With that out of the way, I absolutely love this game.
Story
I know that most people are upset over the episodic releases. I was upset as well until I played the game. There are a lot of missions, and the storyline is fantastic. I found no plot holes ready to destroy the immersion and only a single part of the storyline was predictable(for me anyways). I will not give away the plotline. I will say that if this were a book and not a video game, I would not be disappointed. It does leave you with more questions than answers. I believe that is due to the way they are intended to release the next games and not due to any ignorance or laziness on the part of the developers and writers. Overall, the story is fantastic.
Competitive Multiplayer
The ladder system is kind of confusing at first. I am currently ranked 25th in a bronze 1v1 ladder in a seemingly randomly named group of 100. I have won 7 matches and lost 8. I have only came across one person that completely dominated me. I take that little bit of experience to mean that the match making is at least partially decent. As I said before, I am horrible. After my first 5 placement matches(which help the game decide what ladder to place you in) I was placed with other horrible people.
As far as balance goes, it seems like they have changed up the starting out zerg strategy enough that zergling rushes do not work against experienced players as well as they used to. I still managed to win 2 matches with it, but both opponents confessed it was the first time they had played an RTS. I did find that the terrans have a pretty decent advantage vs zerg early on. I have ready quite a few strategies trying to see a way around it and it pretty much requires the zerg player to be a bit more crafty than in SC1. I can have a supply depot and a barracks up before a zerg player is able to spawn zerglings. That pretty much cancels out the zerg ability to win an early game once you realize it is possible. Protoss dominate end game, as per SC1. I do not play with them as much as I would like because they require patience and micromanaging in supplies that I do not yet possess.
Overall, the game is pretty balanced. Blizzard's history in updating games for a decade after release leads me to believe they will keep adjusting until they get it perfect.
Custom Games
This is where Starcraft 2 sort of fumbles. Instead of me searching through a list of custom games, I am given a list of maps, sorted by type. This would be fine if I already knew what I wanted, but it kind of ruins the ability to find different games you did not know existed. It took me a while to get used to it.
Other than the list sorting, the custom games are similar to SC1. You have a bunch of variations of tower defense. A bunch of "income" games. A few RPGs. Which is AWESOME. I love having all these variations. I love that the game is barely out and there are already all these variations and different game types. It is very satisfying to be playing Red Circle TD and figure out a new strategy that is more efficient. Super Tank Defense is great as well.
Graphics
I play using a G72x. It is not a powerhouse, it is a laptop. It is a very decent gaming rig, but not nearly as powerful as a relatively new desktop.
I am able to run the game at medium settings at 1440x990 resolution with no slowdown at all. The game is beautiful. Zooming in on units does not make them look blocky. There is no noticeable tearing. The cut scenes are spectacular, if a little different than what was in the last game. My only concern with the graphics is that there is currently a bug that will force your GPU to run at max load and can potentially burn it up. Most video cards should have enough ventilation and cooling that this is not a problem. I am not so sure about my laptop. This is also one of those bugs that should not have made it into the retail game. The above link provides a fix for this until Blizzard patches to fix it.
Overall
I find myself wanting to find a big fault so that I can differentiate myself from all the other blogs and reviewers. I am by no means a fanboy of blizzard games. I cannot find a single reason why this game should not be part of every gamers library. It will play on lower end systems, the match making actually works pretty well. The different game types mean infinite replayability. It is a great game and should not be shunned due to Blizzard's decision to release the campaigns in episode form.
