Konami's Generational Gap (Part 1)

"This is a direct declaration of war against Blizzard." An editor from Computer Gaming World said as he organized his recordings. "Warcraft 2's expansion, Dark Portal, was released last month. These two RTS giants are really going at each other."

"Westwood has the upper hand when it comes to pacing." A veteran commentator beside him analyzed, "The units in Red Alert move far too quickly. That shows Westwood is encouraging players to harass frequently and rush early, rather than turtle in their bases and build up high-tier units like in Warcraft 2."

"But Blizzard has made revolutionary changes to its control logic." A reporter from another media outlet turned around and joined the discussion.

He recalled how it had felt playing the latest expansion. "Blizzard implemented the 'Left-Hand Grid Mapping' hotkeys in the Windows 95 version. Players no longer need to move their left hands widely across the keyboard; they only need to remember the grid positions. That greatly lowers the barrier to rapid commands."

"Does Westwood have an answer to that?" the commentator asked.

"Westwood's advantage lies in mouse interaction." The reporter gestured in the air. "They insist on placing the construction panel in the sidebar on the right side of the screen. Players don't need to shift their gaze up and down between the battlefield and the bottom of the screen. And Westwood has always used a left-click-does-it-all logic: left-click to box-select, left-click to move, left-click to attack. For new Windows 95 users who have only just started using computers, the learning curve is extremely low."

"Blizzard divides the work between the left and right mouse buttons: left-click to select, right-click to act," the editor added. "The two companies have taken completely different routes in their underlying interaction logic. Blizzard is trying to raise the ceiling of player