20 years of Starcraft

[sandwich_bird]

Was it this one?

That's the one I was thinking of but there's nothing in there that supports what I said. Either I remember it wrong or I mixed things up and it was actually a different article.

Kerrigan is an enraged killer when "free" in BW because she was made to be a killer and abused her whole life - it's as simple as that. She's just doing all she's ever known to do but now with (dark) honesty - without delusions, denial or restrictions.

That is probably true but the game exposes this very poorly. I can see how people had a hard time understanding Kerrigan's personality and why someone would call it inconsistent. I'd be the first to question it. That's honestly one of SC1 main flaw imo; you have to dig into the extra material to understand a lot of what is going on and draw your own conclusions. Things don't have to be crystal clear but if the gameplay involves heavy story telling sequences then the in-game story should at the very least be self-sufficient.

[Nissa]

I dunno, to me Kerrigan was always crystal clear. She was abused as a human, so as a Zerg she's trying to do her best to punish anyone who hurt her in the past, as well as become as untouchable as possible.

[ragnarok]

I dunno, to me Kerrigan was always crystal clear. She was abused as a human, so as a Zerg she's trying to do her best to punish anyone who hurt her in the past, as well as become as untouchable as possible.

NOBODY is considered untouchable. Prior to any info given to us in HotS, by the end of WoL she could have said (though most wouldn't be convinced) it was merely the zerg messing with her head. I didn't like the whole memory loss in HotS, but I had at least expected someone to tell her in HotS that the memory loss does NOT absolve her.

[sandwich_bird]

I dunno, to me Kerrigan was always crystal clear. She was abused as a human, so as a Zerg she's trying to do her best to punish anyone who hurt her in the past, as well as become as untouchable as possible.

As far as I remember, there's like one line about the abuse in the entirety of the game. It's when Raynor tries to talk her out of going after the protoss in EP1. You don't really know much more than the confeds have been bad on her and Mengsk rescued her. If you base yourself only on that, it's not that obvious that she's actually a psychopath.

[ragnarok]

As far as I remember, there's like one line about the abuse in the entirety of the game. It's when Raynor tries to talk her out of going after the protoss in EP1. You don't really know much more than the confeds have been bad on her and Mengsk rescued her. If you base yourself only on that, it's not that obvious that she's actually a psychopath.

It was somewhat explained what the Confederacy did to her in the Uprising book, sandwich bird. Did you ever read it?

[Gradius]

It creates subsidiary personalities capable of growth and change and sibling rivalry, yes, but all of them are fanatically loyal to the zerg cause (eat everything, become perfect). The Overmind serves the role of a conscience and loving father figure to them, but otherwise they seem to act with the illusion of free will.

Then that's not consistent with your impression. If you think the Overmind is the "personification of the instincts and drives of all zerg" and doesn't actually control anything, then the swarm wouldn't act in unity and Zasz wouldn't have shut up and immediately changed his mind when the Overmind told him to. The Overmind tells the distinct personalities in the swarm where to go, and what to do, just like he did with Kerrigan. The fanon that you have in mind on the other hand is nice, but isn't actually StarCraft.

[Turalyon]

That is probably true but the game exposes this very poorly. I can see how people had a hard time understanding Kerrigan's personality and why someone would call it inconsistent. I'd be the first to question it. That's honestly one of SC1 main flaw imo; you have to dig into the extra material to understand a lot of what is going on and draw your own conclusions. Things don't have to be crystal clear but if the gameplay involves heavy story telling sequences then the in-game story should at the very least be self-sufficient.

Part of the "inconsistency" is due somewhat to the complication of her having been infested. One can explain away the different personality when we see her as the Queen of Blades in the Overmind campaign as her being warped by the process, with it still affecting her even with the Overmind being dead in BW. I dislike this as the "real" reason though since it overtly suggests convenience/Doylist artifice/plot device, much in the way how the artifact makes her capable of being good again in Sc2. I also think that the character being female also makes one lean favourably to thinking that the character is nice at its core, because you know, sexism and all. It's like, if it was a nice guy going all evil, no problems there, but if it's a nice girl going all evil, it's like "oh no, no, no, that's impossible!!".

You don't really have to dig that far or infer that much really. All you need is the description of Kerrigan in the manual, know that she's still working as an assassin of her own free choice (I mean really, are we supposed to believe that a such a nice, moral, good girl that human Kerrigan is supposedly depicted as would choose to be an assassin after having being rescued from being a forced assassin in the first place?), Raynor's mention of past abuses and that she gets betrayed by the one person she put her absolute faith in beyond all others.

It's way more interesting if you think of Kerrigan's personality being as the result of having developed and being affected by the events that she's gone through. If the story had it that she managed to escape her predicament on Tarsonis and did not get infested, would one expect her to still be the same person as she was depicted earlier in Rebel Yell after such a betrayal? I would think not - she'd be full of rage at the injustice that was put upon her... which, incidentally is just like it was depicted in controlled form in Sc1's Overmind campaign and then, in uncontrolled form in BW.

As far as I remember, there's like one line about the abuse in the entirety of the game. It's when Raynor tries to talk her out of going after the protoss in EP1. You don't really know much more than the confeds have been bad on her and Mengsk rescued her. If you base yourself only on that, it's not that obvious that she's actually a psychopath.

It wasn't immediately obvious that Walter White was actually a psychopath either.

All you need is but one bad day... For Kerrigan, it was being abandoned on Tarsonis by the person she had trusted most.

[sandwich_bird]

It was somewhat explained what the Confederacy did to her in the Uprising book, sandwich bird. Did you ever read it?

My argument was that it's hard to understand Kerrigan by just playing the game and not reading any book.

. I also think that the character being female also makes one lean favourably to thinking that the character is nice at its core, because you know, sexism and all.

I'm not sure about that. Internal bias may play a role in this case but the real problem is that she is never displayed as being demented in EP1. If anything, she sounds like just a cherry person who's trying to do what's "right".

know that she's still working as an assassin of her own free choice

Yes she's a rebel assassin but it's not portrayed as being evil in the situation. In this situation, saying she's probably evil because she's an assassin is like saying Kirby is a genocidal monster devouring anything in his way without mercy because he eats his enemies. Technically it's true that he just eat the entire wild life of anywhere he goes but it's not portrayed as being bad in the context. If Kirby starts taunting his enemies before eating them and do other psychopathic stuff along those lines and plan to conquer the universe, would you say it makes sense? Technically speaking, yeah there's a precedent to it. He's technically always been a devouring monster but honestly, that's a strange jump from the child-like happy pink thingy to the psycho. Obviously that's a bit unfair as an analogy because in Kirby, the intentions of the designers are much clearer. But, I'd argue that Kerrigan isn't meant to be portrayed as anything other than a hero sidekick in EP1. At least, that's how I experienced it before knowing anything else about the EU. If you read about Metzen's first intention too, it makes sense. If Kerrigan is supposed to be the equivalent of Tanya in RA and she's there for the player to experience a loss, there's no reason why she'd be anything other than a "good" sidekick.

By solely playing the game, you have to assume that the infestation just messed her up real good and that's why she's evil in BW. As you say, it's not the most interesting take.

It wasn't immediately obvious that Walter White was actually a psychopath either.

All you need is but one bad day... For Kerrigan, it was being abandoned on Tarsonis by the person she had trusted most.

In breaking bad though, you clearly eventually understand the character's motivation and how he became that way. You never get that sense by only playing SC1/BW

I still don't get why she's so butt hurt about Tarsonis to be honest. It's even worse when you see the SC2 cinematic. She was clearly screwed no matter what. Would have been stupid to risk forces down there to rescue her. If Raynor wanted it so bad, why didn't he take a dropship and try saving her?

[ragnarok]

By solely playing the game, you have to assume that the infestation just messed her up real good and that's why she's evil in BW. As you say, it's not the most interesting take.

In some ways I feel this is a reason why it was necessary to explain all this via books, to show the infestation alone is an oversimplification. That being said I still felt in the DT Saga books they tried to explain why in the years after BW Raynor still made her feel regret. They should have explained if there were limits to the infestation or something

[Mislagnissa]

Then that's not consistent with your impression. If you think the Overmind is the "personification of the instincts and drives of all zerg" and doesn't actually control anything, then the swarm wouldn't act in unity and Zasz wouldn't have shut up and immediately changed his mind when the Overmind told him to. The Overmind tells the distinct personalities in the swarm where to go, and what to do, just like he did with Kerrigan. The fanon that you have in mind on the other hand is nice, but isn't actually StarCraft.

Before I address this I need to explain some important background on the lore. Even before the blatant retcons and plot holes introduced by BW and SC2, the lore was not entirely consistent with itself. The manual has a few inconsistencies with itself and with the script of the game, suggesting that the text of the manual and the script of the game underwent partial rewrites and the leftovers from previous drafts were not caught by proofreading. The nature of the zerg hive mind, which is extremely important, is one of the plot points that is not explained consistently at every mention.

In the manual, the zerg backstory states that the Overmind was created by structuring/unifying/amalgamating "the collective sentience of the Zerg" and the Overmind's bio states its species is "bodiless entity." In the game the Overmind states that all zerg personalities are contained within itself. However: in the bio of Tiamat brood and in the game, it is implied/shown to have a distinct body (or at least a distinct brain). In the game it states it requires a ritual to be "made manifest." What is not clear is whether the Overmind always had a body, discarded that body at some point only to create a new one later, or created a distinct body for the first time on Aiur. This is kind of important for determining the nature of hive mind: whether the Overmind (and by extension the cerebrates) is intrinsic to the zerg or not.

If it is not intrinsic, killing it will leave the zerg feral forever (until someone with a hive mind emulator steps in). If it is intrinsic, then even feral colonies will eventually spawn a new Overmind or cerebrate to replace the previous one. In seeming support of the latter possibility: SC2 states that the Overmind had its own DNA, which is present in the genetic libraries of the larvae.

The nature of zerg reincarnation is not clear either. When a cerebrate is permanently killed, the Overmind goes silent but the cerebrates do not go temporarily feral themselves; we never learn why this is or what the mental/psychic architecture/topology is like. When a cerebrate is killed temporarily: does it have a metaphysical soul that is stick in limbo until a new body is available (which has massive implications for the rest of the lore, since other creatures could conceivably have souls), or it it a purely materialistic phenomenon in which the new brain bug downloads a backup copy of its personality from the nearest hive cluster? The atrocious novel Queen of Blades explicitly depicts the former (and by virtue of the transitive property SC2 implies that the Overmind and cerebrates' souls are still floating somewhere in the purple goo "Void"), whereas Kerry's resurrection in SC2 suggests the latter according to an interview (I don't have the link on hand but can search on request). In the case of the later, how does the dark templar deus ex machina interdict that?

The manual states that zerg are genetically hardwired to listen and obey the orders of their superiors. However, in the game the Overmind does not treat the zerg as mere slaves. When Zasz gets upset by Kerry, the Overmind takes the time to assuage his concerns. Whenever it talks to or about the zerg, the Overmind always treats them affectionately.

It is not clear why the cerebrates need the Overmind (depending on the source), but the same is not true for the rest of the zerg. The entire deal with Kerry's independence, demigodess powers (the SC2 Q&A literally says that), and the brood mother takeover never really made much sense in the context of SC1 or SC2. The zerg have numerous plot threads like this that ultimately lead nowhere.

The manual states the zerg explicitly lack free will, but in the game they display no cognitive dissonance in regard to this. They never ever display any sign they are unhappy with following orders, and always display a deliberate loyalty to the zerg cause. They want to do what the Overmind wants them to do, or more specifically what they think the Overmind wants. Case in point, Zasz only ever displays dissent because he suspects Kerry of dissenting herself. His suspicion is largely baseless in the game itself, but the awful Queen of Blades novel depicts her actively trying to usurp him... among other things, like Zasz (and by extension the omniscient Overmind) being stupid enough to let Zeratul walk up and whisper in his ear when he is clearly an assassin! He does prove right that her stubbornness causes them problems, but the same may be levied at Surtur brood! BW proves Zasz completely right about Kerry being the "doom" of the cerebrates, assuming you don't disregard BW as one giant plot hole.

According to the manual, the Overmind does not micromanage the cerebrates but gives them broadly defined directives to fulfill on their own initative. Even in the game, the Overmind only gives very broad goals to the PC whereas it falls to Zasz and Daggoth to give specific instructions or advice to the PC.

The bio of the Surtur brood states that it so vicious it needs to be restrained when not deployed. When deployed, and then as a last resort, it has to be given wide berth because it will cause collateral damage to any other zerg in its path. The Overmind clearly does not have perfect control over the zerg, otherwise this would not be a problem.

Zasz's bio explicitly states that other cerebrates find him unstable and whiny. Daggoth's bio states he is more willful compared to other cerebrates.

So I believe I am correct when I say that the Overmind does not, strictly speaking, "control" the zerg. It gives the zerg purpose and direction, but the swarms act on their own initiative and while incapable of deception or treachery they do not work in constant harmony. It seems to serve as the zerg equivalent of a shoulder angel, albeit one the zerg are biased to follow.

This is probably why UA, in his SC LP thread, mentioned that he believed the cerebrates had the potential camaraderie, rivalry and politics that are not shown the game. The cerebrates were sadly underutilized and underexplored before being unceremoniously killed off in BW.