StarCraft 2

Last Tuesday my boss came in and asked me if I had ever played StarCraft. I was truly at a loss for words. How would I properly convey my level of experience with this game to him? StarCraft came out when I was 17. My two neighbors and I found a group of beta testers who had been floating around top 20 of the ladder rankings during the entire beta test. We played with them 4 or more hours every night upon release.

IGN hosted its first 2v2 tournament and we formed two teams that took 1st and 2nd place. The only people we ever lost to was one another. We sought out all the top ladder players and arranged matches with them. After launch none of us really spent any time trying to climb the ladder, we played for the fun of it. The competition and challenge of beating our friends what made the game fun.

StarCraft was the single most influential game in my life. Not the game it’s self but what the game allowed me. Four of my closet friends I met on Battle.net by chance. We happened to live a few miles from one another and met up. For 10 years now we have gamed together, lived together off and on, and hung out doing various things.

StarCraft also taught me that most people are bad at video games. I would overhear people talking about StarCraft in High School classes and how they “owned someone with a mass carrier” strategy. This taught me that my gaming was better left in silence. I would rather no one knew I played video games than suffer through ignorance.

When StarCraft 2 comes out all of my friends and I that met in StarCraft will be throwing a party together. This is like our High School reunion. I know since we have aged our skill will not be what it once was, however I know that I will never consider a mass carrier assault a viable strategy.