Starcraft II: The Zergling and the Development Team

StarCraft II’s Marine unit has a voiceline triggered by clicking the unit repeatedly: a reference to the classic StarCraft I marine response lines, which themselves became internet memes. The line is directly from the original game, recorded in the same style, serving as a tribute to players who had spent time in 1998 clicking marines until they complained.

This was standard Blizzard easter egg procedure. What was less standard: a Zergling in the campaign mission ‘The Devil’s Playground’ — which takes place on a lava planet with rising flood cycles — will, if given a move order to a specific lava-adjacent tile after the first lava surge and before the second, produce a unique animation not found anywhere else in the game: it dances.

The dancing Zergling animation was discovered by dataminers before release and was initially believed to be a developer test animation that leaked into the build. Blizzard confirmed post-launch that it was intentional — placed specifically for the one player per ten thousand who would order a Zergling to dance on a lava planet mid-mission.