Chapter 468 - War Commander
“StarCraft?!” This name was even harder to understand than the Matrix!
“Is there a Diablo in this game?” Jiang Xiaoyue asked curiously since she saw the logo of Blizzard, which was also shown in Diablo 2 and the official novel of Diablo.
Even people like Wang Xie and Yue Bai had read the official novel of Diablo and found it very imaginative.
Seeing Blizzard’s logo, Jiang Xiaoyue immediately wondered, “Is this game a sequel or a prequel of Diablo 2?”
“It doesn’t look like one…” Sitting on a couch, Yue Bai turned to the beginning of the official novel of Diablo. “Diablo tells the story about the survival of humans who are stuck in the battle between angels and devils…”
“Look!” The audience looked at the big screen and saw a metallic aircraft hovering in the dark space with stars twinkling in the background. “This seems to be… the galaxy?”
This was a different place from the one described in Diablo.
They all looked baffled. “Is this space above the sky during the night?”
Yes, it must be night. Otherwise, how can it be so dark during the daytime?
The opening computer graphics (CG) of StarCraft was different from other games; it was the start of a grand world and described the first encounter of humans (Terrans) and Protoss, another intelligent species in the universe.
The Protoss was purifying the infested human planet, and a group of unlucky humans was watching it right there.
The huge shadow cast by the spacecraft blocked out the light above their heads. When they looked up, they saw the giant thing. If it were a battleship, the bow of the battleship blocked out all the light and filled the people’s vision.
They felt as if they were a school of tiny fish which suddenly looked up and saw the legendary Roc.
“What’s that?”
“This spiritual ship is so huge!”
“It seems bigger than the academy’s Sky-Patrolling Spiritual Ship!”
Suddenly, blue light shot out under the ship!
The big screen was filled with a wave of destructive blue light!
The black-robed Daoist Zhou Mo yelled, “Where did these cultivators come from? How come they can build such a powerful spiritual ship?!”
In the Jiuhua City Shop.
A group of people sat on the couches in the lounge area.
A white-robed old man was eating spicy sticks with leisure.
“Brother Gongshu, how is this ship compared with the warships of your Gongshu Family?” someone asked casually.
“…” Damn it! He put the spicy sticks on the table with force as his face turned dark.
There were three races in StarCraft.
The human civilization was based on science and technology with the assistance of psionic power; Terran ghosts were one example.
The Protoss was also called the race of gods. This race shared some similarities with cultivators or a magic civilization with templars being the center of the society. They had had powerful psionic abilities which seemed to be in the same category of magic power and spiritual essence. Meanwhile, the Protoss could cast magic spells and close-range combat techniques with extremely powerful individual combat forces.
[TL Note: Protoss was directly translated into gods in the Chinese version of the game.]
The zerg followed the combat style of insects and beasts; their greatest advantage was their large population and the lack of fear of death. The Queen of Blades had once been a human and thus could battle using psionic abilities.
Entering the option interface, Fang Qi saw two options to operate the system version of StarCraft.
The first option was the commander mode which was the most popular mode. The players would act as the commander to battle and fight with other players.
The other option was the single-player RPG mode. In some battles, the players were not allowed to develop Commander Center or SCVs (worker units) and were equipped with only one or several squads without back-up. They could enter the battle as an individual character such as Jim Raynor (The main character of the humans), Sarah Kerrigan (Queen of Blades), Zeratul (A Dark Templar of the Protoss), the marines, drivers, other templars, or Hunter Killer Hydralisks, etc.
Among the characters, only female players could control the Queen of Blades, and Zeratul and some other Protoss characters could only be controlled by male players. Otherwise, the players could only finish the battle from the perspective as the commander.
The most classic operation was naturally the commander mode.
Mr. Fang chose a human battle and started the game.
This was the background of the battle. Since a colony was destroyed as introduced in the opening CG, Mr. Fang was asked to protect another colony named Mar Sara as the commander.
In the original game, there was only a crude map with one commander center and a few SCVs. It was a barren land with a few mines.
However, it was different in the system version. When Fang Qi entered the game, he saw a prosperous human colony base. The main base was a lot more complicated compared to the original version, and there was a vast interior space.
There were all kinds of buildings, streets, and plants outside the commander center. It was complex and unique, looking like a small town.
On the modern streets, some marines who wore heavy armor were patrolling with huge guns.
The pale-grey modern rooms were the office of the judicial officer in the colony, and the young female deputy officer was reporting the situation of the colony on the side.
Fang Qi looked at the screen and found that he could issue electronic or verbal instructions. The electronic commands were similar to the original version but had more complete functions. Combined with verbal instructions, he could simulate the commanding process of a battle.
Of course, it was the operation method of humans, and Fang Qi still didn’t know if it was different from the commanding method of the other two races. In the tutorial session, the players must destroy the small zerg forces nearby. There was a squad of 12 marines, and Fang Qi casually organized a wing-shaped formation.
He found that after he told the marines to keep this formation, they would do it when they advanced or turned to another direction. However, in the original version, the formation would be disrupted whenever they encountered an obstacle and they would block themselves with awful pathing.
After the squad walked out of the center, they saw a squad of zerglings loitering outside of the colony.
Obviously, the zerglings saw the marines and swarmed up swiftly.
“The center, retreat! The flanks, surround them!” At Mr. Fang’s dizzying operations, the marines in the center retreated while firing, and the marines from the two sides surrounded the enemies. The number of zerglings decreased quickly.
When the last zergling rushed to the marine, the marine in the center moved to one side at Mr. Fang’s order.
Meanwhile, the other marines fired almost simultaneously. The zergling missed its target and fell to the ground.
Gunsmoke filled the battlefield. With smooth retreat and attacks, the marines killed all the enemies without any casualties.
“We can command soldiers to battle in this game?!” The audience gazed at the big screen, realizing that they could not only play the main characters but the commanders as well!