WarCraft III: Reign of Chaos

The Good
First off, it is graphically awsome. If you have the power to run at full details, it's rather stunning. Sadly, you need a beast to be able to run at full details, and not lag in games, especially 4v4.

This is a fast game, and I like fast games. You'll need to make quick decisions to be able to get anywhere levelwise.

This brings up the micromanagement. This game requires a very large amount of micro. If you aren't able to manage every unit in a battle, you're going to lose games. Being able to spot which unit is getting hurt, and moving it away; being able to cast hero spells as soon as they are available; never having a break in production (all at the same time) is crucial to winning. Luckily, the population limit is so low it's a bit easier. The population limit is 90, but it's essentially 70, because once you go over 70 you start paying 7 gold as "upkeep" for every 10 gold you mine. Once over 40, you pay 4 gold for every 10 mined. And, of course, almost nothing takes only one population point. The armies are quite small compared to previous RTS games.

The heroes are a nice RPG twist to the RTS genre. Each race (Night Elves, Undead, Orcs, and Humans) have three heroes from which to choose. Each has strengths and weaknesses. The hero you choose at the start can, and should, greatly effect your tactics in the game. For example, if you are Humans and playing vs an Undead, you would strongly consider the Paladin hero as one of your early choices, as he has a spell that not only heals your units, but harms Undead units. If you, as an Orc, decide to go for the Tauren hero, you will find that a defensive style is probably the way to go. Etc, etc.

The creeps (units controlled by the AI) are another interesting injection into this game. Special places on each map (a health fountain, fr example) are guarded by creeps, ranging in difficulty from terribly easy to terribly hard. Killing these creeps with a hero nearby allows him to gain experience, and therefore, more skills (just like an RPG, as mentioned). They also drop items which can be used by your heroes.

Lastly, if you just want to go online and play a game, it is simple as can be. Just a couple clicks, and Bnet will match you up with another person, within a certain level. Levels are basically a meter of your skill. More wins and you will go up in levels. Lose, and you could drop in levels. Beating high level people will give you bigger boosts then lower people. It is another RPG concept inserted into Warcraft III.

The Bad
The micromanagement can still get incredibly overwhelming, and if you don't keep up, it will quickly destroy you. Trying to process all the information isn't always easy for us people over 20.

The creeps have lead to several, shall we say, cheap tactics. On certain maps, it is quite easy for an orc player to quickly destroy VERY high level creeps, and have the experience go to their hero, without sacrificing more then a peon. This, of course, leads to a huge advantage within five minutes, and theres almost no way to overcome this.

The fact that you get so few units leaves little margin for error. Lose one little unit by mistake, and it could cost you the battle, and if you're not careful, the entire game. Losing a hero is even more catastrophic, as they can take a while to revive, especially at higher levels.

There is little variety. Each race has a pretty specific thing they do to win, and the only difference is who has the better micro. Sometimes you will be surprised by a different strategy, but not too often. It can get rather dull. I know of several high level players who do the same thing every game, no matter what they are facing, and they tend to win because their micro is insanely good. There's just not much you can do against that.

The Bottom Line
A decent, fun game. RPG elements help make it more then a simple RTS, but little room for error can make it a very frustrating experience.

The Good
I was wary of Blizzard going 3D for Warcraft III - after all, I felt Westwood's Emperor: Battle for Dune was largely hampered by the almost complete lack of personality of its 3D units. However, I was pleasantly surprised to discover that Blizzard has managed to craft a 3D engine that allows its units to shine in the traditional Blizzard way. It manages to straddle the fine border between cartoonish excess and hand-drawn realism, and I applaud the programmers for that. Aside from the graphics, the design of Warcraft III is uniformly excellent. You get four races to play with, and each is involving and offers a spread of unique challenges and intricacies. Furthermore, the story is engaging, and plot has for the first time in RTS history become as important as the action going on in the field. I really was interested in finding out what was going to happen, especially once you get up to the end of the first campaign... Blizzard has also reinvigorated the concept of hero units. In past RTS games, "hero" or unique units usually were part of mission-specific goals, requiring you to protect them at all costs. While these unique units might have sported slightly higher damage rolls or special powers, I usually found myself squirreling them away in the most protected parts of my bases so that they would not die an untimely death. Warcraft III completely changes this mold, now enabling you to place hero units at the forefront of battles where they belong. These hero units (each race gets three to use) are incredibly powerful, and if you do not field one or two on the battlefield, you are usually asking to get tromped. The orcs' Swordmaster, perhaps the coolest hero unit, is capable of spinning in a blade-wielding frenzy, chopping down multiple enemy units in no time.
I also really loved the fact that the game rewards you for exploring the entire map by offering neutral units to defeat in exchange for experience points for your hero. As your hero increases in levels, he or she gains more and more powers. Furthermore, sometimes defeated neutral units drop items that can further bolster the power of your hero.

The Bad
I really, REALLY hate upkeep. In Warcraft III, the size of your army dictates how much gold is deducted from your income due to taxation. Thus, if you're fielding a relatively small army, all the gold your workers collect will flow into your coffers. However, once you build up your army to respectable numbers, you'll find more and more gold vanishes even before it reaches your coffers. Thus, if you launch a major attack against an enemy while burdened by high upkeep, you'd better hope you win - otherwise, the loss of gold due to taxation will render you almost incapable of defending against a counterattack. Upkeep is probably useful in stopping rushes in multiplayer and encouraging more strategic play. Fine and dandy. But what's the point in single player games? Often, you'll be facing three or four separate enemy camps, all bent on wiping you out. With the deck stacked thus against you, why cripple you even further with upkeep? I found this aspect of the game to be the most frustrating, and I hope Blizzard does not make this a recurring feature in future RTS products.

The Bottom Line
Take Warcraft II, stir in some Starcraft, blend with a 3D engine and some innovation and you get Warcraft III. Also, I highly recommend the cool special edition, if you can find out - all the extras are worth the $70 price tag.

The Good
Not to much. The units were well drawn and the animations were excellent. Also the voices were well done and the maps were varied but the good stuff but...

The Bad
The races, though different, all felt the same to me. Every unit felt like it was mirrored from another race with a couple different magic spells that ultimately did the same thing.

On top of that all the units seemed like mobile structures. How can 3 guys with swords take out a heavily fortifed tower when being shot at by 3 other towers at the same time. Base defences are supposed to DEFEND bases. Not act as temporary brakes on an attack.

People tended to do the same thing every game too. It was a sudden rush of a ton of units every game. No matter the map. That's not very much fun because it's just whoever can rush the fastest that wins the game. There are no tactics, just swarming.

What is the point of being able to rotate the camera? You can't do anything with the rotation and it recenters automatically. Plus you are stuck at the same perspective and zoom levels. The game had so much potential but it wastes it at every chance it gets.

The Bottom Line
Meets the quality of the last 3 [Blizzard]Craft games, being a boring and repetitive reincarnation of the same game just this time with fancy looking graphics.