Game Analysis 1
WarCraft 3: Reign of Chaos

I think a game can be called a hit and a classic when it is still getting people to give up $40 for the two precious discs 6 years after its release. This past week my roommate and I both went and purchased the last two copies that Gamestop had on hand, which gives credit to its continuing sales. I choose to write this analysis on WarCraft 3 because I have been immersed in it the last couple of days and it was released just two years after the last title Rehak discussed because of that I think it will be particularly applicable to his conclusions.
WarCraft 3 was the first fully 3D strategy game that I know of. Using the page up and page down keys combined with the scroll wheel on your mouse a gamer can zoom in and out of the map and change the angle of viewing the map. Though I remember this being a big selling point it has little affect on the gameplay. The game is the third installment of a world rich in history. The storyline pits humans, orcs, elves, and undead to a battle to the death(Yes, even the undead die.) Each race has its own unique abilities, units, and structures. Most importantly each race has 3 heroes which are summoned/created to fight. I will explain any other pertinent aspects to this paper as I go along.
“Whereas first-person shooters remain the clearest example,”(WP, 104) of the critical relationship between avatar and human player it is by no means the only example. WarCraft has this critical aspect because of the heroes that you summon to fight. Looking down on your buildings and units you select your hero and upgrade his 4 special abilities. This hero builds his strength, armor, attack damage, manna, hit points, manna regeneration, hit point regeneration, and agility. Also the hero collects items that can be used in battle to heal himself, summon units to fight, upgrade an aspect of the hero(previously mentioned), or teleport himself and units places. All of this combines to give make the relationship between gamer and hero complex and personal. “The simulated experience of death and resurrection—is a key function of the avatar,”(WP, 114) and the hero fits into this mold because in a single game you can re-summon your hero each time he dies. When he returns he has everything that he died with, in other words he doesn’t have to start from Level 1 again and collect items all over again. The Heroes life of death and resurrection is different than the other units you train in the game. While these units have a single life, which once they die can not be resurrected, an identical unit can be made to replace it. You rarely win an entire map with a single army but must create several of them through out the duration of the game each time the army being led by your resurrected Hero.
The Hero is critical to winning a game and I see it as the avatar representing the human because when you engage the enemy you quickly forget about your troops(they attack on their own) and focus on your avatars powers and how he can help the troops and turn the tide of battle. While the connection is different than the connection imbued in a FPS because of the lack of direct connection with environments it is nonetheless important. For example in a FPS you have to use the jump key to get on a ledge in WarCraft 3 there is no direct contact besides walking with the environment. I see this as more of an aspect of strategy games than a loss to the avatar gamer experience, though. Each time you click on your Hero he has about twenty responses that he uses to acknowledge that you clicked on him. His/her voice is unique and the sayings he relays are unique to his race and him personally. This drew me closer to my character because it gives him character in a way an FPS doesn’t. In the end I find WarCraft 3 just as immersive as Halo(2001) because of the 3D aspect of the gameplay combined with incredible variation and balance in the battles.