Starcraft II, in a less weird moment
Real-time strategy sequel Starcraft II was a massive hit last summer, but its stellar out-of-the-box gameplay experience apparently wasn't quite good enough for creator Blizzard.
So instead they made it into a cooking game, a match-three puzzle, and a zombie survival-horror actionfest. Yes, really.
Bizarre though they may sound, the newly released trio of "mods" are officially sanctioned, developed by Blizzard themselves, and available for owners of the game to download and play for free.
"Aiur Chef" tops the menu: based on the hit TV show of nearly the same name,
it sees players competing to grab ingredients, then escaping to the
relative safety of their kitchen to combine them. The winner is awarded
the enviable rank of "Executor Chef," and hailed as the culinary guru of
the entire Koprulu sector, it says here.
Stablemate StarJeweled will be familiar to puzzle game fans, but in this
head-to-head twist on Popcap's well-trodden match-three format, as you
match gems you earn energy to spend on summoning Starcraft units. And
Left 2 Die (which takes its name from popular Xbox 360 and PC hit Left 4
Dead) is a twist on the game's "Onslaught" mission, forcing players to
cooperate to survive wave after wave of infected Terrans -- that'd be
zombies, to you and me.
Each is available to players through the custom games window in Starcraft's
Multiplayer tab, although blogger Tom Chick recommends typing the mod's
name into the game's search box instead.
