South Korean presidential candidate releases custom StarCraft maps to promote his campaign

StarCraft's immense popularity in South Korea is not a secret, with its professional players treated as celebrities and entire TV networks dedicated to the game. But e-sports tournaments have slowly switched over to StarCraft 2 and other titles over the years, as the almost two-decade-old original game slowly fell away from the spotlight.

However, with Blizzard re-launching StarCraft and its Brood War expansion for free earlier this month, not to mention the announcement of StarCraft: Remastered, the classic game that is set to make a comeback this summer. A South Korean presidential candidate, Moon Jae-in, has capitalized on this opportunity to release two custom maps for StarCraft, titled 'Moonters', for promoting his campaign.

The maps are available in four and eight player versions, and are essentially variants of already existing maps from the base game, but the custom maps arrive with some clever additions.

The four-player map has a group of resources laid out in a particular fashion in the middle, reportedly spelling out "1 Moon Jae-in" in Korean. A video of the map in question was made available via the candidate's YouTube channel (accompanied with a hard rock soundtrack no less), seen below. Have a gander at the resource pattern that's unveiled on the minimap as the video goes on.

The second map, which supports eights players, also has a design made of resources, although not quite as grandiose as the first, forming a large '1' in the corner.

For those who are interested, the maps are downloadable through Moon Jae-in's campaign blog (text in Korean). The likelihood of wide scale adoption or witnessing the map duo in competitive events seems quite small. Nonetheless, it's an interesting and creative advertising campaign for a serious presidential candidate, further reinforcing how widely accepted the strategy game is in South Korea.

Source: Naver - Moon Jae-In via Mashable