games approached the genre. Martin Cirulis of Gamecenter wrote an amusing, tongue-in-cheek article comparing the two games by way of a fictional prizefight. He chose Starcraft as the victor, and many people disagreed with him. Also, in terms of technical achievement in areas such as the interface and unit control, both Total Annihilation and Dark Reign were undoubtedly superior. Starcraft, though, had the inimitable Blizzard style and panache in abundance.
While Starcraft took the United States by storm, its sales in South Korea were truly astounding. In a nation with a population of 40 million people, the game sold almost 1 million copies in 1999 alone. This means that it actually outsold the top-selling game in the United States, Rollercoaster Tycoon, by roughly 300,000 copies. Starcraft is played competitively in the more than 10,000 Korean gaming rooms nationwide and is the preferred game for Korean professional gamers (who are far more established in this line of work than their US counterparts).
In the end, Starcraft is going to be remembered as the most successful of early real-time strategy games, and it provides a bridge to the current generation of games. Each of the titles in this article made significant contributions to the development of the genre.
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