StarCraft II

Did You Know?

• Development on StarCraft II began in 2003, shortly after Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne was released.
• Wings of Liberty sold 1.8 million copies within the first forty-eight hours of release, breaking the record for best-selling strategy game.
• The game was developed under the codename Medusa.

Games

StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty was released on July 27, 2010, for Windows and Mac OS X, taking place four years after the end of StarCraft: Brood War. The game was announced on May 19, 2007, at the Worldwide Invitational in South Korea with a cinematic trailer and a Protoss gameplay demonstration. Originally envisioned as a single game, it was split into three parts during development, each focusing on one race: Wings of Liberty follows the Terrans and revolves around Jim Raynor's struggles against the Terran Dominion.

The game incorporates a new 3D graphics engine, the Havok physics engine, and DirectX 10 level effects in Windows. Two expansions were planned from the beginning: Heart of the Swarm, released on March 12, 2013, and Legacy of the Void, released in 2015, both currently stand-alone games. Heart of the Swarm includes additional units and multiplayer changes, and its campaign follows Kerrigan and the Zerg across 27 missions (20 main and 7 side missions).

Music

The soundtrack for StarCraft II was composed by Derek Duke, Glenn Stafford, Neal Acree, and Russell Brower. Brower, Blizzard's Director of Audio, noted that gameplay music is designed to be unobtrusive, while cinematic interludes feature more distinctive music, and that certain themes become associated with specific characters, a technique borrowed from composers like John Williams and Richard Wagner. The Wings of Liberty soundtrack spans about four hours and was recorded by 78 members of the San Francisco Symphony and Opera at the Skywalker stage at Lucasfilm Ranch, conducted by Eímear Noone, with a 32-voice choir in Seattle.

Both sessions were mixed by John Kurlander, who worked on The Lord of the Rings and Abbey Road. Terran country and blues pieces were recorded at Dreamland studio in Woodstock, New York, by members of Peter Gabriel's band, including Tony Levin and Jerry Marotta. The orchestral music for Heart of the Swarm was similarly recorded in Marin County with 80 performers from the Skywalker Symphony Orchestra, again with Kurlander and Noone.

Multiplayer game modes

StarCraft II features several multiplayer modes, the most common being versus modes and co-op mode. Versus mode supports 1v1, 2v2, 3v3, and 4v4 matches, with 1v1 being the basis for esports competition. Players earn experience points and achievements that do not affect future gameplay, and a matchmaking system based on wins and losses organizes players into a ladder with leagues from bronze to grandmaster. Maps change as team size grows, and multiplayer tournaments are possible in each team size.

Co-op mode pairs two players against a powerful AI, each controlling unique hero commanders inspired by campaign characters. Players earn XP to level up commanders and unlock upgrades and abilities that change future runs. Mutations are special gameplay modifiers that increase challenge with tougher enemies and unpredictable effects. There are 18 commanders evenly split across the three races, each with distinct units and tactics, drawn from the game's 46 story heroes, though only selected characters are fully playable.

Professional competition

StarCraft II has been played professionally worldwide, with the highest level historically centered in South Korea, similar to its predecessor. Tournaments such as the Global StarCraft II League (GSL) have been hosted in Korea and elsewhere. The game was widely considered the largest esport in the world during its early years and has been credited with bringing esports to the rest of the world. In 2012, Blizzard started the StarCraft II World Championship Series (WCS) as the primary sanctioned tournament circuit. Since 2013, Korean leagues like GSL and non-Korean events such as Intel Extreme Masters and Dreamhack have been included in the WCS system. Since 2020, Blizzard entered a three-year partnership with ESL and DreamHack to change the WCS format.