Star Wars: Battlefront

The Good
I'm not a devoted follower of Star Wars, but I am a big fan of massive war games such as Dynasty Warriors so when I first caught sight of this game, I was ecstatic and after renting it, I had to have it, even if it meant shelling out the $50 (back in the day when it was new), that is how much fun it was.

The music and sounds are incredible, authentic Star Wars music from the past along with the genuine sounds of the blasters, speeders, even the voices. The gameplay can be very addictive, with so many things that you can do, from strafing the ground with aerial vehicles to utilizing snipers, there is no end in sight on how to win the battle.

The variety of vehicles also make this game fun to play, snow speeders, AT-ATs, Droid Starfighters (the most powerful in my opinion) and the option to choose the era, either the CIS revolt or the Empire Rebellion on most of the planets keeps things fresh.

The Bad
There were a few things that bothered me, one of which is how short it can be, you can easily tear through enemy forces fast, especially with an experienced human teammate, even though there almost 10 worlds with 2 stages a piece, it's very easy to finish the game in almost a half hour.

Another thing that bothers me is just an opinion, but the lack of having the option to fight against enemies from other eras would have been fun, it would be nice to play against the Empire using the Droids. Another is a better placement of some respawn points, for example on Hoth you can respawn underneath an AT-AT, but you can easily be stepped on by it as soon as you spawn, making it very frustrating.

Sometimes the game can be a bit easy and the Ally AI can be brain-dead at times, such as getting in your line of fire or running at a shooting enemy without stopping to fire back. The single-player missions can be a bit shallow, so playing with a human friend can be much more entertaining.

The Bottom Line
Really this is a great game to play despite its little faults, but for real excitement, hook up with a buddy or relative, either fighting against each other or teaming up to see who is better (a personal best for me and my brother is 20 minutes beating the game on campaign teaming up while we fought each other that lasted up to 3 months going back and forth). Even if you're not a Star Wars fan, at least give this game a whirl, you might be pleasantly surprised about how much entertainment can be taken from this game.

The Good
I like that the game has many levels and characters you can play as. Also, there are tons of weapons and vehicles you can use. With its online play, you can play an even larger variety of people. You can change the difficulty to easy, if your not very good, or to hard, for those die hard veterans. Wonderful graphics and gameplay with excellent sound and tons of action.

The Bad
I didn't like that you can't actually play specific people like Darth Vader or Luke Skywalker. The load time is kind of slow but that's not too bad. The computers aren't to smart either.

The Bottom Line
Star Wars Battlefront is a great, action packed game. With tons of levels loaded with creatures and vehicles of all sorts, this is the game for you. If you like action, you'll love stomping through Hoth as an AT-AT pilot or battling it out on Naboo as a Droid. With online play, this game just gets better and better. Crush the Galactic Empire or the Trade Federation as you choose when and where to fight. Capture bases and destroy your enemy. See how well you stand up against your opponents. Destroy the Empire in an X-wing on Cloud city or as a Rebel Vangaurd. If you like any type of action, futuristic, or shooter game, then Star Wars Battlefront is right for you.

The Good
The thing that truly makes Star Wars Battlefront entertaining is that you can do whatever you want, anywhere you want.(Maybe except a strip club with Jabba staring at his alien dancers) Also Whenever you want, choose either The Galactic Civil War Era or The Clone Wars Era, which changes games experience. Also another interesting fact is you can play on four organizations, the Droid Army, the Clones, The Empire or the Rebels. Oh, did I forget vehicles? nope. Thy'ere is a vast variety of vehicles from swift Speeder Bikes to immense AT-AT Walkers.The music is superb and changes from the classic trilogy music to Episode I and II, depending on which era you choose. And don't worry their are plenty of weapons!!! But most of all, they have footage from the star wars films which are used in Historical campaign hand Galactic Conquest, awesome. Also their are Planets that in which you can choose your battles like Hoth, Naboo and more.

The Bad
Sometimes games have a dark side, but they all do. one downfall is it gets repetitive at times, like you can't make it past a Droideka unless you kill get killed ten times. (Yes you can be a Destroyer Droid.) Second of all the extras are not too surprising, just stills and concept art, you deserve much more, like cheats for all your hard work! Last of all, the Historical Campaigns are too short, yet the game is not lacking.

The Bottom Line
The game is a brilliant game, mostly set on the star wars battles and characters, and is very war like and you can play for hours without boring out, and is one of the best Star Wars games, I have ever known so get your wallet out and buy it, it's worth it.

The Good
The graphics are very well done and it features video clips direct from the movies which are nice to see. It's also interesting fighting in all the different locations taken from the movies. And the areas are recreated very well.

It's nice to play as the light and dark sided teams and you have the ability to play in both 1st and 3rd person, which can be nice for fighting.

The number of different units you can play as is great. You won't get bored with playing the same unit all the time.

The rankings at the end of each mission are interesting as they track things such as top "camper" (staying in one place for long periods of time), top deadeye (headshots), and top enemy of the state (kills). You can also see the stats of all bots in the game.

The Bad
Where do I begin? First of all, the most disappointing thing about this game is the format of it for single players. This game is really a multiplayer-only game. If you choose to play single player, you are simply playing a standard multiplayer bot match against the computer rather than against other people. If you die, you just spawn back into the game.

Weapons are limited greatly based on what unit you play. You have a main weapon with very limited ammunition, a secondary weapon with unlimited ammunition (but it recharges slowly), and some form of mine/bomb weapon. You may also have a shield, health packs, etc. If you end up running out of ammo for your main weapon, unless you want the limited weapon power of the blaster weapon that has unlimited ammo, you basically have to just go get yourself killed so you can respawn with more ammo.

AI is sadly lacking in the game. If you go up onto a ledge/balcony/etc and sit there, you can take pot-shots at your enemies as they come along and no one will try to get you. There is no thought of flanking or retreating or anything. Units will often just stand there as you shoot them.

The Bottom Line
If you like Star Wars, you like Bot matches, and you can live with poor AI, this game is definitely for you. The graphics are great and the short clips from the movies are nice to watch.

On the other hand, if you want good AI and a real single player game... find something better.

The Good
Well, the graphics are very well done and there is certainly a wide array of maps, tanks, fighters, and weapons. The controls are very east to master, and each faction, Republic, Rebels, Empire, and Confederacy all have their bonuses and disadvantages. It's really fun in multi-player and the "Galactic Conquest" mode where controlling certain planets grants certain bonuses is really cool.

The Bad
First, many of the maps are incredibly unbalanced, and favor one player over another. As an example, let's take a look at the Tatooine: Dune Sea map. In this map, there are some NPC's (non-playable characters) that attack everyone and have an unlimited amount of spawns. This wouldn't be a problem, except that they spawn right next to one of the players, while the other player is perfectly safe from their attacks. Another example is one of the Yavin IV missions. One side gets heavy tanks, while the other faction gets none, putting them at a severe disadvantage in terms of firepower and endurance. The Jedi in this game are also incredibly over-powered. Look, we all know that Luke, Vader, Mace, and Dooku are powerful guys, but do you see them taking 50 blasts from tanks and troopers? And at the same time block missiles from rocket troopers? No. The problem is that these jedi are nearly invincible and they can kill any trooper in one hit. If the bumbling AI manages to get this jedi to one of your spawn points, you will just have to accept having a jedi sitting in your spawn point, slaughtering dozens of your troops and taking no damage. The controls for the tanks are ok, but the controls for the starfighters are simply terrible. The maps are too small for good starfighter combat. If you move forward for more than 10 seconds, the screen will flash that you are "leaving the battlefield" and you will have to turn around or explode.

The Bottom Line
In the end, this game is just a bot match on a few maps, some good, some terrible. Unless you have a PS2 network adapter to play on the internet, then there isn't really enough to get this game, especially at the hefty $50 price tag.

The Good
Graphically this game is very good. You really do feel like a part of the Star Wars universe in this one. Graphics help bring you into this game. This was not made easy given the grand scope of the prequels. The detail of the Star Wars movies (up to 2004) is preserved in this game with great success. You can relive epic battles from the Star Wars movies with good detail.

Sound and music is also very good in this game. This is important in any game, especially if it claims to be a Star Wars game. Sounds are authentic to the movies, such as the fellow playing Jango Fett in Episode II. His clone troopers are recreated in this game with perfect detail.

There are numerous weapons in the game, and some five classes of soldiers for each side. There are lots of vehicles too, all of which can make the difference between victory and defeat.

This game is not like Battlefield 2, which records so many of the moves you make in the game. In Battlefront I no permanent statistics are collected. This makes for a much more casual game as it does not require you to be a perfect gamer to enjoy the game.

The main campaign in this game is well done, with cutscenes taken directly from the movies to fill in the story. It is great to play alongside Mace Windu during the Battle for Geonosis, especially after seeing the jedi master leading troops in Episode II.

The Bad
Gameplay is not bad in this game but the controls are somewhat unintuitive, even for a FPS game. You cannot run and when jumping you cannot shoot. Although this does put you on par with the other characters on the battle map it hurts your ability to make precision moves.

The AI is not very good in this game. That is the case for a lot of games though.

A major weakness in this game is the air vehicles (X-Wings, TIEs, snowspeeders, etc). You find yourself making a lot of tight turns in this game, hurting your ability to set up an attack run on an enemy position. This is especially true when playing the Hoth map as you fly a snowspeeder trying to take down an AT-AT.

One odd thing in this game is that to hit your target requires excellent precision. Even an AT-AT with its enormous guns must be as precise as a little laser pistol to hit its target, otherwise the guns have little effect.

The galactic conquest mode is fairly short. This is not necessarily a problem, but more could have been included to make this mode more fun (ie more planets).

The Bottom Line
This is a good, decent and clean game. If you want to fight some of your favorite Star Wars land battles, any way you want, then this is a good game to try. Star Wars fans will not be disappointed.

The Good
What you’re looking at is gorgeous presentation with some of John Williams’ great music scores and epic foley sound effects. The live-action cutscenes set the stage as much as the mission briefing. Every planet and battle front you go to has plenty of space, multiple routes for you to fix and flank your enemies. Many notable battles from Naboo to Hoth seem to show you what you didn’t see in the Star Wars movies.

What you can do during the battle depends a great deal on available resources, choices you make and creative moves that you execute. There are turrets for defense, kill zones to pin your foes, vehicles to spearhead enemy territory and specific troop classes you can pick to fight the battle differently. You get a decent variety and play style whether you’re an OOM battle droid, Republic Clone or Empire Stormtrooper. There’s enough content in the game to make playability last.

The Bad
You might think that, with practice and tryouts, you would be ready for this game. But when you go deep into the gameplay, there are many problems you need to withstand to play it through and through. One problem is the lack of balance between the types of soldiers. You only get two weapons, nothing else. Your abilities as a rocket trooper or sniper have very limited ammo, you need an ammo droid at all times. And the healing droids have a slow rate of healing. And speaking of slow, you’re going to find your soldier spawning at the most inconvenient spots that force you to do a marathon of jogging, wasting precious seconds to enter the battle. If you'd spawn at a command post nearer the frontline or of your choosing, that would have worked.

The controls are another matter. Mouse can be jerky and make aiming precisely a chore. Controls are not predefined well since your finger on the mouse can accidentally slide on the right mouse button and throw a grenade you didn’t mean to toss because we all take traditional modern shooter controls for granted. But the worst part of the game are the flying vehicles which seem to soar out of control and crash using the reverse mouse aim. Why couldn’t there be manual ascend, descend and accelerate buttons for user friendly movement? You’d best stick to boots on the ground.

The Bottom Line
Battlefront did some things right like capturing the Star Wars lore and atmosphere perfectly and paved the way for a fantastic battle simulation framework. Unfortunately what problems exist make it less fun to play, where you expect to fight harder. Still there is decent genuine challenge. Perhaps specialists like Kyle Katarn or RC-1138 would have fared better, but that’s wishful thinking. As long as you stick to choosing a regular rifle trooper and nothing else, you should last throughout the battle without too many losses. It’s gun toting time across the galaxy when you grab yourself a copy and get it running.

The Good
Every fight is rather big for Playstation 2 standard, both the multiplayer and singleplayer matches put you in the role of a soldier in the middle of the battlefield along with a few hundred other soldiers. There are lasers flying everywhere, armies taking over bases and you are a relatively small part of it all. It is an interesting take on what we expect from war games, the kind of games where we are supposed to be everyday soldiers, but can take a few hundred bullets and grenade shells to the face. Here you will just have to outwit the AI if you want to be relevant.

I am a big sucker for multiplayer games with vehicles in it (see also Halo 3), I simply love it when I can step into a car whenever I feel like and cruise around while firing lasers at everything that survives the initial collision. The Star Wars universe is home to some pretty basic cars, but you may also take over Walkers and aircraft... I probably don't have to explain how insanely awesome that is. Flying over an enemy base and firing a huge laser into the main room is so much fun that it should probably be illegal.

You can choose what kind of soldier you want to play as, meaning you will select between different classes every time you respawn. This choice can make a lot of difference and choosing the correct spawn location is also something to keep in mind because you are naturally not going to live very long if you spawn a sniper in the middle of a settlement that is under attack. I often found myself switching between the classes all the time because the battles have the tendency to be very unpredictable, you might be doing fine with a standard assault class for a while until some vehicles drive into your base and you find yourself switching to a rocket launcher.

The AI is pretty good for a game as hectic as this, their main tactic is to overrun enemy settlements, but they at least try to dodge bullets and encircle the base. When they are given a vehicle they will also do pretty well and if an objective is in danger they will try to fix it without abandoning the main battlefield altogether. I especially like it when they get into a flying vehicle because they will try to protect ground units during their dogfights, which both looks impressive and really saved my hide from turrets a few times.

The Bad
The truth is that I have never watched any of the Star Wars movies. I don't like sci-fi, I was born too late and I simply don't have any interest in them. When I got this game with my new Playstation 2 I was hoping it would be nice to me and at least explain what I was supposedly doing, but instead I got a very poorly explained story. I played this game in a bit of a trance, going from battlefield to battlefield with not a single bit of understanding. It was kind of fun, but I wish there would at least be a narrator to explain how I went from mining center in the middle of space to a jungle level within the same five minutes.

I don't like doing tutorials before I start a game for reasons I consider to be very obvious, you just want to get started with the game and not play through an hour of boring instructions. Left 4 Dead fixed this rather well by giving advice as you got across new features of the game, if you found a grenade a little message would pop up telling you how to throw it for example. I kinda hoped Star Wars would do the same, but while rarely needing it, it would have been nice to get at least a few hints now and then. When I first played the Jet Trooper for example I had no idea how to use the jet and during a mission in the snow I had to fight these huge walkers which I had to take down by somehow putting a rope around its legs. Those are the moments when a simple message telling me how to pull that rope out of my ass would be VERY welcome.

The game's audio was really messed up and my copy of the game seems to be fine, so I assume it is a programming error of sorts. The most common problem was dialogue getting stuck or the narrator telling me things about the battle about a minute after they happened (regarding events such as taking over an enemy base or taking a huge hit to our reinforcements). Normally I wouldn't really mind seeing as I got through the game just fine and I couldn't really care about the story anyways, but it was just very problematic during combat when I wouldn't be able to reinforce a settlement because by the time the message would arrive, it would already have been taken over.

While it is fun to drive around in vehicles, it is not nearly as fun when you have to fight one. The main problem is that unless you can specifically target the enemy riding it, you will likely die before the vehicle will. Most vehicles just have an ungodly amount of health, even when firing rockets at the most common ones it will take a while to take them down. It is also doubly unfair when they have a mechanic onboard that repairs the vehicle in question, this was the case during the snow level too. Most of the time a vehicle only counts as one or two reinforcements too, so all that effort is kind of a waste in the end.

The Bottom Line
Star Wars: Battlefront has some pretty grave problems that would normally give me enough reason to drill the game into the ground and I have certainly given bad reviews to much better games for much lesser problems, but I just have to admit that I had fun when playing Star Wars: Battlefront. I had no idea what I was doing, but the hectic combat and the size of even the smallest conflicts was just so thrilling that it felt like playing a game like Space Invaders, you don't need context, you just need a weapon and enemies to fire at.

If you are a Star Wars fan you will likely love this game, judging by the other reviews here on this website it may even be a great game once you know what is going on. The few, rare people that aren't fans (like me) can probably do a lot better than this game. Am I going to review the sequel to this title? Yes, I certainly am, but not until I have played Ratchet and Clank. I want to know what all this "best franchise ever" is about...