Awesome gameplay , great music and an engrossing storyline, make Starcraft one of the best RTS games of all time
Story : Unlike many RTS games before it, Starcraft features a great story, it involves three sides of a conflict, the Terran (Humans), Zerg (insect like aliens), and the Protoss (high tech, intellegent aliens), unlike the simple "each side wants to take over" story, these races have their own unique reasons for fighting. Starcraft also features a cast of characters which are actually pretty interesting, characters like Jim Raynor, Sarah Kerrigen, Tassader, Zeratul and others, help drive the plot forward, sometimes breaking into conversation in the middle of battle, again, these things were quite rare in an RTS game, with the exception of the command and conquer series, characters were usually an afterthought and so was story, but Starcraft uses its story to create an atmosphere that draws you into the game.
Gameplay - while Starcraft wasnt too revolutionary, it did offer some interesting ideas, and did everything superbly. there are 3 sides to choose from , this was unique in itself. what was even more unique was that each side was completly different, with units from one side, often having no real counterparts in other sides. this was very unique in 1998, when most RTS games features armies that were very similar to each other. fighting takes place in various locals, from the ruined planet Char, to mobile space platforms, there are even a number or indoor missions which require more stealth then brute force. added to this was battle net, the free online service provided, in its time this was great, as many games lacked this feature.
Graphics and Sound - Graphics are perhaps, Starcraft's only real flaw, while not bad by any means, they were defenitly somewhat dated even at the time of release, furthermore they run at a somewhat low(even for the time) 640 X 480 resolution. the FMVs on the other hand, are very good. but while the graphics might have not created the atmosphere of the game ,the music certainly did, Starcraft has one of the best soundtracks of any game, the music is dark and helps create the dark, tense, atmosphere Starcraft has.
In conclusion, Starcraft is one game, every gamer should check out, it has a great story that keeps you interested, it has great gameplay that holds up well even today, and music which is epic to say the least. this game can be bought cheaply today and is usually found along with its expansion (Brood War), which is also an amazing game in itself. there is also the N64 version, but that one is very rare, and is considerd by many to be inferior to the PC.