StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty review

I think the storytelling of SC2 sucked so much with cheap recycles of already-revealed-cutscenes making it even worse. It was amazing how they managed off to finish the whole campaign with movies most of those everybody already watched like 10 times, exposing Blizzard's low capability of creating high-qual CGs and that explains why their quicly made race promotional clips were pieces of joke; the one where a queen's voice said "we are the swarm..." What was with Valelian the prince welcoming Rainer's party aboard? Huh, since when were battle cruisers armless? And the other two ships just waching Rainer's docking? LOL. What was with "My friend, I did not experience true death yet." crap? Ok, some might have liked the return of our old hero, so I won't say more about it. In SC1 Mengsk and Rainor were kinda allies fighting against Kerrigan and they had to be for Kerrigan had infliced them heavy damage with betrayals, yet Mengsk somehow became Rainor stalker. Huh-huh. And how the heck does Mengsk not only know about the hybrid and prophecy, but also performing experiment with those things? (unless he is minion of the "Far greater power") He got his ass booted by Kerrigan in SC1, so he Absolutely Should have focussed all his attentions to Zerg's movement and plans, yet somehow he uses his intels to figure out about Xel-Naga's some old tales and myterious hybrid and busy tracking Rainor down? WTH. What's with General someone's character? so typical cliche-like I don't even remember his name. Was it war field or something? What's with Kerrigans A-princess-waiting-for-hero-on-white-horse attitude? What is Mengsk and Kerrigan doing while Rainor travels all aroud galaxy righting the wrongs acting like a super-hero full of justice? Are protosses off to toilets during the final battle? WOW. JUST WOW. There are just too many things that I can not even count those tell how wrong, childish, unrelated, irrelevant SC2 stories are. Perhaps good for light users, but come on, those who enjoyed Mass Effect and Planescape-torment, Bioshock will never be able to appreciate SC2's story. Apart from great cinematics and mission system(and perfect multi too),the story telling is just too bad that almost forced me to post a writeup about it on SC2 official forum from where I just got overflamed with swearings and black mailings. WHATEVER. I'm still a large fan of Blizzard as I bought Collector's Edition, but it is towards thier impressive world-creating ability and multi play, not to thier story.. Their story sucks man. SC only stood out with its background settings, WC3? A typical mythology. Diablo. Oh, don't even mention it.

Blizzard has come along way since starcraft one! It definetly seems more realistic than starcraft one. (Not saying that Starcraft one is bad though)

Im really not sure why this game deserves anything close to a ten. It took Blizzard over a decade to release what is essentially the first starcraft with better graphics? God forbid Blizzard try anything new, it might take a century. There were plenty of companies out there trying to bring something new to the genre and trying to keep their fans interested but blizzard can dick around for over ten years and put out a standard RTS with decent visuals and gets an automatic ten? I am really struggling to understand why this game is so special.(aside from the MP popularity) Seems to me a ten should be reserved for games that fundamentally alter a genre not game that just do a great job. Don't get me wrong, Im sure this is a great game but blizzard had me waiting ten years for a game that just does the same old thing but looks a little better doing it. Then charges an extra ten bucks for the privilege.

Why change?Well, because old is fine, but, y'know, using your creativity to make something fresh and original is not a bad thing, eh? Especially since you're making the sequel to what is probably one of the most played games of all time... Take Dawn of War for example...everyone loved the first game with its expansions, and everybody expected a next-gen RTS sequel (and nobody would complain if they did just that)..and yet THQ made a RTS/RPG hybrid with a shipload of new features, most of them making the game radically different from its predecessors... But yeah, frankly, I didn't expect anything different than a simple graphical update (and a "new" campaign) from Blizzard...they just like to milk their games, it's just how they are..

I would first like to say that mahabat is awesome. Second, what's the big deal with you folks? As odd as it sounds, critics have opinions, and they are not always going to agree with yours. And anyways, what does the score matter? The words themselves are what you should be looking at. They tell you what you should expect. Of course, some game sites tend to be biased, but then that is why you should never limit yourself to one game site. Get different opinions. It helps. And for those complaining about the game not being that different from the first? For some reason, I thought that was the reason you wanted a sequel. I mean, StarCraft is supposed to be a great and awesome game, so why change what was so awesome about it in the first place? And if you wanted some big change (because you would, of course, need that in order to make the game not be so similar to the original, and from what I gather, you certainly don't want that), why don't you take a look at Command & Conquer 4. Not very successful now was it? Also, please note that I'm not trying to be mean or hateful here, even though I most likely come across that way. I'm just a bit mystified by some of the comments I'm reading.

Does it always have to be some fat jackass with a cigar hanging out of his mouth and "Pain" tattooed somewhere on his body? Not very original.

doesn't it not support LAN for multiplayer though?

When people complain about this being the setup for the next game... isn't that what the original Terran story was? It set you up for the rest of the story lines. But the fact is, the stories are so large and engaging they have to split them up. Except this time each GAME is a different piece of the story, instead of all pieces being in one. Sure, they could of put it in one, but who can blame Blizzard for trying to make money as a BUSINESS? And it doesn't have the same "feeling" of the "end of the universe"? Uhh, did you complete the same storyline I did? Or did you somehow manage to skip (possible spoiler)------- Zeratul's story?

ok...I absolutely hated the first Starcraft game, as it was probably around '05 when I first played it...after having played AoE 2 (and expac) and Age of Mythology (which imho was great, not quite on the level of AoE2, but still great), Starcraft just did not stack up. Seriously, I borrowed the game from a friend, installed it...played it once and uninstalled it - my friend got it back literally an hour or 2 after i first borrowed it....that is how much I hated the first Starcraft. One day though...probably summer of 07 I was reading a hands-on preview in PCGamer which got me cautiously optimistic for SC2. Fast forward to July 28th, and I pick up Starcraft 2 at local store. Install it immediately after work and play it for 2 hours at which point I decided that sleep was for the weak and would stay up all night...thats how good this game is. Also, I do not have a thousands upon thousands of dollars PC...I got my PC about 3 years ago for mebbe $750-800 (I am still on Windows XP for Chrissakes), and haven't upgraded it since....my GPU is an Nvidia Gforce 8600...I got like a duo-core proc (yeah...not even quad-core) and can still run Starcraft at high to ultra graphics...and you know what? A brand new game on Consoles will cost you 70 bucks guarenteed...this was $63 well spent... and to those saying this game doesn't deserve 10/10 as its not a 'perfect game': I believe OXM says it best - a 10 Classic "One of those rare and very best of games. Every Xbox gamer" (substitute Xbox for platform of choice) "simply mustbuy it and play it, regardless of whether they're a fan of the genre." -and their rating system doesn't stop there however it goes all the way to 11 - Mechagodzillas Choice "The unicorn. Will never happen. Never." - September '09 issue. They (OXM) have also gone on record as stating that an eleven is the perfect game that will never happen, and that 10 is simply their way of saying that game is just a great game that goes beyond simply getting an editors choice - and its not a perfect game too. The problem is that we will never, ever see a perfect game - simple reason being that without fail humanity will find a fault with it which therebye makes it imperfect. Its simple, a 10/10 doesn't mean perfection, it simply means greatness. But otherwise, SC2 is a great game that definitely deserves a 10/10 as being a classic example of it's genre.

A single game "outshines the Dawn of War series"? Sod off...I think there is a shitload of nostalgia and bias all over this review.. You admit that it's a decade-old game with shinier graphics and yet you give it a 10/10, which should be a game that contains ORIGINALITY.

Heck I still play SC1 and love it so I will get this game sometime

I never play RTS games these days, te last one I did play was Age of mythology (which by the way sucked ass) and hearing the rave reviews Starcraft 2 is getting it might just be worth delving into RTS' again..

Hey if you think the score is wrong, why don't you make your own dam sight and write your own review? theres an idea, and then maybe make a comments section and whine about your own score because no one else is going to post there.

"I also find it funny that you would choose to post this comment on the only site that I've seen try to combat the problem of not knowing which one out of two highscoring, similar titles is better by having the comparison section in their super reviews."*

@ crumbdunky If a perfect game came out, it would get a 10 (obviously). The score would be accompanied by a series off words I like to call a "review". In this review, you would be able to read about the game and have explaned to you that this game is perfect and has no flaws. The reason why most games are getting 7-10 is that most games don't suck. The standards for videogames quality has risen along with the cost of making them. Games are too expensive to make these days for companies to risk pumping money in to shitty games (hence the large amount of recently closed projects by EA). I also find it funny that you would choose to post this comment on the only site that I've seen try to combat the problem of not knowing which one out of two highscoring, similar titles by having the comparison section in their super reviews.

i want...i WANT!!!!

It beats dawn of war 2, starcraft 2, and warcraft 3 pretty easily, mostly as those are all out of 10 games. dawn of war 1, however, is still far superior.

@ whoever said a Korean forced them to play Starcraft, Same here. He was playing it at school on a USB, and I had a look as he Zergling rushed his way to victory. He let me have a go, and i died, with only two zerg larvae spawned. O.o

i knew this game was a 10, but i'm not buying it till the other campaigns, or "the whole game" bundles are released.

I loved the Firefly reference Tyler. Nice work! I've only got an old Dell Precision M90 laptop and while I can run it at the barest of the bare settings, I just can't do it. I can't play the sequel to one of my favorite RTS games without them looking better than the worst. *sigh*