I just got done beating StarCraft II: Heart of the Swarm. I have to say, it was pretty damn good. The story was great. I haven’t felt this way about a StarCraft game since the original. I didn’t like Wings of Liberty all too much, maybe because I’ve always been a Zerg player. I don’t really know, but I’ve found myself liking- no, more like LOVING- Heart of the Swarm. It’s so hard to talk about how good it is without spoiling it, but I’ll try my hardest not to spoil a single thing. The story is basically Kerrigan’s revenge on Arcturus Mengsk. You see a few old characters here and there, but there are A LOT of new ones. A lot of interesting new ones. There are plot twists and of course, a love story. As I stated earlier, since I’m a Zerg player, I definitely appreciated this game even more because it really goes in-depth with how the Swarm works. I loved every second of this game. Again, if you’re looking for a change of pace, or expecting something different other than a free-for-all Zerg versus Terran versus Protoss, then you shouldn’t. It still sticks to this as a story; However, what would you a expect from a game about warring factions. The in-depth story is amazing, though. I now await the Protoss Expansion for the Grand Finale of the StarCraft II series.
Now, moving away from the story, let’s talk about gameplay. I liked it, although as I’ve stated in my last post, Blizzard really changed the game. They changed hotkeys, most likely because there are a bunch of new units. Not all of these units aren’t necessarily new, but evolutions of previous units, such as Mutalisks can evolve into Guardians (as an example). As you level Kerrigan, she gets her own unique active abilities for herself AND she gets a few passive abilities that affect the Swarm, as well. You can go into the “Evolution Chamber” and mess with the DNA strands of your “main” units to give them one out of three unique abilities. One thing that I found nice was it’s a lot easier to unlock achievements and rewards in Heart of the Swarm. I don’t know if it really is easier, or as I said before, that I’m a Zerg player so I’m actually used to the build structures and units. It definitely felt a lot easier to me than Wings of Liberty did.
I’d definitely recommend this game to anyone. RTS lovers and StarCraft fans would have a blast with Heart of the Swarm. I know I did.
Logging Off,
Aaron “Ehpik”.
