First Impressions

Well if your here i guess that means u didn't make the beta. me neither :( ah well, we're in good company. want to see what could have been in your email stocking Christmas morning? here's the email the beta testers got :

Congratulations!

You are one of the one thousand testers chosen to participate in the StarCraft Battle.net beta. We will be sending you another e-mail very soon that will explain the beta procedures in more detail.

Happy holidays from everyone at Blizzard Entertainment.

now doesn't that just make u want to go hug someone?? hehehe me neither :) ah well, lucky for me Wargasm and T'kron made the beta and have agreed to send info. so on with the reports...

T'kron Answers a Few Questions

Hmmm...this sounds like Empire, or Heroes of Might and Magic, with flavors of Master of Orion...

I do see a lot of similarities of Empire, however once an attack starts you can change the mission of the attacker, and you can have multiple attackers attacking the same target real time simultaneously. Instead of when you capture cities, you define what it produces. You build buildings and select what that building produces/does based upon that individual buildings list of options. I say does because some buildings are research facilities that can upgrade your equiptments armor fire power range etc etc. When a research center finishes its assigned task, it will not perform a new task unless told to do so. Buildings that produce fighters allows for the queuing up of up to five products each one can be different from the previous, IE your Barracks can have lined up to produce marine warrior warrior ghost marine in this order. when y=one is built you could add another to the list or wait till more than one slot is open and fill them.

What is combat like? Is it all automated?

Combat is sort of automated you can control a single or group of fighters and target a single target (not a group of targets you can change the target at any time. And it is real time, in that all attacks go on at the same time. There are no turns, which means that efficiently directing your resources/forces is critical.

Do you have communications with other players? Is it 2D or 3D map?

Yes, you can talk to other players all or individually (I think). In team events you can talk to your partner and your opponents or just your partner or just your opponents.

The map size varies by type of game 126x126 96x96 and others, and the style of map can also be selected at the start of the game .. Continent, planet, space station/platform to name a few.

There are plateaus surrounded by cliff's that you can only access by ground troops/vehicles/robots from certain locations. The cliffs are not climbable. There are also lava filled gullies you can not traverse with ground forces.

That's all I have time to comment on for now.

T'kron

Some Basic Info from T'kron

You can play three races: Terran, Zerg, or Protoss You can play games of any race against any other race even terran against terran.

You can play online or single player mode

There are several types of games that can be played.

One on One Melee Melee team Free for All Free for all Team Capture the Flag Capture the Flag Team

Slaughter Sudden Death Ladder Greed Steal the Bacon King of the Hill

The object of all games, but the Capture the Flag, is to destroy all of your enemys buildings. At the start each race has a base building and 5 robots and the first thing you do is get the robots mining minerals so you can build more things. The names of the buildings, warriors, robots, tanks, planes, carriers etc are different for each race and the info here is by no means complete.

You can play on many different terrain maps also.

Here are the buildings and what they do:

• Base builds robots if you have enough minerals and fuel
• Refinery refines fuel which must be transported to base by robots
• Storage facilities are need to hold fuel and minerals
• Factory's build three progressivly more potent land vehicles
• Physics Lab upgrades equipment.
• Armory upgrade equipment
• Barracks make two types of soldiers
• Space Ports makes three types of flying ships requires control tower for best ships to be built
• Bunkers for defense (required to be maned)
• Anti Aircraft towers
• Nuecler Research Facilities
• and more (about 5 other buildings I can't remember)

Each building cost a specific amount of minerals and sometimes fuel to build.

The quicker you can build the better buildings the more powerful you will be and the better your chances of winning.

The quicker you can find you enemy and attack his buildings to slow up his ability to build his foces the better your chances of winning.

The game is in real time and you have to keep everything producing at top efficiency. It can be intense (depending one the game speed you choose), since it is real time online you can't rest or relax you have to keep everything progressing as quickly as possible if you hope to win.

The team games of from 2 to 4 two man teams are great, especially for slower players who can concentrate on production but may have trouble handling all the main aspects of the game.

Main Aspects

• Production at top efficiency
• Scouting the enemy.
• Scouting for new resources
• Attacking your enemy
• Progressing to manufacture the better equipment as quickly as possible.
• Mining at top efficiency
• Controlling the mix of your buildings efficiently.

I know it sound complicated but even with no manual and never having visited the Starcarft forums I was able to pick up on the game very quickly. The game also gives you certain hints, like when you point at a building and find that you cannot build it yet because another building is required before you can build the one this one. Or other Verbal hints.

You can also control the game speed to slow down the pace of the game.

That's all for now,
T'kron

Wargasm's Quick Game Impressions

Sound 8/10 (check those cool soundtracks)
Graphix 8/10 (seen it all b4 still good)
Gameplay 9/10 (this game will rock for a long time)

So it's cool and ok :-)
now let's wait till the game comes out and buy it then .

game impressions finished and a new record is set in the world of reviewing hehehe

Ok let's highlight a few subjects

gametype is the same as Dark Reign , C&C, Warcraft, etc, etc..
just collect minerals , build factories, build troops and kill each other
yep another peace loving game.
if u played one u've played them all

So what's all the fuss about ??
well seems SC is completly overhyped
is it a bad game?? Nope!

We got another killer seller here ppl . The online gaming offers enough options to make sure u won't beat up your grandma for a few month's .

we fire up SC and create an account, a name, and a password . little tip , name your password "password" so much easier to remember. then u hangout at b.net for 2 hours and your account is saved.

Graphics, Sound, etc..

the graphix are detailed and crisp, however larger resolutions then 640x480 are not supported.
best guess - to increase the game speed.
The sound is good, speech is nice and filled with humor from time to time.
the minimap could be more detailed.
The soundtracks are awesome , another well done job . not boring at all and add another depth to the game.
The game is still buggy.
Zerg rushes can knockout a terran/proton base in a few minutes right at the start of the game.
This sux in one on one mode.
In free for all diplomacy this problem can be counter attacked.
and offcourse it depends on the map.
maps with water create a natural barrier.
what is missing: bnet is a great place to find opponents but direct ip to ip play wouldbe a nice option.

let's rock ! cya at bnet

WARGASM

T'kron's Game Impressions

Keep in mind that I do not play alot of this type of game. My only prior exposure is to Empire, and I played a little Civilization II (emphasize a little).

Sound 8/10
graphics 8/10
gameplay 8/10
control 9/10

This game can get to be intense. For the following buildings you can have up to five units in the que to be built. You have to control the production of your:

• Base: which builds SCV mining/building robots
• Barracks: which builds your fighters: marines/firebots/ghosts
• Vehicles: vultures/siege tanks/Goliath's
• Air force: Wraith fighter/drop ships/battle cruisers/Science vessels.

There are several buildings and attached structures you must also monitor that upgrade your equipment, namely: Engineering Bay, Armory, a science lab with attached covert opps, a science lab with attached physics lab, machine shop, control tower, Base with nuclear silo, base with communications center. You must also keep and adequate number of supply buildings. And you should build antiaircraft towers and bunkers as you see fit.

T'kron

Tkron's views on Game Balance and Bugs

There are still some serious bugs with starcraft. The most glaring is the break point fault crash that happens right at the end of a game, when your opponent conceeds and you hit the end game button. The reason that it is so serious is that it cheats you out of a win, and that can be very frustrating to the customer. I have been "cheated" out of about 5 victories because of this bug. My record is 10 wins, 13 losses but it should be 15 wins, 13 losses.

The game balance is getting better between the races. But blizzard is still adjusting the balance. I have beaten every race with the Terran's ( have not seriously tried the other races), and have also lost to every race.

Blizzard has promised that the map editor will be included in the next patch, so it looks like the beta test will go on for a bit more.

A new method of "cheating" is being used. If a player has a grudge against you, he or a group of players can infiltrate your team with one or more traitors. Then you cannot win, when one of your partners is playing against you.

The game is rated by me as all eights and nines out of ten. I think they have a hit on thier hands, and they know it. That is why they are trying to be so careful not to release a buggy product.

T'kron
1/26/98

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