StarCraft on Vista

Installing StarCraft on Vista can be a pain. First, you need to add the a registry key in the following location:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current Version\Explorer\Shell Folders

If there is no key named "Programs" add one of type string with the following contents:

C:\\Users\\%USERNAME%\\AppData\\Roaming\\Microsoft\\Windows\\Start Menu\\Programs

Exactly as shown.

Now you can install StarCraft (it will give a non-fatal error which you can ignore). Don't bother running it, quit and install BroodWars - it will give the same error.

Download the latest patch from Blizzard and install it.

Once the patch is installed, you can follow the instructions here to copy the MPQ files over to run without the CD.

Now, to get the game to run you need to tell Vista to run StarCraft.exe as an administrator, or you'll get a "Unable to identify Application Version" error.

If you do run as Administrator, it should allow you to connect to Battle.Net - note that you may have to tell Vista to allow StarCraft to access the internet.

Note: I originally thought that this was Vista 64, turns out the system had 32 bit Vista.