StarCraft: The Catalyst of the Pro-Gaming Revolution

To think that a video game was able to transform a nation so dramatically, almost overnight, is shocking. StarCraft was assimilated into Korean culture, becoming an instant cultural icon. With the wide popularity of StarCraft, soon StarCraft related scenes and characters were popping up all over Korea.

Beyond the added features and new gameplay innovations introduced to the RTS genre by StarCraft, it was the fast-paced style of the game that attracted Korean gamers on such a massive scale. The action happened quickly and was very exciting, requiring the player to think and react with little to no margin for error, which proved very conducive to Korean gamers. Gamers were no longer merely tested on who had the largest bank of hours playing the game, but instead the winner of a match was determined by the players’ strategic decisions, how well they gathered and acted on intelligence information of their enemy, and their dexterity with a mouse. To help understand the diversity this provides, let’s look briefly at each point.

There are two general advantages either player may possess at any given moment in the game of StarCraft, the military advantage and the economic advantage. Possessing both advantages in a game between two similarly skilled players usually results in a win, though in StarCraft advantages can swap hands faster than a gamer can double click his mouse. As a general rule of StarCraft, players can only focus on building one advantage at a time, as both military and economic expansion require common resources. Players are forced to decide the best avenue to pursue at any given moment and the decisions made often serve to determine the victor. Strong mathematical skills will shine through for players when evaluating their options, while strong discipline is often required to make carry out those objective decisions. It is between the immaculate balances of these aspects that has allowed the generation of a seemingly limitless number of possible ways a game of StarCraft can play out. Indeed, like snowflakes, no two games of StarCraft are ever the same! There are still new tactics emerging today, ten years after StarCraft’s initial release, resulting in ever increasing strategic possibilities. This concept has captured the interest of Korean gamers without limit and played a critical role in StarCraft’s massive success. The non-repetitive nature of StarCraft’s gameplay combined with the fast action of the combat would make a game of StarCraft interesting to observe as well as play, something few other games can claim true.

One gameplay innovation of special note is the fog of war. The fog of war concept existed in the WarCraft model before StarCraft but its importance was dramatically different. The fog of war hides all enemy units and undiscovered buildings that are not in close proximity to a player’s units. This required gamers to explore the map, scouting their opponents out to find their base and army position, their level of technology, and make conjecture about their strategy as well as military and economical strengths. In turn, this led to a form of counter intelligence where in which players would attempt to hide their strength from the enemy as much as possible, destroying or impeding scouting units before they can reveal crucial tech buildings and units exposing a players strategy, or building in remote locations of the battlefield where there is less chance of being discovered.

Truly, the psychological and informational warfare aspect of StarCraft caused it to shine like none before it and helped establish it as the golden standard in RTS gaming. To help understand this phenomenon one might look to the timeless game of poker, where the winner is most often the one with the best response to three questions: What does my opponent have? What does my opponent think I have? What does my opponent think I think he has? The player who best answers these questions will often be the one to best judge the risk vs. reward of different choices he may make in the game, ultimately leading to victory. Like poker, it is possible to bluff your opponent, for example causing him to believe you stronger or weaker than you really are. There are even specific units and abilities designed for exactly this purpose. For example, the Protoss High Templar has the ability to bolster Protoss ranks with hallucinations, short lived copies of other units which, to the Protoss player’s enemies, appear and act exactly as the copied unit, the only difference being the hallucinations do no damage. As Sun Tzu advises, when you are many, appear few; when you are few, appear many. This ancient philosophy and many like it regarding war and strategy are easily adapted to a game of StarCraft thanks to the innovation of the fog of war system.

The last key factor in establishing victory in StarCraft is a gamer’s dexterity with a mouse. With each player able to control hundreds of units and dozens of buildings, the player who is able to best control his forces has a significant advantage on the battlefield. It is possible for very few units, or even a single unit, to cause massive, perhaps fatal damage to a superior enemy force, when managed properly. This type of control is often referred to as ‘micro’ as gamers are micro managing individual units’ actions. By the same token, there is also strength found in numbers. The ability to multitask, managing multiple areas of the battlefield at once, or handling large groups of units, is similarly referred to as ‘macro’. Through a combination of micro and macro it’s possible for a player to establish an advantage over his opponent and erect a win. Some players regularly perform several hundred actions per minute (APM) and are capable of generating wins even though perhaps possessing inferior strategies or intelligence on their enemies.

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