StarCraft: Brood War (1998)
StarCraft: Brood War is a 1998 real time strategy (rts) video game made by Saffire and Blizzard Entertainment.
Brood War picks up immediately after StarCraft's campaign and deepens every faction's situation: the Terran Dominion is fracturing, the Zerg are reorganizing under a new hierarchy, and the Protoss are struggling with the aftermath of their homeworld's fall. Seven new campaigns extend the story across all three races and introduce new units that shifted the competitive metagame significantly. The expansion is inseparable from StarCraft's reputation as an esport, still played at high level in South Korea for decades after its release.
Quick answers
What is StarCraft: Brood War about?
Brood War picks up immediately after StarCraft's campaign and deepens every faction's situation: the Terran Dominion is fracturing, the Zerg are reorganizing under a new hierarchy, and the Protoss are struggling with the aftermath of their homeworld's fall. Seven new campaigns extend the story across all three races and introduce new units that shifted the competitive metagame significantly. The expansion is inseparable from StarCraft's reputation as an esport, still played at high level in South Korea for decades after its release.
When was StarCraft: Brood War released?
StarCraft: Brood War was released on 18 December 1998.
Who made StarCraft: Brood War?
StarCraft: Brood War was made by Saffire, Blizzard Entertainment and Sierra Entertainment.
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A few thoughts on StarCraft: Brood War
StarCraft: Liberty's Crusade is a novel set during the events of the original starcraft, following a journalist embedded with the Terran forces, and it gives the war a human scale the game's missions don't have room for. The Legend of the Galactic Heroes: Die Neue These shares the same interest in multi-faction space conflict where no side is simply right.
Military science fiction where no faction can win outright
Brood War keeps the Terran Dominion, Zerg and Protoss locked in a three-way fight none of them can fully win. StarCraft: Liberty's Crusade tells that same war from a soldier's view, Legend of the Galactic Heroes stages its own decades-long empire war, Old Man's War puts recruits through similarly brutal combat, Stargate SG-1 keeps facing new alien threats, and Mass Effect 2 juggles three rival factions of its own.
Concept albums that play out their own space war
Brood War's three-way war between fracturing empires plays like a concept album in game form. Ayreon's Universal Migrator, Part 2 tells its own interstellar war across a double album, Deltron 3030 raps a dystopian future conflict start to finish, Muse's Simulation Theory and Black Holes and Revelations lean into alien-invasion paranoia, and Repo! The Genetic Opera stages its own dystopia as a rock opera.
Science fiction manga that takes its future as seriously as its present
Brood War treats its Zerg swarm and Protoss psionics with the same seriousness classic science fiction manga brings to its own futures. Ghost in the Shell interrogates identity inside a cybernetic war, Galaxy Express 999 and Phoenix stretch their scope across the galaxy and across time, Appleseed imagines a fragile post-war society trying to hold itself together, and Space Brothers keeps its eyes on the stars for gentler reasons.
Alien wars and human survival on an epic scale
Brood War's fight for survival against overwhelming odds scales up nicely to the biggest screens. Avatar: Fire and Ash pits its factions against each other in open war, War of the Worlds and The Matrix stage humanity's fight against forces it barely understands, Avengers: Infinity War spreads its war across the whole galaxy, and Project Hail Mary bets one lonely mission on saving an entire species.