StarCraft II Beta First Impressions

Having finally found my way into the SC2 beta, I thought I'd throw out a few first impressions for anyone still reading. Let me just start by saying the game is awesome. Blizzard seems to have found a great balance between keeping aspects of oldschool SC while still adding loads of new things. Best of all, it still feels like StarCraft.

So far I've only gotten into the Zerg, my all time favorite race. I want to take this slow and learn things one race at a time since there are a ton of new units, buildings and abilities. I started out vs a computer to figure out some build orders and then moved on to some 2v2 where I've done pretty well. I've only just dabbled in 1v1 so far, and though I've gone 3-0 I have yet to play anyone who really seems to have a clue as of yet.

For the Zerg, Queens seem to have made a huge difference in the way we play the macro game. You don't need to keep making new hatcheries to keep up with your resource intake, because Queens have the ability to spawn 4 larvae at a hatchery, which takes 40 seconds. It really is nice to not have to manage 8+ hatchs, but it does take some getting used to.

Roaches appear to be the Zerg bread and butter unit, except maybe in ZvT. Hydralisks have moved up to lair tech and seem to be much stronger, and I am still seeing them used frequently. There really are so many new things in SC2 that it can be a bit overwhelming to any oldschool SC player who thinks he's going to be able to bust down the door and starting owning away.

I am going to start keeping track of my 1v1 matches here and posting some replays as I (hopefully) start working my way up the ladder.