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Warcraft II Tides of Darkness Free PC Game Download Full Version

by CHANONG

Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness is a popular fantasy real-time strategy computer game that has been developed by Blizzard Entertainment and published under the banner of Davidson & Associates. The game has been produced by Sam Didier, Michael Morhaime, and Patrick Wyatt. Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness was first released for DOS in 1995 and then in 1996 it was released for macOS.

Table of Contents

What is the game about?

Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness is a real-time strategy game in which players collect different types of resources so that they can build different buildings and units to defeat enemies in combat. As players go ahead in the game they will gain access to more advanced units upon the construction of tech buildings and research. For most parts of the game, the screen will show the part of the territory on which the players are currently operating. The game Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness is now available to play in both single-player mode and multiplayer mode.

Gameplay

It is important to talk about the gameplay of Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness because the game has been around for a long period and it is not one of the most advanced technology games available in the market. The developers of the game have been updating the game regularly for more than 20 years and they have made sure to make minor upgrades to the game. The technology used in the gameplay is quite primitive but when the game was released it was way ahead of its time which is the reason why Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness is still relevant in 2021.

Features of the games

Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness is a game that has been around for more than 20 years and has still not lost its popularity amongst gamers. The main reason why gamers like Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness is because of all the great features it offers. Here we have listed down a few of the features of the game which make Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness a must play in 2021.

Great Story building

The main reason why Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness has been able to stay relevant for such a long time is because of the great story-building feature of the game. Players will get to build their own story in the game as they progress ahead making it unique and fun to play.

Seamless user interface

The user interface is something that the developers have put a lot of effort into. The developers of the game have successfully been able to create a seamless user interface that is easy to understand and helps players access all the features of the game without any issue.

Cross-platform play

The cross-platform play of Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness is quite a fun feature where players can play the game with their friends even when they are not having the same console. The game is available to play on PC, macOS, Saturn, and PlayStation.

Multiple game modes

Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness is a game that offers players both single-player mode and multiplayer mode to play. The multiplayer mode of the game requires a stable internet connection to run.

Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness is one of the oldest available games in the market which still has such a huge amount of players all across the globe. The game is mostly played in multiplayer mode where players can play with their friends and family. Make sure to also play the single-player mode of Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness.

Name	Warcraft II Tides of Darkness
Initial Release Date	9 December 1995
Platforms	Microsoft Windows, PlayStation, DOS, MS-DOS, Linux, Sega Saturn, Classic Mac OS, Berkeley Software Distribution
Developer
Composer	Glenn Stafford
Series	Warcraft
Mod	Single-player video game
Category	PC Games >Strategy

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Warcraft II Tides of Darkness – Minimum System Requirement

CPU: Intel Core i5-760 or AMD FX-8100 or later
CPU SPEED: Info
RAM: 4 GB RAM (8GB for integrated graphics such as Intel HD Graphics)
OS: Windows 7 / Windows 8 / Windows 10 64 bit
VIDEO CARD: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 2GB or AMD Radeon HD 7850 2GB or Intel HD Graphics 530 (45W)
PIXEL SHADER: 5. 0
VERTEX SHADER: 5.0
FREE DISK SPACE: 70 GB
DEDICATED VIDEO RAM: 2 GB

Warcraft II Tides of Darkness – Recommended System Requirement

Processor: Intel Pentium III / AMD Athlon MP
Graphics: AMD Radeon 7000 64mb or NVIDIA GeForce 2 MX 400 64MB
RAM: 0MB
HDD: 0MB

FAQs

Can we play the game in multiplayer mode?

Yes, we can play the game Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness in multiplayer mode.

Who is the writer of the game Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness?

The game Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness has been written by Chris Metzen

Under which banner was the game Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness published?

The game Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness was published under the banner of Davidson & Associates.

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Categories PC Games, Strategy Tags Blizzard Entertainment, Cyberlore

Warcraft 2: Tides of Darkness Download

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a game by	Blizzard Entertainment
Platform:	PC
Editor Rating:	8.3/10, based on 3 reviews, 5 reviews are shown
User Rating:	8.0/10 — 21 votes
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See also:	Warcraft, Download Best RTS Games

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Overview

Warcraft 2: Tides of Darkness is basically a war/strategy game. This is a war between the Orcish Hordes and the Human forces of Azeroth. Whether you decide to aid the orc or the human cause, the tasks of your missions are much the same: destroy an enemy encampment, rescue a captured ally, or immolate an enemy oil refinery, to name a few. As you beat back the forces of the opposition, you must have your peons or peasants constantly gather resources (gold, lumber, and oil) for your use in building a superior war machine. Eventually, the human forces will destroy the Dark Portal through which the Orcish Hordes have come to Azeroth. The Orc campaign ends with the orcs establishing a firm hold on their position in the human kingdom of Azeroth.

Graphics/Realism

I must admit that the graphics of Warcraft 2 threw me off a bit at first. After playing Command and Conquer a great deal, the cartoonish look and feel of Warcraft 2 was hard to take seriously. But once I delved deeper into the play of the game, what seemed childish soon became endearing. Since Warcraft 2 is set in a fantasy realm where orcs and humans €battle for supremacy, realism only partially applies as a category anyway. Still, the game is more realistic in its action than in its graphics—keeping in mind that the graphics were not intended to represent reality. There is also enough graphic brutality to please most wargame enthusiasts. But after you’ve killed ten or twenty helpless «critters» and have witnessed the extremely disturbing yet comical way in which they expire, you tire of that novelty and concentrate on the mission at hand. Among the nicer touches in Warcraft 2 is the «Fog of War,» which allows you to see only those parts of the battlefield where your troops have been sent. If you have sent troops through an area and they were demolished, you will still be able to view that area’s layout and buildings, but not the actual forces of the enemy. There are also several video sequences that appear at points of major accomplishment in the story, but while they were a nice break from the action, I didn’t really feel that they added to the overall quality of the game.

Setup/Documentation/Interface

Game setup is easy, taking about 10 minutes or so. The only annoying fact I must mention is that if you load into Windows with the CD in your drive, you will get a little window about Warcraft 2, asking you if you would like to install it, even if you already have. This would seem to be a minor annoyance, which it really is, but once I was jolted out of bed because this screen popped up and started blaring some march music out of my poor Yamaha speakers. I guess that teaches me not to leave the CD in the drive and have my sound set louder in Windows than DOS; still … a silly occurence that may have been comical to me (upon reflection) could perhaps send some unsuspecting senior citizen into premature cardiac arrest.

Moving on to more positive ground, I thought the documentation that came with Warcraft 2 was great. Each unit is illustrated and its characteristics defined completely. The only minor gripe I had was that some of the descriptions were too colorful to be clear—for instance, some of the descriptions of the Mage’s spells might tell you that the «Mage will use the lightning bolt to utterly vanquish the enemies of Azeroth from the sacred land. » A nice feeling to it, but not very helpful when you’re trying to decide whether that spell might be enough to protect your paladins on their next jaunt into the Orcish stronghold. Nevertheless, the manual provided a wonderful reference during gameplay. Often, while learning the game, I would see a chance to build a new structure and have my wife read the description to me, so that I could continue hacking away at those poor enemy dimwits who dared to get in my way.

If you’re familiar at all with Westwood’s Command and Conquer, you’ll feel right at home playing Warcraft 2. You simply point and click on your guys and then click on the object you want them to manipulate … click on an enemy and they’ll attack; click on trees and your peons or peasants will harvest them. This manner of controlling your forces makes it very easy to handle many tasks at once, which is paramount to success. You are able to gather resources, scout new territories, and fight the mother of all battles—all at once. One advantage that Warcraft 2 has over Command and Conquer is the ability to build non-adjacent structures. This allows you to build guard towers and such at your camp’s perimeter without «sandbagging» out there. To be fair, I heard that C&C: Red Alert was supposed to allow non-adjacent structures as well. In Warcraft 2, I also like the fact that you can rebuild all your structures: as long as you have the money and at least one peon or peasant to do the building. It was always a drag in C&C—especially head-to-head play—when your «friend» snuck an engineer into your construction yard via helicopter, and you had to concede because you couldn’t rebuild it—even if you had $20,000 tucked away. Comparisons aside, Warcraft 2 has a very intuitive and fun-to-use interface.

Audio

The worst thing about the audio for Warcraft 2 is the narration before each mission. Can you say «overacting?» But I was very pleased overall with the game’s consistently nice audio touches. The various characters in Warcraft 2 have very distinct and colorful personalities, mainly characterized by their reactions to your commands—for instance, the peasant’s cry «Yes, me Lord,» or the Paladin’s «For the King!» Some of the effects are gruesome, such as the dying wail of the various critters. Music itself is fairly nonexistent during the missions, which suits me just fine—it really isn’t needed since the richness of the sound effects provides a nice backdrop for the action. There is, however, some fitting, warlike music used under the narration and during the video sequences.

System Requirements

486DX\33, 8 MB RAM, SVGA video card, 2X CD-ROM drive

Recommended: Pentium, 16 MB RAM, a really good mouse

Reviewed on: P-120, 16 MB RAM, 4X CD-ROM drive, Diamond Stealth 64 video card

Bottom Line

I had a lot of fun playing Warcraft 2: Tides of Darkness. Although the game had its share of shortcomings, I felt that its good points heavily outweighed them. I am pleased to award Warcraft 2 a generous score of 89.

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Windows XP/Vista/7/8/10

System requirements:

PC compatible

Operating systems: Windows 10/Windows 8/Windows 7/2000/Vista/WinXP

Game Reviews

It is kind of crazy to think that the first time I played Warcraft 2 was on the Sega Saturn at a buddy’s house. Well, that was great and all, but it was not as amazing as it was on the PC. Before we had World of Warcraft, we had this and it is a game that many people have a lot of fond memories of.

Two Sides Of A War

Warcraft 2 actually has a pretty neat story. It is basically humans and orcs at war and the game has a fun campaign that showcases this really well. You get to play the game from two points of view which is kind of interesting. The campaign missions on both sides (while the story is different) do follow the same kind of formula no matter if you are playing as the humans or orcs.

Scenarios!

One of the things that Warcraft 2 is most well known for is its scenarios. You have plenty that you can play, but you can also make your own. For a game that is as old as Warcraft 2 is, I feel that this feature here is way ahead of its time. You can pretty much create a whole new campaign for yourself and friends to play.

This is really well done and you would be surprised at how easy it is to make a new scenario. You can play your scenarios against the AI or you can get a friend involved and play them.

Easy To Play Hard To Master

The gameplay of Warcraft 2 is what has kept so many people playing it for all these years. They really did streamline things here and while this is a real time strategy game and there is a lot of thought behind it. You have to play at a quick pace as the AI (and of course any human you play against) can be very relentless and will not wait for you to think of what to do next.

There are tons of units that you can use in this game. It still has the same two resources to gather as in the first game, but Warcraft 2 introduces air and sea units that require oil, so you now have a third resource to battle over. The different units are a lot of fun and what the humans have there will be an alternative on the Orc side. This is something that other RTS games have so it is not really a negative.

Pixel Perfection
While it may seem a little bit “dated” the leap in presentation from the first Warcraft is pretty incredible. I still like the way the game looks and think that the Orcs and the more fantasy-based creatures look fantastic, many of which have kept their place in the Warcraft universe to this day.

If you love RTS games, you will love Warcraft 2. It is a truly fantastic game and one that is just as much fun to play today as it was when it was first released. I love the storyline and the whole lore behind the game. But it is really the gameplay that has kept me hooked for so many years. It is even more addictive if you can sink your teeth into creating your own content for the game.

Pros:

I love the lore of the game
Plenty of units to make use of
New units are a lot of fun
It is easy to get into and play
You can make your own scenarios

Cons:

The visuals are a tad dated
Could be more story in the campaign

Almost Two Years After The release of Warcraft, the sequel arrives with a continuation of the original plot (ie «let’s all save Azeroth from nasty ores», for those who don’t know) and all the characters from the first game have been kept too, so you just might be wondering exactly what the designers have been up to during the lengthy gap between the two titles. Well, as it happens, they’ve introduced lots of new features for the sequel, although you’d never think so from the first hour of play.
To be honest, my first impressions of Warcraft 2 were less than favourable.

I had a good look at the manual and was confronted with a lengthy section explaining the history of Azeroth and all its heroes and legends. It goes on and on about people with names that nobody can pronounce (except whoever made them up in the first place), and does nothing to set the scene for the game or give you any great desire to play it. Worse still, when you first load the thing up you are subjected to an intro which features the most idiotic voice-over I’ve ever heard in a computer game. Let’s face it, if you’re interviewing candidates to perform a voice-over for a highly polished cd-rom title, it’s hardly likely that you’re going to pick someone with a highly embarrassing speech impediment. Imagine David Bellamy in a state of feverish excitement trying desperately hard to pronounce lots of words featuring the dreaded letter ‘R’ and failing miserably, and you’ve got the Warcraft intro in a nutshell. Even bloody simple stuff like ‘brave warriors’ suddenly becomes ‘bwave wawwiors’ and while we all found this highly amusing in the office, it’s hardly the sort of thing that atmospheric intros are made of. Still, as always it’s the actual game that matters, and when I finally got to the opening level I was greeted with…

Glowlous SVGA

Warcraft 2 has hi-res graphics which, it has to be said, look very impressive indeed when compared to the graphics in the first game. The sprites are very big with lots of detail, and the scenery graphics are rich and.colourful. Suitably impressed with all this graphical loveliness, I innocently began to click on a few sprites when… disaster struck! The voice-over from hell was back! Click on a peasant and they respond with ‘wot iz it?’ in the dumbest accent you’ve ever heard. Click on a footman and he says your owders?’ and so on. This was just too much. I went straight to the options screen, turned unit acknowledgments off, and when I went back to the game there was sweet, sweet silence. Finally I could get round to playing the damned thing without having to listen to the most irritating twerp in the universe.

I suppose that the obvious question to raise at this point for anyone who’s played the first game is: «Has it got any better?» Well, yes it has, although apart from the obvious improvements in the graphics you won’t notice any major leaps in the gameplay itself until you’ve played four or five levels of the game. This is because Blizzard (the designers) have kept the learning curve for the sequel pretty much the same as it was in the original, in as much as each new level introduces a new aspect of game-play. This will probably suit newcomers to the game, but it’s bound to piss off Warcraft veterans. The game’s designers seem to think that the average pc gamer can only cope with getting used to one
;jor two new elements of gameplay per level — come on guys, we’re not stupid you know. If they’d made the first level bigger they could have taught the player all the basics in the game (which aren’t exactly difficult: you cut trees for wood, mine for gold, train peasants to do your work etc), but as it stands you have to plod through loadsa levels before you get into the real meat.

When you finally get there, you’ll discover lots of new things to play with. You now get fighter ships, transport ships for taking your units across the sea, scout planes, new ground vehicles, cannon and scout towers to keep the enemy at bay, lots of new mage spells and a much higher level of resource management than was offered in the first game. This all adds up to make the whole thing challenging and rewarding.

Whereas the original Warcraft was a tad too easy and the gameplay repetitive after continuous play, the sequel really is genuinely difficult when you get to the later levels, and the missions are varied enough to keep you interested right up until the end. Apart from the speech, the only thing that really pissed me off about the game was the artificial intelligence (or the lack of it, as it were). Take this as an example: send a peasant off to cut some wood and he’ll go off and cut down trees miles away from where you sent him, stupidly ignoring a big bunch of trees right beside the lumber mill he’s meant to come back to. And the fighters are a bit thick, too; if you don’t tell them to attack specific targets they’ll often just stand around admiring the scenery instead of taking the initiative and kicking the shit out of the nearest baddie. None of this sort of stuff would ever happen in a game like Command & Conquer, and that’s why I’ve scored the game in the low eighties rather than closer to ninety.

Apart from the dodgy Al…

Okay, so it has to be said that the dodgy ai is slightly annoying — but it doesn’t change the fact that overall Warcraft 2 is a very addictive and enjoyable game. It’s even better still if you are able to take advantage of the multi-player option and take on a human opponent over a network. It’s a definite ‘must buy’ for anyone who liked the original.

Nostalgia Is a wonderful thing. Actually, I’m lying, nostalgia is usually little more than a distorted and over-romanticised view of the past, especially when it comes to games. Let’s be realistic, as much as we loved playing the likes of Warcraft II when they first crawled out of the evolutionary pond which spawned the RTS genre back in the mid ’90s, we’d be hard pressed to find anything worthwhile in them now. For starters, graphics do count, and Warcraft Il’s boast that it features Super VGA graphics at 640×480 is a bit like an aging Casanova bragging about having a 2in penis in a room full of 6ft Amazonians. Pointless.

So onto the game, and what a basic mix of cliches it is, especially in light of the recent release of its stunning, four-race-epic sequel. Orcs battle Humans over two campaigns in an attempt to gain control of the land of Azeroth (which I think is in Wales, but I’m not completely sure). The Al is basic and the graphics resemble greasy pizza stains on your monitor. Back in 1995,I was impressed. Now I’m just bored. My advice? Save your five quid, and use it towards buying the excellent Warcraft III instead, and to hell with the nostalgia.

In this sequel to Warcraft, the king is dead, Azeroth is destroyed, and the surviving humans are trying to build a new homeland on a different continent. The ores are breathing down their neck, though, in this adventure that reeks with the same blend of in-depth strategy, savage combat, and ribald humor that made the original a hit.

As in Warcraft, you can play as either the humans or the ores. The ores’ allies include the likes of goblins and trolls, while the humans are joined in battle by elves, mages, dwarves, and others. The gameplay focuses on the standard collection of resources. construction of fortifications, and deadly combat, but enhancements give the action added realism. Look for more air and sea battles, a larger map, and more structures and weapons. And of course, all the savagery and mayhem is depicted in glowing Super VGA graphics. Let the carnage begin!

Snapshots and Media

PC Screenshots

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Warcraft: Orcs & Humans

Tides of Darkness on Old-Games.

You can run this game on modern computers using the program DOSBox (download). Detailed instructions for use are located in our Wiki.

Rip version Download file | 28.49 MB (added: 05/14/2013)
Russified version of the game from the SPK. Cut videos and music.

Russian language
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Demo version Download file | 9.85 MB (added: 02/24/2012)
A demo of the game showing some differences from the final version.

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Documentation Download file | 5. 89MB (added: 01/16/2014)
User manual for the game (in PDF format).

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Update Download file | 5.3 KB (added: 11/07/2010)
A patch for the SPK version of Warcraft 2 that adds cheats to the game.

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Update Download file | 1. 19 MB (added: 03/19/2015)
Official patch up to version 1.40.

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Disk image Download file | 3.15 MB (added: 03/27/2015)
An «electronic copy» of a game disc is its full version, which requires installation and, in most cases, the presence of a disc in the drive.

Unofficial mapbook WarCraft 2: Addon Levels Vol 1. Disc image in MDF/MDS format.

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Disk image Download file | 1. 47 MB (added: 03/27/2015)
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Unofficial mapbook W!Zone II: Retribution. Disk image in CCD/IMG/SUB format.

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Disk image Download file | 41.14 MB (added: 03/27/2015)
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Unofficial collection of W!Zone maps. ISO disk image.

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Disk image Download file | 26.14 MB (added: 03/27/2015)
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Unofficial Total War: Over 1000 New Levels for Warcraft II mapbook. Disk image in CCD/IMG/SUB format.

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An unofficial collection of Morecraft maps.

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Disk image Download file | 67.14 MB (added: 03/27/2015)
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Unofficial mapbook Levels & Add-Ons fuer Warcraft II. ISO disk image.

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Disk image Download file | 12. 92 MB (added: 03/27/2015)
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Aztech’s Armory: Campaigns for Warcraft II unofficial mapbook. ISO disk image.

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Disk image Download file | 452.89 MB (added: 10/15/2021)
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Disk image Download file | 430. 91 MB (added: 11/07/2010)
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Russified version of the game from the SPK in the form of a disk image in MDF\MDS format.

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Useful files Download file | 14.97 MB (added: 03/27/2015)
Unofficial Warcraft II: Final Conflict mapbook.

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Useful files Download file | 1. 26 MB (added: 03/27/2015)
Unofficial collection of maps More War — the Return of the Horde.

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Pre-release version Download file | 12.29MB (added: 02/24/2012)
An alpha version of the game showing some differences from the final version. Mostly graphics.

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the good old WarCraft II game in a new face

Wargus is the implementation of the beloved by many game WarCraft II on the powerful Stratagus engine, with improved graphics, new interesting and convenient features. The second variant is back! The second varicose is back in a new face!

Eh… how many memories and emotions the game WarCraft 2 evokes in me…

First of all, I’ll tell you my story about how I got acquainted with this wonderful real-time strategy game.

Contents:

My history with the game
What is Wargus
Building Wargus for Windows
Screenshots from the game
Goodies and extras
Conclusion

My story of acquaintance with the game

At the time when MS Windows 95 had just appeared, as a little boy at my father’s work I visited a small server room, in which there were two modern computers at that time:

Pentium 166MHz with 15″ Samsung SVGA monitor, sound card, Primax 90S and Win95 speakers on board;
Pentium 233MHz — a server for a whole factory, a hefty tower with a stack of hard drives inside and some kind of Unix or Netware on board (only console text output was observed on the monitor).

These and several other machines were factory connected to a 10 Mbit LAN using a coaxial cable (BNC). The Pentium-166 was used for data entry and infrastructure maintenance, generating various reports, writing all sorts of scripts and the like, MS-DOS and MS WINDOWS 9 were installed on it5.

Under MS-DOS, the local programmer-admin often liked to sit and play different toys. Sometimes he played himself, and sometimes he came with a friend and they could fly a whole day over the game.

The first of these games that I remember was Dune 2 (Dune 2). I still remember myself staring at these squares, blue containers that collect something and a lot of small cars that, on orders, go somewhere and even shoot.

Until that time, I was already familiar with such games as CD-MAN, DuckTales, Prehistorik 2 and many others, played them on an IBM 386, knew many MS-DOS commands, felt free in Norton Commander (THANKS to my FATHER for help and science!).

I liked to watch the programmer and his friend play with toys, what they played was some other, more interesting level of fantasy flight for me.

One day, when I came to my father at work, I found them playing a new game, which was unusually colorful and with a wide variety of different buildings, troops and ships, besides, each unit could say something if you clicked on it … this seemed like a fantasy.

That’s how I met Warcraft 2 (Warcraft 2) and over time I wanted to try to play it myself. The game was completely in English, so I did not understand anything in the menu, or in the names, or in the sheets from the text before the missions (instructions for missions, briefing).

But still, desire won over ignorance — I asked my father to help me figure it out, together with the programmer they wrote down all the names of buttons, menus, messages and houses on a piece of paper, a translation was made into my native language using a dictionary. I studied this leaflet and could not wait for the moment when I would try to play Warcraft II on my own.

It was very interesting to play, as if plunged into another world where I can manage the army, build various buildings, ballistas and catapults, ships and even use magic. With all this, you still need to think and analyze, experience and make important decisions.

And what a soundtrack from the speakers… it was an inexpressible pleasure. Every trip to work with my father was a small holiday for me, even then I had dreams of my own computer.

Time passes and everything changes, new technologies, opportunities and games appear. However, even now it is possible to play old games without problems using an old computer.

You can also use an emulator such as DosBox or VirtualBox to play Warcraft 2. But I will offer you something a little different, more perfect.

So, I’ll tell you in detail about a project like Wargus, how to make your game build, where to get what and where to put it, plus some goodies 🙂

What is Wargus

Wargus is an amateur project, the authors of which decided to modernize the good old game a bit. More specifically, Wargus is a port of WarCraft II on the Stratagus engine.

This port made it possible to play the game on various platforms: Linux, Maemo(Nokia N900), Android, BSD, BeOS, MacOS X, Microsoft Windows.

Older versions of the Stratagus and Wargus projects are now hosted on the Launchpad platform (a web project created for collaborating on free software), while newer versions are hosted on GitHub.

Installing Wargus under Windows

Installing Wargus under Microsoft Windows is quite simple. To create your build, you need to follow a few steps: install the Stratagus game engine, and then on top of it the Wargus game (scripts and base game resources) with the extraction of resources from the original Warcraft II game.

The game will only work and display correctly with resources from to the English version of Warcraft II . If you take resources from the Russian version, then at startup most of the texts, menu buttons simply will not be displayed. This problem was solved by compiling the Wargus game from source under Linux (see comments), but there is no solution for Windows yet.

Therefore, if you are not satisfied with the English version of the game (for example, you do not even have basic knowledge of English), then you will not be able to play Wargus yet.

But don’t worry, you can play the original Russian game for MS-DOS by running it under Windows XP/7/8/10 in a special emulator program. In one of the articles, I described in detail how to install and configure the DosBox emulator under MS Windows.

If the English game suits you, then continue …

It is important that the versions of Stratagus and Wargus match during installation, be careful when downloading files! At the time of this writing, I was using MS Windows 7 and version 2.2.6 of the game, later I checked version 2.3 — everything works.

Windows Components

Need to install Visual C++ library packages from Microsoft:

Visual C++ 2005 Redistributable Package;
Visual C++ 2008 Redistributable Package;
Visual C++ 2010 Redistributable Package.

All these packages are available on the Microsoft website in ‘x86’ and ‘x64’ versions, you can easily find them from search engines (just download from the Microsoft website, not from any similar ones, be careful). If you have a 64-bit version of MS Windows, then I recommend installing both versions of each of the packages.

These libraries are needed for most programs under Windows, so it is possible that they are already installed in your OS.

With the release of new versions of the game, it is possible that you will need to install even newer libraries — 2012, 2015, 2017, 2019and so on.

If these libraries are not available, then the game may be installed, but after that it will refuse to start. In some versions, when trying to unpack resources, the «Error unpacking resources» window may appear.

Installing Stratagus

Download the latest version of the game engine installer from the Stratagus project page:

https://launchpad. net/stratagus — engine versions up to 2.3 inclusive;
https://github.com/Wargus/Stratagus — all subsequent versions of the engine (2.4.x and up to the newest).

Create a folder for our game (Wargus) on some disk and install Stratagus into it.

Preparing files from the original Warcraft II game

To extract resources, you need the complete original game «Warcraft 2: Tides of Darkness» with the «Beyond the Dark Portal Expansion Set» add-on.

As I said above, you need to take the English version of the game as a resource donor!

The Battle NET Edition (BNE) will not work! What you need is the usual Warcraft 2 with or without additions.

It is possible that you have the original disc with the game, and if not, then an Internet search will help you. Unpack all game files to some temporary folder, for example «War2» on drive C:

 C:
└──War2
    ├── DATA
    │  ├── INSMAIN.INS
    │  ├── INSSTR. INS
    │  ├── MAINDAT.WAR
    │  ├── MUDDAT.CUD
    │  ├── REZDAT.WAR
    │  ├── SFXDAT.SUD
    │  ├── SNDDAT.WAR
    │  └── STRDAT.WAR
    ├── ALAMO.PUD
    ├── DRIVERS
     ......
    ├── README.TXT
    ├── SETUP.EXE
    ├── SFXED95.exe
    ├── UVCONFIG.EXE
    ├── WAR2.EXE
    ├── WAR2ICON.DLL
    ├── WAR2.INI
    └── WAR2KALI.EXE

Installing Wargus

Download from the Wargus project page the same version of the package as the already installed Stratagus:

https://launchpad.net/wargus — game versions up to 2.3 inclusive;
https://github.com/Wargus/Wargus — all subsequent versions of the game (2.4.x and up to the newest).

We launch the installer, for installation we specify the same folder in which we have already installed Stratagus. Later, the installer will ask us to specify the folder with files from the original Warcraft CD — we specify the folder where the files from the original Warcraft II game are available (in the example above, this is War2 on disk C).

Click «Next», then «Install» and wait 5-15 minutes (depending on the power of your computer). The process of copying engine files will begin, resources (graphics, music, video) will be unpacked and recoded into formats for the new game. Upon completion of the installation process, the assembly is ready, you can run Wargus.exe.

Note: the installed game can be copied/transferred to other computers, carried with you on a flash drive — in this case, you will have to run the Stratagus.exe file, running the Wargus.exe file may cause an error.

Screenshots from the game

Several screenshots of the Wargus game:

Pic. 1. Video logo of Blizzard at the start of the game Wargus (WarCraft II).

Fig. 2. Starting window of the game — menu, copyrights, version.

Fig. 3. Screen resolution setting window and global graphics options.

Fig. 4. Briefing — the beginning of the campaign for the people.

Fig. 5. Gameplay Wargus (WarCraft 2) — screenshot 1. Swamp, it’s good that we have transport;)

Fig. 6. Gameplay Wargus (WarCraft 2) — screenshot 2. Westland — trees like mushrooms!

Fig. 7. Gameplay Wargus (WarCraft 2) — screenshot 3. Winter, cold and we are under attack!

Fig. 8. Gameplay of Wargus (WarCraft 2) — screenshot 4. It looks like our rivals are doing well…

Goodies and extras

Playing large third-party maps and campaigns (Skirmish mode) with a huge number of units, I sometimes had game freezes , with the original campaigns, I think there will be no problems — everything is well balanced there.

There is also a powerful map editor in the game, where you can create your own campaign or map for playing on a local network. A big plus is that all units, heroes, buildings, terrain types and additional structures are available.

Finally , as I wrote at the beginning, I put delicious cookies:

Lua script with options to support widescreen extensions 1280×800, 1366×768 and others — Download Lua script with widescreen extensions settings (3 Kb).
Script for mass conversion of maps from WarCraft II format (*.pud) to Wargus map format (*.sms, *.smp) — Download map converter script for Wargus (zip, 50 Kb).
A selection of cards for playing in an already converted format, I once collected for myself on the Internet from different sites. In the archive you will find about 150 campaigns and 50 multiplayer maps — Download a selection of maps for Wargus (zip, 10 MB).