SC2 Ongoing Review #3: "Retcons and Reactions"

The following covers the middle third of the game—from about the first “choice”, just past the second choice, and all of the crystal-based campaign (for a total of 19 missions completed).  Spoilers abound.

Well, the game was going pretty piss poorly for a bit there. The arrival of the Protoss triggered a choice in how to proceed, and I jumped at the chance to swear my allegiance to the noble race.  I haven’t heard what happens if you try to protect the Zerg-infected Terran colonists, but I’m doubting they get cured, so it’s not a choice with which I hold any particular concern.  I am curious how choices will play out in the later game, but I wonder if all roads will eventually converge no matter what. 

Anyways, after an insignificant death (“boo-hoo, I almost liked that girl”) we find ourselves finally getting to some useful STORY.  Zeratul shows up, lord knows how, on the Hyperion and gives us a crystal that allows us to have some legitimate fun.  The Protoss missions are great.  Hero-based, simple mechanics, and a true return to the games’ roots.  Meanwhile, on the basic Terran missions things finally begin to heat up.  A race against Kerrigan and a REAL decision made me far more alert about what was going to happen in the near future.  I chose voodoo over nostalgia for an abandoned game (“omg, NOVA!”), and I have to say again that I really am a fan of the well-constructed hero missions.  On both the Terran and Protoss sides of my journey I ended on a satisfying note today.  The liberation of the Odin was a rip-roaring escort mission that finally managed to make Findlay a character worth showing interest towards, and the last stand of the future Protoss was the first mission that challenged me via a mission failure.  All in all, the game was finally becoming more iconic, although lingering issues of “head up own ass” remain.

“Head up ass, how” you ask?  Well!  First, I think that the fact that it took into the second third of the game for anything new to happen (hell, for us to acknowledge damn near ANY of the events of “Brood War”) is a sad statement on the thinning of storyline.  But all of the new story elements are tainted by a need to re-chew old topics.  The disgusting revelation that the Overmind was somehow the good guy, and Kerrigan is to be our savior just smacks of a desire to force a twist.  I simply cannot see how it lines up with any interpretation of the events of what happened previously.  Sure, the idea that Tassadar didn’t die is cool.  Yes, I’m interested to see the Xel’Naga step into the limelight (but if they really look like a cross between races, I’m going to be sorely disappointed in that lazy choice).  I think it says something that we get two pre-rendered cutscenes in this section of the game, and only one provides us with new information, while the other is a “look how pretty we can make the past” moment.  I don’t understand the resistance in moving on when it comes to the plot.  Everything else seems to have abandoned conventions of the previous game, so I’m really at somewhat of a loss here. 

I do find myself interested in how the game is going to turn out, but I can’t help but feel like I’m only headed towards a listless finale where little will actually take place in order to setup the next chapter.  Hopefully there will be an opportunity to play as Zerg, and we’ll see some more familiar faces pop up in the coming missions.  For now I’m less of the notion that the single player is a total flop, but still wishing we’d gotten something more coherent.