Project Merge is the first installment of the Lost Worlds series, created by RoughRider in 2019. Following Leonix’s indication I share the link to download campaign. Link:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1hufdK7kANJauJakkbzevWh7FngVmMgq9
I’m back with campaign reviews. I share my review of the campaign.
Mission 1 - “Discovery”: This is a map I saw Jayborino playing (the second map too), but that time the map seemed harder to me. I haven’t had much problems playing it. I saved resources from the beginning, knowing that this may be a long mission. In the end, the resources were neither many nor few.
Some minutes after I arrived the first geyser I saw a lot of orange Marines attacking me, but I took good advantage of the high ground.
I explored the left side of the map with a lifted Barracks, but never claimed the resources though, not until the last moments (when I had access through the ramp).
Design is quite different from the other campaigns I played from RoughRider. I like how elaborate the map is.
It took me some time to figure out what to do with the Marine where the Starport is, because I didn’t saw the other Beacon. I guess I completed all the side tasks, except for something related to the Bengalaas (it seems that I missed something there), probably by not getting myself in place in time.
I’m enjoying the story so far. I guess further on not all characters will be voiced, but it is fine nevertheless.
Mission 2 - “The Hunt is On”: I tried multiple times this one. During my second attempt I sent my Barracks to rescue the purple base (before, I had my Dropship built first). Enemy bases were well fortified, so I was careful with my attacks, waiting to gather a force strong enough to match the opponent. I was able to play calmly all the time due to the absence of attacks to the starting base and the purple rescuable base. However, I reloaded a few times after losing Howard Aegis in battle. The hero unit was a good support in combat, along with proxy bunkers.
I attacked the upper left corner first, and that was my first expansion (after rescuing purple, of course). After eliminating that Zerg base I had the Hydralisk and Zergling samples. Then I built a base in the lower left corner, where I found Sasquatch. I expanded in the high ground at the bottom right, bypassing the small brown base. From there, I attacked the brown base going up. To avoid the bunkers, I attacked from the right edge of the map, by that time all the map was explored. I expanded to the left where a small orange Zerg was, brown had that base cleared for me. But when I attacked the main Zerg base I lost a lot of units. I noticed that the Zerg player was building Creep Colonies, so I suspected the AI was Insane. I sent my Wraiths to the main brown base to see if I could complete the mission but didn’t have success. So I reloaded and tried to find the last location of Sasquatch. I found him, and the allied Dark Templars were very helpful to get the main Zerg base. I didn’t attack orange, actually, because I thought I had all the samples: Getting 100 Overlords took me a while, but it was the necessary time to find all the Easter eggs. I maxed supply with Wraiths and sent almost 5 control groups of them to attack brown’s main base. After destroying the yellow Command Center I attacked the main Zerg base. Then I found out that the Drone sample was missing, because I got it there and completed the mission.
A lengthy mission, but fun to play mainly because of the side quests. I think it’s possible to use Computer Players Enabled in the Leaderboards to display the remaining Zerg units simultaneously.
Mission 3 - “Border Patrol”: I explored all the map and defeated both Terran and Zerg, however I didn’t use the M.O.N.S.T.E.R. tank or Nukes. I couldn’t figure out how to unlock the hatch. I should have gotten the air reinforcements earlier in the game, because the Zerg were particularly aggressive. As a matter of fact, when I restarted the mission the Zerg became aggressive sooner (after 16 minutes playing) so I had to protect the base in the middle very well.
Mission 4 - “The Big City”: This mission is very well designed. The landscape of the city invaded by the Zerg was very immersive. I missed a lot of stuff in this map, I was only able to get the Arbiters. It was a bit difficult to protect the base in the center of the map, but I survived long enough to rescue 70 executives LOL. But I like the fact that the orange Zerg control all the map and there are expansions everywhere. It would have been interesting to build bases in distant areas and fight the Zerg back, but due to time constraints I focused on the main objective only.
Mission 5 - “Welcome to the Jungle”: Eliminating the blue Protoss wasn’t difficult. But I had a hard time against the purple Protoss, they were creating lots of Carriers and all my gas was depleted. Because I had 6 Refineries I was able to build some Wraiths (used two control groups) and snipe the Carriers everywhere. I got all the extra stuff in this map except for the Protoss temple in the high ground. I got the right answer for the Protoss Archon so I didn’t see what would have happened if I had gotten the wrong Beacon.
Mission 6 - “For the Record”: This mission was easy thanks to the extra Battlecruisers. I don’t know what damage causes the Nuclear Siege Tank when reaching its target, but I thought that it probably destroyed my mineral expansion near my starting base on the left.
Mission 7 - “Relentless”: When I started this map I explored both sides, finding the yellow Academy, before going straight to where I would find the brown base. This time I didn’t heal Bane Scald, though. During Mission 5 I had him healed once. I defended the island with Bunkers and Missile Turrets but never got attacked there, precisely because of the defense I think.
The Light House was very useful to see from where the Torrasque was approaching. I was surprised by the amount of Defilers used by the AI, I think I counted nine. Suddenly they started to use Plague.
The macro in this mission was intense, albeit not very difficult. I liked the terrain design and how the Terran and Zerg bases combined, with lots of defenses on the way to the installation access. For me, the Zerg Hive in the center was the perfect spot for the Nuclear Tank. So I sent the tank and the enemies triggered the explosion, causing severe damage to the Zerg. Then I saw the red Vultures activating, but it wasn’t a big deal for my forces.
I played for one and a half hours and killed 1774 units and razed 330 buildings.
Mission 8 - “To the Depths”: This Installation map has a really cool concept. I couldn’t find the access code to deactivate the Tower Cannon but I passed through it anyway. When I reached the furnace I only sent Scald through the room. The red Civilian that deactivates the flames died when Scald was already in the next basement, there was no other unit with the Civilian. It’s not a big issue, as there’s dialogue indicating the sequence of events.
I had more than 12 units when I reached the healing Beacon. I got stuck in the puzzle with Batteries and Inhibitors. For some reason, after I gained control of the three SCVs each one of them had a powerup, but there was an Inhibitor (a fourth powerup) left on the floor. I couldn’t catch the Locations. I tried after seeing DK’s playthrough until reaching that section, and solved it. I saw that there wasn’t an extra Inhibitor in DK’s video so I disregarded it.
I moved carefully in the computer room, where the path is tight. I noticed that Spider Mines are called bugs again. As soon as I had Ghosts I sent them cloaked to explore the following basements. One of them got inside the panic room. Again, not a big deal the Marine dialogue without a Marine inside the room. When I got the crystal I had two Goliaths and one Ghost with my SCVs. Bane Scald was scary. Going through the map to escape was intense. The SCV without the crystal stole a white flag LOL. Although it was an accident I simply continued playing through. I lost both SCVs in the acid, and the flag became blue hehe. I completed the map with just one SCV, I lost my last Goliath in the acid leaving my SCV all alone. I’m impressed with the storytelling and narrative in this map.
Mission 9 - “To There and Back”: The mineral and gas in the starting base wasn’t sufficient for a stroke against the red stronghold. So as soon as I saw the expansion in the border with the island I sent an SCV to build a Command Center. I try to expand quickly on missions where there’s limited time, as it gives a lot of advantage in terms of speed. I didn’t worry about the brown base located north of my main. I didn’t attack the Zerg base on the left either, as that would have weakened them while holding off against Scald. Same with the brown Terran. After I boosted my economy I was able to fill 10 Dropships and sent a large group of Battlecruisers to the red base. Bane Scald didn’t show HP but wasn’t invincible either, which it seemed weird because I thought the HP limit was 9999 (not sure if Remastered extended the HP limit or my memory fails). Anyways, Scald never passed through the central brown base, he moved back and forth between the orange and brown bases in the upper half of the map, so at this point I chilled out.
Mission 10 - “The Less You Know, the Better”: I was able to wipe out most of the map with a handful of Siege Tanks and Goliaths using the Negotiator as support, with SCVs to repair them of course. Since I had few resources all the time, the hero Battlecruiser was crucial. I built a Dropship because the perimeter where the Solar Battery was located was huge. I was thinking of recycling the Dropship after attacking the Venlinda’s main base, but the mission was almost done. I sent the Solar Battery though to activate the giant weapon. I missed the side objective with the Cats, but I saw DK getting it done.
Overall the story is very good, with a very well thought dialogue and characters. There’s a noticeable character development for a custom campaign, and they have a very good characterization. The storytelling was very well executed with the map design, and I certainly liked the abundance and variety of side objectives throughout the entire campaign.
The Installation map fitted very well in the story. And since it’s the 8th map of the campaign, it follows Blizzard’s numbering for the Installation missions in the original campaigns.
The final mission of Project Merge reminded me of The Hammer Falls: The layout of the starting base had similarities. I was expecting it to be difficult, but the only difficulty I encountered was the huge number of invisible Wraiths: During a certain moment I was in a hurry when entering the main enemy base, I didn’t build any Science Vessel during all the game and was just using Scanner Sweep.
Kudos to the campaign creator for making such a great campaign. And looking forward to playing the other two when they are finished by the map maker.