Girl Gamer

To start, the game consist of two modes: Campaign and Multiplayer. However, both are so different they could easily be separate games in themselves. So first, we’ll take a look at Singleplayer.

Single Player

I’d first like to say that I started playing this game having not played the first one at all. That’s usually an “uh oh” considering the plot may not make sense, but I felt educated on what had happened prior to SC2. Unlike how other games can leave you trying to guess what happened, everything is made clear in cinematics as well as gameplay.

You step into the shoes of Jim Raynor, a terran convict with an unforgiving criminal past. The journey as Raynor takes you up against the Protoess, Zerg, and in some cases, the environment itself. Jims ultimate goal is to end the war between Kerrigan, his love who was lost to the Zerg, and the other allying races. Along the way movie clips occur and make the world come to life; making you feel more emotionally connected to what’s happening.

Starcraft II’s singleplayer offers hours of unpredictable missions with four difficulties to choose from: casual, normal, hard, and brutal. To top it off, there are TONS of achievements to earn (I’m guessing hundreds) to keep you hard at work. So lets say you beat a mission, but you’re not satisfied with your performance, or you want to go back and complete those bonuses stages – you can! There’s a mission “log” where you can go back and redo all and any of the missions from the game. Simple, yet convenient, good thinking Blizzard.

Throughout the missions you can hire new mercenaries, research both the Protoss and Zerg for new upgrades, buy new perks for your units, and even play arcade games at the cantina. You can also chat with your friends while in your campaigns. The nifty icon at the bottom right of the screen lets you open up your friends list, and chat it up whenever and where ever.

When it comes to singleplayer, this game has it all: extensive replay value, challenging missions, jaw-dropping graphics, and a story line that draws you in from the start.

Multiplayer

So when I’m not busy kicking some alien ass in singleplayer, I always take my chances with multiplayer. At the beginning, you have the choice of doing practice rounds (which don’t count towards you if you lose or win) in either 1v1, 2v2, 3v3 or 4v4. There’s also three races to choose from: Terran (human) Protross (humanoids) and Zerg (insectoids).

After you’ve gotten enough practice, you’re thrown into five placement matches. Once you complete all five, your scores will determine which competitive ladder you fall under.

The ranks starting from lowest to highest goes like this: Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum, and Diamond

The ranking system goes strictly off whether you win or lose, not by your actual in game kills; which could be a good thing or a bad thing. If you end up getting lucky and winning all five matches, you’ll be put against highly skilled players. Now if you’re a skilled player, but just end up having a bad day and losing all the matches, you’ll be set up with rookies. I don’t think five placement matches going off whether you win or lose is the best ranking system. What about your APM’s (actions per minute), number of units you kill, what if your team lags out and leaves you to fend your enemies for yourself? None of that is taken into consideration which hopefully will be something Blizzard can look into.

The key to winning in multiplayer is to perfect your build order that way you gather resources quickly as well as spend them wisely. The two main resources that are collected are minerals and vespene gas; both go towards crrafting new buildings, infantry, and repairs. The faster you get your units up, the faster you can attack your enemies, and hopefully prevail.

Along with the stock maps, there’s a wide range of custom maps to choose from as well, and when I say wide range, I mean it. Some of the maps include categories such as Arena, Puzzle, Sports, Shooter, Strategy, Defense, Role Playing and even Hide & Seek. So when you’re bored of the usual 3v3 or whatever you fancy, just load up some good ol’ custom maps to satisfy your craving.

Another feature that Blizzard threw in, that I absolutely LOVE, is the efficient lag kicker. What happens is if someone is lagging, it will bring up a screen where all gameplay stops, and allows them time to stop lagging. If the player continues to lag for a full minute, they are then kicked from the game.

Genius Blizzard, genius.

Also, if you need a minute because your mom is calling you to do laundry, there’s a feature to pause the game for up to 2 minutes, and yes it pauses it for everyone. No more getting left behind! If things start to get hectic, and there’s just no hope at all for winning then Blizzard also allows you to immediately surrender through out the game. That way, you don’t have to sit through a brutal beating until you’re defeated.

Besides the occasional run in to a sore loser, and the lack of proper placement matches in multiplayer, I couldn’t personally find many downsides to this game. You can tell Blizzard put lots of hard work into Starcraft II to make it go above and beyond what the first Starcaft did. The singleplayer and multiplayer have so much to offer, and keep me entertained for hours. There’s always new achievements to gain, ladders to climb, and enemies to be conquered. As crazy as it sounds,

I think I’ve found a game that comes close to perfect.