WarCraft: Orcs & Humans

aka: WC1, WarCraft I
Moby ID: 371
DOS Specs
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Description official descriptions

The Kingdom of Azeroth was relatively peaceful and ruled by King Llane. That was until a powerful mage named Medivh commanded forces that opened up a portal in the Swamp of Sorrow, leading to another world. This ushered in the Age of Chaos, as Orcs were summoned to this world and attempted to establish an empire. As the Orcish hordes swarmed from the portal, they met with the Humans of Azeroth and battles ensured. Peaceful co-existence is not an option. Only one race will attain dominance over the land.

Warcraft: Orcs & Humans is the first real-time fantasy strategy game from Blizzard Entertainment Inc. By playing either the Humans or the Orcs in this saga, two separate story lines evolve with 12 scenarios per side telling the tale of the battle for Azeroth. Players must mine gold and chop wood in order to construct buildings and create new units. From swords to sorcery, all the elements of classic fantasy are here to explore: rich forests, dark dungeons and bubbling swamps await the stalwart troops amassed to fight for dominance. Command many unique armies and creatures including Knights, Archers, Clerics, Warlocks, Daemons, Elementals, and Necromancers who are able to raise the dead.

The multiplayer aspects of the game allow 2 players to challenge one another on over 20 custom maps and determine who is the supreme warlord. Head to head play is supported over modem, serial link, and IPX networks, and works cross-platform between the IBM-PC and Macintosh versions.

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Credits (DOS version)

72 People (32 developers, 40 thanks) · View all

Reviews

Critics

Average score: 82% (based on 26 ratings)

Players

Average score: 3.6 out of 5 (based on 129 ratings with 6 reviews)

The first installment in this series is clearly shadowed by the second.

The Good
Well, it's a decent game but nothing more. It was refreshing change from Dune II (simply because no other adequate RTS was released during that time) and the music/sound effects are OK.

The Bad
The game is slow - either badly programmed or simply meant to be slow. The enemy is stupid and the entire experience is lacking.

The Bottom Line
You should probably play this just to get an idea how much better the second game is.

DOS · by Tomer Gabel (4539) · 1999

You'll like Warcraft II more if you play this first.

The Good
Seeing as it is the original in the chain of X-Craft like games, it is generally good. Creative theme and original battle system.

The Bad
It was a bit slow and predictable. The levels got repetitive after a while.

The Bottom Line
If you have never played Warcraft, I highly suggest it. You manage units on a battlefield in order to accomplish a mission given to you at the beginning of each level. You train and upgrade your units at the expense of your available natural resources (Wood, gold and food) and build buildings with different fuctions in the same manner.

DOS · by Sam Tinianow (113) · 2000

Play for the story

The Good
The game is great for the story. The story is told through the game is very entertaining and has enough in it to keep it interesting. The original game of course can not be compared to the new ones of today (2008), but it is great in terms of gameplay and units and overall creativity shown in it. Upgrades that are reflected in the game in units is a very nice touch for an early game such as this. The overall music and the sounds are also nicely done. Commenting on graphics is useless as one could not compare, however as I said the sound part of the game could be comparable to the modern games. The game manual is also a well done piece of work. It tells the interesting story from both sides and has good descriptions of the units and buildings. Too bad the upgrades for the units are not described here. The intro and end animation sequences are also interesting in terms of design. However, I can not comment on graphics. Also the amount of units and buildings and resource development for the game of such age is worth admiration and the struggle it take to play the game through despite the modern RTS that are available.

The Bad
There are of course the negative parts to any game. The first is cumbersome user interface that is present in the game. The movement of units overall is hard and the game proceeds to slow. This of course could be the observations of the person who is used to modern RTS games. Another problem is computer AI. It does throw an interesting move on you once a in a while but it ends at that. After a while it is possible to counteract the computer and I found that there a one strategy that works for all maps (except where it is limited force) in both campaigns . This is of course a let down of the game. However, back than nobody could boast about a really smart AI. For this reason a lot of complaints might not be applicable to the game since they come from a person used to modern RTS.

The Bottom Line
If you are a WarCraft fan and want to play the whole story you should play both campaigns of this game. If you are able to play this game continuously after that in skirmish mode and etc. Well you are a hero and I will shake your hand. Myself, I was never able to bring myself to replay the game, yet due to the interface issue, slowness and dull AI. If you are however coming to see what WarCraft is all about well then I would suggest starting with the second one or even the third one and working the way back.

DOS · by Tatar_Khan (676) · 2008

[ View all 6 player reviews ]

Discussion

Subject By Date
map generator? Rola (8485) Sep 4, 2013
Title Spelling PCGamer77 (3158) Apr 10, 2012
More Macintosh madness Dae (7182) May 29, 2008
Demo's Third Level? Robert Classified (2) May 31, 2007

Trivia

Hybrid PC/MAC Version

When the game was ported to the Macintosh, it was released on a so-called "Hybrid Disc". A Hybrid Disc can be read by both a PC and a Mac, containing those respective computer's CD-ROM file systems. This disc contains audio tracks with the game's music, and can be played on any device which will play CD Audio. The music will only be heard in-game with the Macintosh version. PC-Only discs lack the CD Audio tracks.

Innovations

Warcraft was a game of many "firsts" in the RTS world. It was the first RTS game to support multiplayer capability, and the first to have multiple resource types to harvest.

Novels

In addition to a board game and Sword & Sorcery Studios' 2003 pen-and-paper RPG system, the Warcraft setting has yielded quite a number of novels. Pocket Books have published a handful of distinct titles: Day of the Dragon (2001), by Richard A. Knaak, set between Warcraft II and III * Lord of the Clans (2001), by Christie Golden * The Last Guardian (2001), by Jeff Grubb * Of Blood and Honour (2001), an e-book by Warcraft* developer Chris Metzen.

Two self-contained Warcraft trilogies have also been published. Richard A. Knaak's War of the Ancients trilogy features Azeroth's prehistory being subtly altered by visitors from its present:1. The Well of Eternity (2004) 2. The Demon Soul (2004) 3. The Sundering (2005)

He has also written the Sunwell Trilogy, graphic works in the Korean "manhwa" tradition, illustrated by Jae-Hwan Kim:1. Dragon Hunt (2005) 2. Shadows of Ice (2006) 3. Ghostlands (2007)

References

  • If you repeatedly click on any Orcish unit he will eventually say "zug zug!" A little known fact is that in the 1981 film Cavemen "zug zug" is caveman-speak for sexual intercourse.
  • The red banner visible during orc briefings is the same as banner of Sarlac in the game Blackthorne, also developed by Blizzard. You can see it in this screenshot.

Warhammer

In the beginning stages of development Blizzard did consider using the Warhammer license for Warcraft, and this was even pushed for by Ayman Adham to give the game brand recognition. However, after their terrible experiences with DC Comics during the development of Superman and Justice League games, the rest of the staff decided to instead create an original property.

Information also contributed by Chentzilla, Maw, Pseudo_Intellectual and xxxxxxxxxxx

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Contributors to this Entry

Game added by MajorDad.

Windows added by Plok. PC-98, Macintosh added by Terok Nor.

Additional contributors: Trixter, MAT, Belboz, Andrew Hartnett, Jeanne, Great Hierophant, Chris Jeremic, Patrick Bregger, Lain Crowley, MrFlibble.

Game added November 3, 1999. Last modified March 19, 2024.