Author: scharfschutze
Type: PC Game
Released: 1999
Designer: Blizzard Entertainment
Publisher: Blizzard Entertainment
Genre: Real-time strategy
Without a doubt, WarCraft II is one of the most beloved real-time strategy games ever made. First published in 1996 under the title WarCraft II: Tides of Darkness, with the follow-up expansion pack Beyond the Dark Portal published later that year, WarCraft really set the standard for any RTS game that tried to follow. In 1999, Blizzard re-released the game under a new title: WarCraft II: Battlenet Edition.
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WarCraft II takes us back to the world of the original WarCraft, only this time the playing field is much bigger. No longer restricted to the nation of Azeroth (now fallen beneath the boots of the Orcish Horde), WarCraft II's battles take you across the length and breadth of an entire continent, as well as the dark world of the Orcs if you have either the Battlenet Edition or Beyond the Dark Portal. The two original players, Orcs and Humans, have been beefed up with new units, new spells, and a much larger building tree, plus the addition of several other stock fantasy races (Elves, Trolls, Gnomes, and Goblins, for example) who add their own support to the two sides.
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As in the original, there are two sides you can choose to play as: the Alliance of Lordaeron (Humans) or the Orcish Horde. Both sides are complemented by separate "sub-races"; the Human Alliance includes Gnomes, Elves, and Dwarves, while the Orcish Horde has accepted alliances with the Trolls, Goblins, and Ogres. None of these races are separate from the two main factions; in essence, they are a part of each faction, although their own qualities come through both in the units they provide and in the storyline.
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While speaking of units, this brings us to an interesting conundrum: for whatever reason, Blizzard decided to make unit stats universal. To be more specific, a Knight has the exact same stats and properties as an Ogre, and Troll Axethrowers are the exact same as Elvish Archers. While making each side more readily accessible to newer players, this is a rather frustrating fact for hardcore real-time strategy gamers, and can severely detract from your gaming experience. However, there are some redeeming features to the unit system: WarCraft II adds both air and naval warfare to the Orc/Human clash. Naval warfare is very enjoyable, with each side possessing a transport, an oil gatherer, and three warships: light, heavy and submersible. The submarines in game are particularly annoying, being visible only to air units and towers. Air units, on the other hand, are rather limited, with only one attacking unit and one exploration unit per side. They are more useful as a supplement to your ground (or sea) armies rather than having a force of air units on their own.
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The true uniqueness of both races, as in the original, comes through in their spell-casting units. The Humans and Orcs both get access to two. The Humans have access to Paladins, an upgraded Knight with increased stats and four nifty spells, including the ever-useful Healing. Their primary offensive spell-caster, however, is the Mage. He can cast six different spells, ranging from Slow to Polymorph. This last spell allows you to turn even the most powerful of your enemies into a harmless Sheep, Pig, or Seal! The Orcs can eventually upgrade their Ogres to the powerful Ogre-Magi, who can cast spells such as Bloodlust and the minefield-creating Rune. The primary Orcish magic-user, however, is the Death Knight, an undead unit that can cast the base-levelling Death and Decay, and can turn corpses into undead Skeletons with his Raise Dead spell.
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Buildings too are exactly mirrored in stats and (for the most part) function. However, WarCraft II did add an interesting effect to the RTS experience: if you're playing on a snow-covered map, your buildings appear slightly "snowed in" with banks of snow on the roof and icicles hanging off the overhangs. It adds an interesting touch to the game, and though only an esoteric concern, it adds to WarCraft II's immersive environment. As usual, Blizzard used their approach to the building dilemma, with Peasants or Peons both gathering resources and building your structures. An interesting element they added in WarCraft II is the Oil resource. To collect it, you must first build a Shipyard on the coastline. Then, using Oil Tankers, you must find patches of Oil in the ocean and build Oil Platforms over them. The Tankers will then gather oil until destroyed, ordered not to, or until the oil runs out.
The maps over which all this fighting and dying take place are a well-designed set of maps, though they suffer from a lack of elevation - everything is flat, and nothing blocks the LOS of a ranged unit. But they look good and play well with the game's mechanics, and both Trees and Rocks can be blasted through by your kamikaze demolition units (either Dwarvish Demolition Squads or Goblin Sappers, depending on which race you are). Depending on where you are in the campaign or which map you have chosen for multiplayer, there are different portions of the map covered by water, which may or may not necessitate delving into naval warfare.
When Blizzard re-released WarCraft II in the Battlenet Edition package, they included the expansion pack, Beyond the Dark Portal. This is not Blizzard's best effort as far as expansion packs go; while it adds a new element to the story campaigns (either Humans venturing to the Orcish home world or Orcs from said world coming here, depending on which campaign you're playing), it doesn't add any new units to the mix. However, it does add a whole new terrain set - the green, swampy world of Draenor. This is certainly a fun event for those who tire of the maps of Lordaeron. As well, Blizzard finally included Battlenet support in this latest edition (hence the name), allowing the multiplayer element of WarCraft II to finally come into its own. As well, a host of other nifty changes (assigning groups and the ever-popular Attack Move option for example) brought this favourite of the genre fully up to date and ready to rumble.
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The graphics in WarCraft II are somewhat primitive 2-D, but the models are crisp and good-looking. Each unit is very distinct and never obscured by whatever colour you are playing (as opposed to the pure red or pure grey infantry of Red Alert). The buildings look very nice, although the fires caused during combat are somewhat cheesy and don't actually match up with the building.
Effects: 8.5/10Mostly concerned with combat, the effects category does however contain the Blizzard penchant for humorous "annoyed" unit speech. Simply put, if you click on a unit multiple times without giving it orders, it will eventually get annoyed by your presence, and tell you so in several humorous ways. You can make a game out of checking what all the various units say when clicked on.
Gameplay: 8/10WarCraft II's gameplay is among the smoothest I've ever played. The game has no real faults in the interaction between all the various elements in the game. However, the fact that the races have completely mirrored stats for units makes the balance issue somewhat mute. This is a major drain on gameplay, and I've used the map editor several times to modify the unit stats to make them a little more different. Unfortunately, this solution only works in custom games…
Replayability: 8.5/10The single-player campaigns are not, by themselves, all that fun to go through more than once or twice, although they're very good for telling the WarCraft story. However, there is a reasonable map editor that allows you to create custom maps to play on. With the addition of Battlenet support, this game becomes just as fun to play as its successors, allowing you to fight opponents literally across the street or across the world.
Overall: 9.5/10With the Battlenet Edition, a great classic of the gaming world became even better. This is one of the most timeless real-time strategy games ever created. Even today, it is played all over the world because it offers an intriguing mix of strategy, tactics, and magic that keep gamers coming back for more. It is certainly worth it to play this old classic.