SANTA MONICA, California—Before giving us a world-premiere look at StarCraft Remastered‘s gameplay, the franchise’s holders at Blizzard rattled off a few major rules for how the game would be made. “Blend classic with modern.” “Community’s voice.” One of the buzz phrases made Blizzard Classic Games Producer Pete Stilwell laugh: “Don’t be disruptive.” “That’s how I was told to say, ‘Don’t fuck it up,'” he said.

Stilwell had already set that PR guidance aflame when he loudly declared his development team’s mantra of preserving original games’ systems and mechanics at all costs. “We’re not here to change classics from a gameplay perspective,” Stilwell said. “We’re not here to fuck with that. We say, ‘don’t fuck it up,’ all the time. Do not ruin this game.”

The Blizzard Classic team appears to have pulled that off with a game that, for better or for worse, plays, feels, and, in a few cases, looks just like the 1998 version. StarCraft Remastered‘s announced price, $14.99/£12.99, reflects that aesthetic, as it has mostly been built to slap new paint on old mechanics. But executing that “plays exactly the same” mission—while making the new game (launching August 14 on PC and Mac) look demonstrably improved over the original and sneaking a few changes in—wasn’t a complete breeze.