Shorts
Will likely use this page to catalogue anything I write that’s very short (<250~).
StarCraft “Review”
Balance. It is vital for success, not only in RTS, but in all forms of video gaming. Weapons must do the correct damage, units must move at the right speed, your opponents must be on the same track with cars that are comparable – things, basically, must be fair to be fun. This has been the biggest factor in the success of StarCraft, the late 90s release from Blizzard Entertainment, and its massive endurance in the multiplayer market.
There quite simply hasn’t been a development team with the skill (or luck) to create a game that could survive ten years of constant scrutiny by the best players. Though no major changes have been made to the game itself since the release of its expansion pack, the way the game is played has gone through several revolutions. Terran domination earlier this decade was quickly followed by a Zerg era and we are now entering a period of Protoss supremacy. Every day new strategies are developed, making the game and metagame unrecognisable from just a few years ago. The amateurs of the “foreign” (outside South Korea) scene inherit these tendencies and use custom services like iccup or Blizzard’s own multiplayer service battle.net to match their skills against each other.
The result is that it is impossible to recommend any other RTS title for competitive play over StarCraft. There may be games you prefer but you simply won’t find one that has the same competitive spirit and constant striving for a perfect way to play.
Rock (Parody Review)
Rock from Nature Games is a massively underrated title. There’s no arguing with that, it’s the simple truth. There are so many thinly disguised clones that it is simply unbelievable that their parental figure has faded so far into obscurity. Admittedly, a few million years have passed since its first release, but the basic premise is still highly relevant today. I picked up a copy from my local bargain garden and decided to give it a shot.
The much hyped revolutionary physics engine was brought into play almost immediately. Merely the simple task of starting to play required massive processing. Perhaps this was part of the problem on release – the minds at the time could not comprehend the undertaking needed just to pick up and play. Obviously, as Nature grew in popularity so did our understanding of their products, but at the time we were ignorant in the extreme.
It is worth mentioning that in the current climate of DRM hate and piracy debate that it was simply impossible to copy Rock. No fun-stopping DRM or 45 digit CD key but a simple hardware dependency that shipped with every copy. You can’t rip a CD of Rock; something will just end up broken. This doesn’t even get in the way – the hardware is an integral part of the way you play.
So, remember that while the more modern Glass (Blower Entertainment) or even the spiritual successor to Rock: Brick may have the upper hand in ease of use and interface design, the whole genre was started 4.5 billions years ago in evolutionary fashion.