A Little More StarCraft!

Just a couple a days ago, my friends and I were playing this cool StarCraft boardgame. I suppose we all needed a break from the usual PC/Xbox360/DS gaming. We could have played a good ol' fashioned pen-and-paper RPG, but no one wanted to DM, so we played this one (as well as a couple of other board games) instead.StarCraft The Board Game is definitely a good change of pace. I'll write more about it on another blog entry. In between rounds, we'd also talk about the latest news in all kinds of gaming- and one of the highly-anticipated games for us was definitely StarCraft II. Heck, why do you think we were tiding ourselves over with the board game? :D

No word yet on when the game is officially going to be released, but the latest trailer was already out on Gamespot (you can check that out here). In the meantime, I thought I could get myself oriented on what else had gone on in the Starcraft Universe.

The original StarCraft game is one of those games that is installed in my PC to this day. It's definitely a classic- one of those games with great replay value, and still provides a great deal of real-time strategy entertainment even when there are a lot of new games out there.

Now most of us have the original game, as well as the Brood Wars expansion pack, but I just found out that there were a couple of other campaign packs not in my collection, namely Insurrection and Retribution.

StarCraft: Insurrection, according to Wikipedia:

Insurrection is the first add-on pack for StarCraft. Although developed and published by Aztech New Media it is authorized by Blizzard Entertainment. It was released on PC on 31 July 1998.

The expansion's story focuses on a Confederate colony during the course of the first campaign of StarCraft. As in StarCraft, the player takes control of each race in three separate campaigns. In the first campaign, Terran colonists attempt to defend themselves from the Zerg invasion of the sector as well as from a rising insurgency, while in the second campaign the player directs a Protoss task force sent to clear the Zerg infestation of the colony by any means necessary. In the final campaign the player assumes the role of a Zerg cerebrate, moving to crush all opposition on the surface. The expansion only contains new campaigns and multiplayer maps, it does not include new content such as units and graphical terrain tilesets. Insurrection was criticised by reviewers for lacking the quality of the original game and as a result of its lack of success, it is not widely available. Although the add-on is authorized by Blizzard Entertainment, they offer no comment on support or availability of the game.

StarCraft: Retribution, according to Wikipedia:

Retribution is the second of the two authorized add-on packs released for StarCraft. The add-on was developed by Stardock, published by WizardWorks Software and authorized by Blizzard Entertainment. It was released for the PC in late 1998.

Retribution is set during the second episode of StarCraft, revolving around the acquisition of a crystal of immense power connected to the Xel'Naga. Divided into three campaigns, the player assumes the roles of a Protoss fleet executor, the commander of a Dominion task force and a Zerg cerebrate, all tasked with retrieving the crystal from a Dominion colony and getting it off the planet as quickly as possible. As with its predecessor, Insurrection, Retribution does not include any new gameplay features beyond its single player campaigns and consortium of multiplayer levels. The add-on was not received with critical support, instead being regarded as average but at least challenging. As with Insurrection, Retribution is not widely available. Despite authorizing the add-on, Blizzard Entertainment offers no comment regarding support or the availability of Retribution.

So this means I have to find myself a copy of Insurrection and Retribution and play the damn things before StarCraft II comes out. I've already checked out the official Blizzard website, and, yeah, there's a whole lot going on in there. Here's a trailer for the upcoming sequel to StarCraft, which I found on YouTube.

You could visit the official Starcraft 2 website for lots of artwork, downloadable trailers, even a recap of what has happened so far in the Starcraft universe.

In the meantime, it seems I'm gonna get more of my sci-fi RTS fix playing Warhammer 40K and blow away some Necrons- as soon as I install them into my PC once more.

Cheers, everyone!