StarCraft 2: Wings of Liberty Review - Page 2

06 Aug 2010 at 13:11:50 by Tim McDonald
Systems used to review this title: (PC)

The multiplayer is where some would say the “real” StarCraft 2 is to be found, though, and with the sheer number of campaign-exclusive units, the two sections are almost disparate products. Due to the 12-year old community with plenty of StarCraft experience and the fact that the campaign only focuses on one of the three sides, Blizzard has tried found a number of ways to help ease new players in, and it works - with mixed success. The multiplayer side of things is divided into leagues, with five placement matches seeding players appropriately, and the matchmaking system (hopefully) giving you players of a similar skill level to deal with. Prior to this are fifty optional practice matches, which use a slightly different set of maps and a slower game speed. Other than that, there are a variety of fun single-player challenges which aim to teach skills ranging from basic micromanagement and support unit specifics, through early rush defence and the importance of hotkeys.

But there are problems. The practice matches are a nice idea that inevitably breed bad habits – having your base safely walled off to prevent early rushes stops you from learning how to deal with early rushes, and while it provides an environment for new players to work out build orders and tactics without being dominated by experts, skirmishes against the computer do much the same thing without the map tweaks that don't occur in ranked matches. Sadly, the skirmish AI itself is lacking in personality. While it reacts well enough to your approaches, I've yet to see it wall itself off and tech up for air superiority, or do any of the completely batshit insane things that humans do.

Sounds bad, right? Well, in these areas it's a little disappointing, but these criticisms really only apply for the complete beginner; anyone who's played a Craft game before should have little difficulty adapting to StarCraft 2's particulars. This multiplayer component is well-balanced and deeply, deeply enjoyable once you've got the basics down, and the matchmaking appears to work well enough in that I've yet to be completely steamrolled by an opponent far above my calibre, nor have I ever completely outmatched a player I've been paired off with. Multiplayer matches have mostly been close-fought, tense, and exciting, and I'd wager they'll get moreso once I stop forgetting how best my fearless Protoss can counter those bloody Terran Marauders. With the intricacies of three wildly different races to learn, I'm going to be coming back to this for a long time to come. (It's worth noting, however, that Battle.net 2.0 doesn't feature cross-region play, which is odd. I'm sure there used to be this thing called the internet that let you play games with people anywhere in the world. I must be getting old.)

Even with that, though, StarCraft 2 is well worth the price of admission whether you're buying in for the single-player, the multiplayer, or both. The single-player campaign is spectacularly well-presented and it continually surprises and pleases with twists on old formulas, while the multiplayer has plenty of tactical nuance in typical StarCraft fashion, with lots of new units and tweaks to keep things interesting, and a matchmaking system that will hopefully help new players avoid experts. When both of these are exhausted, there's a comprehensive map editor that's leaps and bounds ahead of Warcraft 3's offering - and that eventually led to amazing custom maps along the lines of Defense of the Ancients and Tower Defense. Considering the aforementioned Lost Viking shooter was apparently made in the editor, I'm eager to see what the budding SC2 map community can come up with.

If you don't like Craft games, or if you can't fathom going back to a “classic” RTS after having been spoiled by directional damage and cover systems, then this probably isn't for you – but this is StarCraft, and you knew this already. For every other RTS fan on the planet, this is one of the most well-polished, well-balanced, and just plain enjoyable games on the market. Buy it.

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