These days, developers tend to hype up their games long before their games are actually released, which usually leads to disappointed fans. They make too many promises, and end up breaking most of them. Blizzard seems to be the complete opposite of most developers out their right now. They probably do the most thorough game testing of all developers right now, yet their games still have amazing graphics and gameplay. Of course Warcraft 3 is no different.

If you've ever played Starcraft, the look and feel of Warcraft 3 should feel familiar. The developers seemed to take the basic ideas of Starcraft, and expand on them with Warcraft 3. For example, there is now 'time'. At night it gets dark and certain units are able to hide, and not be seen by enemy units. During the day it is sunny and every unit can be seen. To prove how few bugs Warcraft 3 shipped with, I only had one problem. I was using a high resolution and after playing for a while, Warcraft 3 would freeze. I ended up fixing it by updating my video card drivers. Out of all the games out right now, it has probably got the least amount of bugs.

The different types of units are also similar to Starcraft. Each race has a different method for mining gold and wood, and each has a different hierarchy of units. Like Starcraft, you must build new buildings and upgrade old buildings to be able to train advanced units. In Starcraft though, in order to attain a 'powerful' army you would need to build a massive army, since each unit alone was very weak. In Warcraft 3 on the other hand, armies are much smaller. Instead of concentrating on building a larger army, you can upgrade your units and research their abilities.

New to Warcraft 3, are heroes. They are similar to RPG characters, in that they can gain experience and special abilities throughout the game. Each race can train 3 of them, and at the beginning of the game the player can get one for free. Throughout the rest of the game the player can train the other 2, or if any of them die they can be trained again. Each hero does much more damage, and has more hit points than a normal unit. The more units a hero kills, the more experience that hero gains. With more experience, comes more hit points and more strength.

"Creeps" are also new to Warcraft 3. A creep is a group of neutral units which protect a gold mine, shop, and sometimes they don't protect anything at all. They are good for getting your hero more experience, since they are generally easy to kill. By killing creeps you also gain gold.

If you're a fan of Starcraft, then you'll love Warcraft 3. The game uses the basic ideas behind Starcraft and expands on them. With it's new 3d engine, Warcraft 3's graphics are as beautiful as it's gameplay. The capabilites the map editor presents to map makers will allow anyone to make a great map. With that said, in my opinion Warcraft 3 will be a favorite among RTS game fans for years.

- ragear