StarCraft: Frontline Vol. 1: Blizzard Legends

Starcraft: Frontline #1

by Richard A. Knaak, Naohiro Washio (Illustrator), Josh Elder

The brutal, dark and fascinating world of Starcraft comes alive in this collection of never-before-seen thrilling adventures.

Why We Fight / Josh Elder & Ramanda Kamarga
In this profoundly moving introduction to the Starcraft universe, the three species in Starcraft are examined--and what drives their war for survival will shock and awe.

Thundergod / Richard A. Knaak & Naohiro Washio
In a story by Richard Knaak, a Thor driver's ego leads him and two partners to try to pull of a heist in the middle of a war zone.

Weapon of War / Paul Benjamin, Dave Shramek, & Hector Sevilla
A psionic six-year-old boy is at the center of a conflict between a Terran mining colony and the Zerg.

Heavy Armor / Simon Furman & Jesse Elliott
A Viking pilot must battle his mentor--for the lives of an entire colony.

Genres: Manga, Comics, Science Fiction, Graphic Novels, Video Games

192 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2008

About the author

Richard A. Knaak is the bestselling author of Dragonlance novels, the Dragonrealm and Black City Saint series (his own creations), six novels for Blizzard Entertainment's Diablo series, and six works in the Warcraft universe. He has also written several non-series fantasy books.

Reviews

[Gianfranco Mancini · Rating 3 out of 5]

Why We Fight: 5 stars.
Thundergod: 3 stars.
Weapon of War: 4,5 stars.
Heavy Armor, Part 1: 2 stars.

A mixed bag and not liked very much the manga style art, shifting from good to awful sometimes, but two stories were grimdark gems.

[Lee · Rating 2 out of 5]

I have now given this style of comic book two goes and both of them in the StarCraft theme. I have to say that I am not overly impressed. A couple of the writers/artists are ok, the others I just can't get into their stories at all. I think the only reason why I am giving it two stars is that I am interested in StarCraft and two of the stories resembled something that could pass as StarCraft driven.
I won't be carrying on with these.
I am struggling to find good graphic novels in my local library, they have hundreds, but all are manga and I have no idea where to start on those. I opened a couple and wondered if the librarians would consider me a bit of a perv checking them out, as they were some what...well typical manga.

[Vivone Os · Rating 3 out of 5]

Bookoplathon – Manga

S obzirom da ne posjedujem nijednu mangu, od prijateljice sam posudila prvi nastavak StarCrafta. Znam da se radi o SFu, a i robot na naslovnici me je privukao.
Svezak se sastoji od 4 različite priče iz svijeta StarCrafta. Povezane su samo tim nekim globalnim činjenicama da ljudi vode galaktičke ratove s vanzemaljskom rasom po imenu Zerg (naravno, puno je kompliciranije, ali igricu nisam igrala pa ne mogu reći ništa više o priči). Svaka priča je posebna, prate različite likove i radnja se odvija na različitim planetima. To mi se zapravo i nije svidjelo. Nisam mogla ništa s ničim povezati, nijedan lik mi se nije stigao svidjeti, već je priča bila gotova. Manga je malog formata, manjeg od A5, ilustracije i slova su mi bili premali. I još crno-bijeli. I to mi je smetalo da se ufuram u radnju. Ali ipak me vuče da čitam dalje pa ću prvom prilikom uzeti drugi svezak. Možda u njemu dobijem nešto više objašnjenja.

[Federico DN · Rating 2 out of 5]

Average at best.

A comic based on “Starcraft”.

The game is awesome and one of the best RTS I’ve ever played. This comic is average at best, and pretty forgettable. Don’t bother.

-----------------------------------------------
PERSONAL NOTE :
[2008] [192p] [Comic] [Not Recommendable]
-----------------------------------------------

★★☆☆☆ StarCraft: Frontline, Volume 1
★★☆☆☆ StarCraft: Frontline, Volume 2
★★☆☆☆ StarCraft: Frontline, Volume 3
★★☆☆☆ StarCraft: Frontline, Volume 4

-----------------------------------------------

Regular cuando mucho.

Un comic basado en “Starcraft”.

El juego es espectacular y uno de los mejores RTS que jugué jamás. Este comic es regular cuando mucho, y muy olvidable. No te molestes.

-----------------------------------------------
NOTA PERSONAL :
[2008] [192p] [Comic] [No Recomendable]
-----------------------------------------------

[David Matteri · Rating 3 out of 5]

A series of short comics set in the Star Craft universe, this collection is a quick and fun read for those who are already familiar with the game and its expansive lore and those who are not. Some of the artwork and plot is hard to follow at times, but there is still plenty of action and suspense to read on.

[William · Rating 4 out of 5]

Because Frontline is an anthology, I will break down the review into its individual stories. But as a whole I give it a 4/5 for art alone. I really liked the illustrations in this first volume and could honestly just flip through this book looking at the art. There’s only a few stylistic choices I don’t like in regards to some of it but thats totally subjective and more on that in the individual reviews.

Why We Fight - Awesome. Loved it. Depicts the 3 different perspectives of each factions basic unit - a Terran marine, a zergling, and a Protoss templar. Very affective use of panel layout to tell the three different perspectives of each race. Not a big fan of manga or anime but I really liked the art here and the line work was clean. Pacing is perfect, the whole thing crescendos into a brutal convergence of the 3 opposing characters’ paths. 5/5

Thundergod - First off the art in this one is rad. I loved the line work and details in the drawing. The story was not so interesting to me sadly. It follows the ace pilot of a Terran Thor who is aptly nicknamed ‘Thundergod’. Thundergod has an ego to match the title and decides to go treasure hunting with some stooges in the somehow intact Jacob’s Installation ruins. Pretty underwhelming story for a Thor. I’m giving this a 4/5 but thats really because I liked the illustration.

Weapon of War - This is a tough one but you know what thinking about it occupied a good chunk of time in my brain so that has to account for something. I’m torn about the illustrations here. I love the dark tones, love em. Give me those Caravaggio shades all day. I can absolutely respect the artist for being very skilled and talented. But man I do not like manga or anime. Like look, I will say objectively the artist is great. He knows what he wants and he executes it in a style that I feel is unique. There are some really awesome panels in this comic and the dark, gritty tones are absolutely perfect in a way that is reminiscent of concept art for the game or 3rd edition warhammer 40k. For me, the anime eyes, kitten faces, and the hyperbolic facial expressions and gestures just ruin that whole aesthetic. There’s just no gestalt there. Now the actual story is cool. However the pacing is just off. It follows a Terran colony in a vespene gas refinery being visited by a senator and his son. Almost immediately its overrun with Zerg. Immediately the colonists turn on the senator and his son because the boy is a telepath. The beginning felt extremely rushed but the middle to ending were paced out fine. Ending was kind of cheesy, or at least the dialogue was. 3/5

Heavy Armor Part 1 - Again, awesome illustrations, Loved the line work and details in the mechs. Kind of manga in style but it honestly reminded me of X-Men Evolution or DC animation like Young Justice. The story felt lackluster but it was a tale as old as time: The protégée must defeat his master who’s gone off the deep end. To be honest I didn’t feel like there was anything too memorable here other than the unique little spin of the mentor character’s mental deterioration being attributed to Stim Packs. 3/5

[Kassar Krennic · Rating 3 out of 5]

This series was...very, very odd. Some of the stories are excellent, as in some of the best Starcraft stories ever written, while others were utterly, unimaginably terrible. For example, the plotline spread across the 4 volumes following Colin Phash was painfully bad, it almost physically hurt me to read them. Terrible art, terrible story and awful characters.
But stories such as Why We Fight, Creep, and Voice in the Darkness are by far some of my favourite pieces of Starcraft literature ever. They're fascinating, with interesting characters, great art and amazing stories.
Other stories are simply OK. They're not good, they're not bad, they're perfectly readable although you'll likely forget them soon after reading. Similarly, the art is, for the most part, passable but don't expect the Frontline manga to be filled with wonderful art from cover to cover. Just like the stories however, some art is amazing while some is also horrible.
What really annoys me about this series, however, is how it was advertised as telling "fringe stories that normally wouldn't be told" by Blizzard and yet, it doesn't really do that. Yes, there are a few stories set in, or involving, the Umojan Protectorate and the Kel-Morian Combine but the story never focuses on those factions and you never really get a good look into their lore, how they operate, what life is like to those living within them etc. Which is a huge shame since the Umojan Protectorate is a faction bursting with potential.
You also don't get any stories focusing on the United Earth Directorate (also known as the UED) or the Tal'darim which are, once again, two factions that are practically overflowing with story potential. The UED is by far my favourite faction in all of Starcraft, followed closely by the Tal'darim so to see neither of these factions even be mentioned at all in Frontlines is a huge shame imo.
So all in all, the Frontline series is difficult to rate. It never reaches its full potential, has its fair share of terrible stories and swings back and forth between fun to read, and agonising to read. And yet, I still recommend any true Starcraft fan read it, because the good stories are really good and you're doing yourself a disservice by not reading them.
So read Frontlines, just be prepared to love it and hate it as you do so.

[Jason Ray Carney · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a pretty fun manga anthology set in the Starcraft universe. The first story, "Why We Fight," adopts three points of view: a protoss warrior, a zerg, and a human space marine, and gives insights into their battlefield motivations (a very appropriate approach for the game where all the races are playable). The second one, "Thundergod," is about goliath pilots who go "off grid" in search for treasure and encounter something they were not expecting. The third--probably the best--is "Weapon of War," about a human father and son who are trapped in a vespene mining facility due to a zerg attack. The son is psychically sensitive, a pre-"ghost." The art style in this one is my favorite--lots of shading with a sketchy charcoal aesthetic. There is a fourth entry that is partial story, titled, "Heavy Armor," about a goliath pilot who becomes addicted to stimpacks. Overall, this is lighthearted but sincere. The art is well done. It helps fill out the Starcraft universe/lore. I started playing the Starcraft II campaigns and this was a fun means of getting into the mental zone of this game.

[Elias Helfer · Rating 2 out of 5]

I expected little going into this, and that's what it delivered. The stories were relatively run-of-the-mill plots, transposed into the StarCraft universe, and tailored to showcase units from the games. I had hoped that some of them might have some new perspectives on the world, but alas.

The art style, meanwhile, was often somewhat muddled and unclear, and I often found myself trying to piece together what was happening. At other times, it seemed to be mostly a cavalcade of shots of military hardware in different poses.

I did have a feeling that this was going to be all fan service, and that turned out to be accurate. I had hoped, though, that there would be a bit more originality, and maybe some more interesting and multifaceted characters. Ah, well.

[Anastasiaadamov · Rating 2 out of 5]

When I got to reading this I did not know that it is a short story collection.
The stories were basic and the visuals were badly adapted to black and white format.
For someone who doesn't know much about the background world, the stories were not informative enough.
The whole thing read more like an action movie summary.
The violence dragged the attention away from the story and characters too much to make them memorable. Everything seemed so generic...

[Adrian Podaru · Rating 5 out of 5]

I always loved and will love StarCraft. And thanks to Mada, I have this in my collection.

[Jesus]

Ñé, apuntaba alto este cómic, pero se ha quedado en algo más bien rutinario. Traiciones y dobles traiciones, naves espaciales, armas descomunales, armaduras, bichos asesinos, alienígenas telépatas... rutina, pura rutina. Tiene el tirón de Starcraft, que sale Jim Raynor... y no demasiado más. Pero debo reconocer que los he leído mucho peores (todavía no se me quita el mal sabor de Prototype, beeeeej). Nada del otro mundo.

[Becky · Rating 2 out of 5]

The only one I liked was the last one, and it was to be continued in volume two. *sigh* I suppose I'll read the next one, just to see if I get on better. Because they're shorts it's really hard to get into. I feel like I just get a handle on the characters and what's going on, and it's over.

[Joseph Young · Rating 1 out of 5]

Only enjoyed this for the StarCraft nostalgia. If I didn't like StarCraft, this book would be total garbage.

[Tiago · Rating 3 out of 5]

Traz um pouco do clima de starcraft aos quadrinhos, o roteiro é mais ou menos. Não gostei muito dos desenhos.

[Elena · Rating 4 out of 5]

Definitely makes to want the sequel in the hands.

[Chris · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cool manga style StarCraft.

[Ivanhoe · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not bad, is good to immerse again into the Starcraft universe D: