| Category | Strategy |
| Players | 1-8 |
| Difficulty | Medium |
| Review Date | 10/96 |
| Developer | Blizzard Entertainment |
| Publisher | Blizzard Entertainment |
| Minimum System Requirements |
| 68040 or Power PC |
| System 7.5 |
| 8 MB RAM |
| CD-ROM |
| 13" 256-color monitor |
If you buy this game you might forget to eat, you might lose your girlfriend, but WarCraft II makes it all worth it. For fans of the first WarCraft, Dune II, and Command and Conquer, WarCraft II is a must-buy. The rest of you (over age 13) should probably get it also. Even though it took them an extra year to come out with a Mac version, we're still happy they did!
WarCraft II is a real-time strategy game, played much like the first installment. It may not have the constant mayhem of an action-shooter, but it keeps you on your toes. With game play that actually makes you think (oh my god, no!), and astonishing depth and attention that sucks you in, you might just have to kiss the world goodbye.
There are two sides in this conflict, the evil orcish axis (orcs, ogres, trolls and a horde of nasties), and the good human alliance (humans, elves, the church, gnomes and other nice guys). There are 28 complete scenarios to play, 14 for the humans and 14 for the orcs. For the novice player, no worries. The first scenarios are much easier, and will help you to learn the game. For the veteran player, the later levels do take good planning and excellent strategy to complete.
WarCraft II is a war game. Squeamish people beware! War is very violent, and WarCraft makes no excuses . You must plunder the land for gold, clear-cut whole forests and fill the oceans with oil derricks. Al Gore would cringe at the sight of this game. With the resources you gain, you must kill the enemy, raze buildings and burn farms. There is no surrender, there is no mercy. Soldiers, civilians and animals scream when they die. They also bleed and leave corpses behind to rot slowly into the earth.
"Like an elemental force of havoc and destruction we thundered through the lands of the Draenei, devastating all that we beheld. Not one life was spared. The only traces of their existence were the blood-soaked fields they had worked for nearly five thousand years; and the rank, acrid smell of the huge victory fires that consumed the bodies of their young."
Many new units have been added since the first WarCraft. Water is no longer an obstacle. You can now build several different kinds of boats and even a submarine! Beware of the skies now, as well. They can fill up with flying machines, zeppelins, dragons and griffins. Many of the spells have also changed. Gone are the clerics and necrolytes that died so easily in the first game. Instead, knights and ogres can be updated to have magical powers. They are not only good magicians, but also good fighters.
The graphics and sound are both improved. All the units and buildings have a 'cartoonish' quality to them. The movements well animated. Even the movies in between some of scenarios are worth watching. The Mac version is identical to the PC version down to the last pixel. While this was a drawback for the VGA graphics of the original WarCraft, WarCraft II looks beautiful. The designers also spent a lot of time working with the sound effects. Each kind of army unit is given a different voice, and they acknowledge commands with dozens of randomly picked phrases. They even get angry at you if you click on them too many times in a row (sheep even say, "Baa Ram Ewe" for all you Babe lovers out there). One flaw is the lackluster background music; this is easily fixed, however. The game lets you insert and play any music CD you wish. This is war, so I must recommend either Carmina Burana or nearly any Wagner piece to set the scene.
Another good addition to this sequel is the 'fog of war'. This covers most of the map in a gray area that obscures everything outside of the line of sight of your units and buildings. While buildings and geographical features are still visible, you can no longer magically watch enemy troop movements from afar. No more 'medieval radar'.
There are a few minor problems. Many of the scenarios require the total obliteration of the enemy, down to the last peon or peasant. When you've spent hours defeating a difficult map and have already burnt down all the enemy buildings, having to scour the map for the last enemy submarine just isn't much fun (Its easier if you turn off the fog of war for a short period, but turn it back on afterwards. Cheaters never prosper.) Also, the units that have spells available to them are sometimes difficult to operate. You have to cast all of the spells yourself. Their AI should be a little smarter.
The only real addition to the Mac version of WarCraft II is the addition of speech recognition software. Because all Macs come with microphones, the designers threw it in just for kicks. The only thing you can do with this addition is yell out the cheat codes. While this adds nothing to the gameplay, it certainly is a hell of a lot of fun!
WarCraft II a fantastic game that all Mac owners should have. Even though it took the guys at
Blizzard a year to come out with it, everyone should still buy it. Maybe if they realize that there is a market for Mac games, they'll come out with their games on a more timely schedule. We'll see when WarCraft III comes out next year.
Look for WarCraft II: Beyond the dark portal for the Mac coming soon. This expansion disk should be chock-full of new campaigns set on the orcish homeworld.
Revolution Report Card |
A- |
|
A game so addictive it should come in a syringe. Awkward spells. Play game instead of getting work done. Not quite revolutionary, but a damn good game. Highly recommended. Took too damn long to come out. |