Star Wars Battlefront – Review

●●●○○

DICE’s Star Wars Battlefront was always going to be laden down with the baggage of its predecessors, and could never hope to match the expectations placed on it by the fans of the original Battlefront games. However, it still manages to succeed in many ways — not, perhaps, as the successor to Pandemic Studios’ series, but as the first title in a new Star Wars series, delivering its own, unique, experience, with its own successes and failures. Never before has a game so accurately and authentically immersed you in the Star Wars universe, boasting breath-taking graphics, easily-accessible gameplay and a score that really crunches down on the nostalgia factor.

Battlefront is a shooter stripped of most of the baggage of the genre, providing an ease of accessibility unknown in today’s world where titles like Call of Duty and Destiny dominate. It’s a game that caters to casual gamers, perfect for spending an hour on at the end of a long day to unwind, but a lack of depth means that it’s unlikely to satisfy those with more dedication. The game boasts a mere ten hours or so of gameplay before all maps and modes have been exhausted. While it looks like this will improve with the launch of downloadable content, including the recently released (and free) Battle of Jakku DLC, it’s more than a little frustrating that a game with so much promise gives you so few options to explore.

The lack of gametypes becomes immediately obvious, and what makes this worse is that there is considerable overlap between some of the versions on offer. Cargo, Drop Zone and Droid Run are all, essentially, capture gametypes, and while they do offer slightly different varieties of this mode, the differences don’t seem to be enough to warrant the presence of all three. Similarly, the existence of the Blast gametype seems unnecessary — why anyone would play it over the larger-scale Supremacy or Walker Assault is a mystery. Fighter Assault offers a fun, if short-lived, alternative to the constant ground battles, as you take to the skies in a beautifully rendered TIE fighter or X-Wing, though it doesn’t quite capture the spirit of the large-scale space battles in the older Battlefronts.

On the plus side, the graphics truly are spectacular, using the Frostbite 3 engine to create the illusion that you are stepping into the world of the films, creating a more visually authentic and impressive game than others that previously held the Star Wars name. While many of the gametypes can be underwhelming, when you find one in Battlefront that you can truly sink your teeth into, it delivers an experience like no other. Walker Assault is such an example — a game in which you either have to protect or destroy two Imperial AT-ATs, pitting two teams of forty players against one another. It combines the best Battlefront has on offer, from thrilling ground combat, a wide range of both ground and air vehicles, and the ability to play as iconic characters from the original trilogy (or “heroes”), allowing you to play to your strengths, whatever they may be.

The game also offers an improvement on its predecessors in how it handles its heroes and villains. Luke, Han, Leia, Boba Fett, The Emperor and Darth Vader are all playable in several of the gametypes, as are the Millenium Falcon and Slave I in Fighter Assault. While there was a far larger selection of heroes and villains in Battlefront II, Star Wars Battlefront really nails the experience of being one of these characters, and each play very differently to each other. While the voice acting is a bit stilted and not quite as accurate as one could wish, never before have you been able to step into the shoes of one of the characters from the films to this level, slashing your way through hordes of stormtroopers/rebels with a lightsaber.

However, if you’re looking for a strong single player campaign, this is not the game you’re looking for. While Battlefront does offer a few single player options, these essentially fall into two types — short, easy tutorial style missions, or a basic horde mode, which provides an hour or so of fun before exhausting its content. At times, this does feel like a real let down on DICE’s part, but unfortunately it seems to be the trend for video games in this era — see: Titanfall, Evolve, Destiny, etc.

While Battlefront is by no means a perfect game — its glaring lack of single player, the repetitiveness of some of its gametypes, the handful of maps — it still manages to deliver an incredible experience for those already invested in the franchise. Those who love Star Wars will love this game. For those who don’t, the game just doesn’t provide enough content to warrant its price tag.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *