StarCraft II: Heart of the Swarm Review

After almost three years of waiting, the StarCraft saga continues on in StarCraft II: Heart of the Swarm.  2010’s Wings of Liberty (you can check out our review here) catapulted the StarCraft universe back to the upper echelons of gaming.  It was new, fresh, and exciting without sacrificing its identity or heritage.

While Heart of the Swarm was originally scheduled for release in the first half of 2012, history tells us that getting pushed back by only a year is still pretty good timing for Blizzard.  So, has the company that many hold near and dear been able to repeat the brilliance of Wings of Liberty – or will Heart of the Swarm leave the same yearning for more feeling that Diablo III left everyone with?

In StarCraft II: Heart of the Swarm Sarah Kerrigan replaces Jim Raynor as the game’s main protagonist and continues on from where Wings of Liberty left off . . . or at least that was the intent.  More on that later.

The basic formula remains largely the same.  The Hyperion gets traded in for a giant Zerg Leviathan.  Most of the crew members you spoke with on the Hyperion have some sort of Zerg replacement as well.  The general flow of the game still consists of traveling to different planets to complete various objectives while allowing time to converse with your crew between missions.

As before, your progression through the game grants you a myriad of upgrade options.  The upgrade system has been adapted to be philosophically more in line with the Zerg.  Each battlefield unit ends up with two distinct upgrade types: one that’s changeable and one that’s permanent.

After completing a mission where a new unit was introduced you are then allowed to take advantage of the changeable upgrade for that unit.  This consists of choosing between three different options and you can switch which option you want to use whenever you want between missions.  These upgrades usually provide bonuses to things like attack speed, attack damage, movement speed, or health bonuses.

The permanent upgrade for each unit comes later and is a reward for completing Evolution Missions.  After you’ve had a chance to learn how to use a new unit for a few levels you are eventually presented with an Evolution Mission for that unit.  These Evolution missions are sort of like a short little trial ground where you get to try out the two different upgrade options.  These two options represent divergent evolutionary pathways and whichever option you choose will be permanently locked in for the rest of the game.

These missions are quite useful as they allow you to make a more educated decision before permanently locking in your choice.  The upgrade options from the Evolution Missions are generally more involved in changing the actual character of the unit such as allowing it to attack more types of units, adding a life-steal mechanic, or making the unit hatch almost instantly.

The upgrades don’t stop with regular units.  Unlike its predecessor, Heart of the Swarm’s main protagonist grows and gains new abilities as you play through the game.  Completing missions and bonus objectives levels Kerrigan up allowing you to make use of her skill tree.  There are plenty of options to pick from and you are free to change anything on her skill tree anytime you want between missions.

While mostly familiar, there have been some changes to Zerg units.  As always, units are slowly introduced throughout the campaign in a way that gets you comfortable with every unit in the Swarm.  With all the emphasis Blizzard has placed on having different classes being pretty equitable in its Warcraft and Diablo franchises, there has been worry that Heart of the Swarm would bring us a Zerg army that behaved awfully similar to the Terran army.  Thankfully, that is not true at all and the Zerg remain incredibly distinct.

Unfortunately things aren’t all peaches and cream this time around.  By far, the biggest disappointment is the overall quality of the writing.  It’s not a few details here or there that’s problematic, but rather almost the entire product that suffers from poor writing.  One of the largest let-downs comes only a few hours into the game when you begin to get this gnawing feeling that a substantial portion of the storyline in Wings of Liberty was completely wasted.  What was such a powerful moment now feels like a waste of time.

Another huge let-down has to do with the pacing of the StarCraft II trilogy.  It has been apparent for some time that there is a certain formula successful trilogies follow.  The first entry in a trilogy offers only small hints of the larger story to come but still ends with some sort of victory for the protagonists.  The second entry in a trilogy is when the real problem explodes out and the protagonists appear gravely outmatched.  The third entry in a trilogy culminates in a massive battle which ultimately leaves the protagonists successful.

In Wings of Liberty the protagonists got their happy ending and the larger story involving the hybrids existed only as a small portion of what happened.  Undoubtedly the third StarCraft II outing, Legacy of the Void, will be about the massive battle against the greater threat and presumably the good guys will prevail.  However, for some reason the second installment has gone awry.

In Heart of the Swarm the looming greater threat still only exists as a small side story compared to everything else that happens.  Instead, hours upon hours of the game is spent having Kerrigan perform frivolous and boring tasks such as regrouping the Swarm.  Even the game’s ending was very bittersweet because while enjoyable and meaningful on one hand, it was still kind of disappointing because such little attention was spent on broadening the scope of the trilogy.  What was initially set out as an epic plot that would span three games has turned into three separate games with three separate plots that are only very loosely connected.

A lot of the smaller details of the writing suffered as well.  The time spent between missions in Wings of Liberty was intriguing and entertaining.  This was because Raynor and the characters he interacted with on the Hyperion were interesting.  In Heart of the Swarm, speaking with Kerrigan’s companions on the Leviathan is a painful process.  I very quickly got to the point where I had no desire to actually hear what they would say but would click on them solely out of fear that I would miss some plot point.

To make matters even worse, several of the companions only say variations of the same thing for the entire game.  Whether its “I’m stupid, teach me how to lead,” or “I follow essence,” it gets old really quick.  It’s fine that most Zerg are mindless idiots but that doesn’t mean we want to keep hearing their stupidity.  Blizzard should have realized in the very early stages of development how terrible a lot of the conversation in the game is.  There are many other options they could have utilized to give Kerrigan people to talk with that would have made the game more compelling.

With all that being said, Blizzard never fails at delivering a polished game.  Everything you do in the game is smooth and requires minimal effort to figure out.  The technical quality of the cinematics is still first-rate.  Multiplayer on Battle.net has seen substantial improvements and provides ample opportunity to continue enjoying the game for a long time.

StarCraft II: Heart of the Swarm is a very fun game to play.  It just can’t live up to its predecessor.  Unfortunately, after Diablo III and now Heart of the Swarm, Wings of Liberty’s exceptional writing seems to be more the exception than the rule for Blizzard currently.  However, Blizzard has always placed its core emphasis on gameplay and in that regard Heart of the Swarm definitely delivers.  I just wish equal attention had been spent on crafting a quality narrative.