"An expansion to a masterpiece of a game."

After the huge success of Blizzard's Starcraft, Blizzard decided to release an expansion pack to the hit game, upgrading and adding many things. Players can still play against each other online on Blizzard's premiere server of Battle.net, or play on one-player mode, albeit that does get a little old after a while.

The premise of this game is fairly simple. It's a war-torn universe between three races, the Terran, the Protoss, and the Zerg. Using your collected Vespane Gas and minerals, you build strategic units to defend your base and attack and wipe out your opponent's base. There are over 40 strategic units for you to use at your disposal throughout the three races. You can get the full story for each race out of the instruction manual, but here's a nutshell story for each race.

The Terran is the human race, for the most part. They become overrun by an alien race and fight to keep their homeland safe. With the Terran you get such strategic units as Marines (the most basic unit, a machine-gun toting army man), Firebats (basically, flamethrower-toting men), Siege Tanks (big tanks!), Goliaths (walking Missile Turrets), and Battlecruisers (huge air battleships).

The Protoss identifies mostly with robotic units, and they are the most expensive units to make. They have agreed to keep the peace with the Terrans, but they still keep close tabs on all Terran activities. Now, with the new alien race invading the Terrans, they are somewhat confused about what to do. With the Protoss you get such strategic units as Zealots (the most basic unit, a ground-to-ground unit of robots that can hack their way through anything), Dragoons (4-legged plasma shooting spiders), Carriers (huge air battleships that can deploy very small ships to distract and destroy your opponent), Scouts (machine gun firing, missile-toting air ships), and High Templars (lord units that damage large areas from a distance).

The Zerg is the alien race attacking the Terran and possibly threatening the Protoss. They are commanded by the Overmind, and after they overthrew the control of the Xel'Naga, the Zerg became a race dedicated to basically overrunning and conquering enemy lands. The Overmind commands such Zerg units as Zerglings (very fast, small creatures, the basic Zerg unit), Hydralisks (slightly larger, slower creatures that spit spikes at their opponents), Mutalisks (appear to be red birds with weak, multi-hitting attacks, dangerous in large numbers), and Ultralisks (huge, tank-like units destroy their way through everything).

Starcraft: Brood War adds some new units to the game to spice up the gameplay a bit. The Terrans gained Medics (which can heal Marines, Firebats, and each other, plus do some other fun stuff) and Valkyries (VERY powerful air-to-air units). The Protoss gained Dark Templars (always-cloaked sword-toting units), Dark Archons (very nice units, they are a meld of two Dark Templars and are capable of Mind Control - you can nab a builder from another race and use it to build all of the buildings and units of that race), and Corsairs (air-to-air units that can fire very fast). The Zerg gained Devourers (tank-like air-to-air spore attackers), plus some excellent upgrades for ground attacking units.

You have a few different methods of taking down your opponent. You can rush from the very start with about 16 - 24 of Terran Marines, Protoss Zealots (just 8 Zealots right off the bat are extremely dangerous), or the Zerg Zerglings (well into the battle, 100-200 Zerglings with some air support can team up a base with ease). Or, you can wait, establish your defenses, and build up a huge attacking force of any number and any variety of units of your race. That's the most fun. :)

You can choose to follow the one-player storyline to learn the basics of the game and gain experience with all of the races, which is the best thing you can do to start off. Once you complete the one-player mode, it has no real replay value for you, except perhaps building up different units to make the one-player mode harder. The one-player mode picks up where Starcraft left off in the storyline.

The part of the game that has the most replay value is the online Battle.net multiplayer mode. You can team up or battle against up to 8 players, and even throw some computer players in there if you want. You can do 3 against 3 computers, 3 against 1 computer, or even 7 against 1 computer, very cheap. 4 on 4 real player battles are a lot of fun and really help you to gain the necessary experience to get good at the game.

The graphics of the game are detailed and smooth. You would think that, with so many units running around, that the action would slow down and get a lull, but it doesn't. Blizzard did an exceptional job of keeping the action moving smoothly along. Every unit and every map is detailed and beautiful. There wasn't too much added in Starcraft: Brood War from Starcraft though.

With so many units, it would seem that the sound would be fuzzy and crappy, but it isn't. Every unit has its own sound to accompany the type of unit it is. For example, a Marine's machine-gun fire is different from that of a Goliath's, and the Scout's machine-gun fire is independent of both. Also, if you click on the units over and over again, they will eventually express their exasperation for your actions and will say some pretty humorous lines (especially the Siege Tanks). Each race has their own background music when you use them, for example, the Terran's music is upbeat, while the Zerg's is dreary. There is no real addition to the music in Starcraft: Brood War, except that the new units have their own sound effects.

Control is simple enough. It's not difficult at all to learn, and all you have to do is choose which building you want to built and place it, then after the buildings are completed, built your units from them.

Overall: 10/10
Blizzard truly has an exceptional game in Starcraft, and they improved on it here. If you're interested in the best real-time strategy game out there and you don't have it yet, you can pick up the Starcraft Battle Chest for a mere 20 bucks. In it you get Starcraft, Starcraft: Brood War, plus Prima's official strategy guide for each of them.

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 10/20/02, Updated 10/20/02