Oh, how I wish I could play a practical joke on you all and talk about the original Star Wars Battlefront - since EA couldn't be bothered to change the name despite this being nothing like a Battlefront game.
It's funny how apologists for this have said: "I think people are dissapointed because they were expecting a 'Battlefront' game." Well...yes! When I go to McDonalds, I expect a McDonalds! I don't expect a Buger King! If I wanted a Burger King then I would go to a Buger King! But I don't want a Burger King; I want a McDonalds- hence why I came to McDonalds seeking a McDonalds! If you're not making a Battlefront game then it shouldn't be called Battlefront!! Call it Star Wars: Pew Pew Pew!!
But I digress. Star Wars: Battlefront is a first person/third-person (I do like it when games let you seamlessly switch) online shooter set in the Star Wars universe. Amazingly, this game doesn't acknowledge any of the prequels and just focuses on the original trilogy - which, if you're lucky and aren't familiar with the prequels, is a good thing. You get to blast your way through a handful of iconic locations (and some new ones) whilst enjoying the memorable soundtrack. It's just a shame you can't turn it down because it's a bit too loud compared to the SFX.
The original two Battlefront games this one is based off-of weren't masterpieces. They're great 'drop in, have fun, drop out' experiences that won't change your outlook on life but will relieve it if you're a bit down/bored. Before, I would always throw Battlefront 2 into my PS2 on a whim, get a killstreak going, be an unstoppable army of one, then shut the console off and go back to being a productive member of society. Recently, I bought the GOG.com version of Battlefront 2 during a sale, and so the PC version is now installed, modded up, and just a desktop shortcut away. If I need a break from work then I just click the icon, play a few matches (they don't last long because I'm too good) and then return to what I was doing before.
Despite me not being able to just throw the Battlefront disc into my newly acquired PS4 and immediately be killing braincells, I really like how whilst waiting for the game to install I got to play a fun mini-game where you're Darth Vader storming the Hoth base. Why don't all games do this? If having to wait for at least 20 mins before you can start a new game is now the industry standard, then can we at least have stuff like this that lets us get a taste of what's to come in the meantime?
I'll get the obvious praise out of the way first: the graphics are more beautiful than Hercules's posterior. At moments it's photo-realistic. I'm not really bothered by the rock textures, but the snow looks so deep you could sink your hands into it. The forests are so green and lush. I have yet to find a fault in the lighting and shadows. Even the humblest props are lovingly rendered as high as the engine can permit. Projectiles cause dust and rock to fly up. When you shoot at trees, chunks of it break off spraying bark everywhere. The production design also does an outstanding job capturing the feel of the original movies. I almost made an 'eek' noise of pure delight when I spotted Jawas running round the map.
Obviously, because the graphics are so jaw-dropping, then the maps are much smaller and claustrophobic then the previous games. Battlefields are really just a series of tightly-knit tunnels. The detail looks great, but often it meant I kept getting stuck on walls or unable to see enemies. In fact, I wasn't really able to see where I was going. Such maps as Endor and Tatooine are often really confusing to navigate since there are so many trees/rocks that you can't see where anything is. In fact, navigation as whole is a pain because of how tight the maps are. It's not even hard to get a 'return to battlefield' message, whilst in the original games you'd have to really go out of your way to reach the end. Once I even went up a clear pathway that I thought would take me somewhere only to be told that's not the map.
Whilst some gameplay modes revolve around command posts, you can't respawn from these - meaning there's no tactics behind the battles. You can customise your own layout to work out unique ways to get a killstreak going, but in modes where the aim isn't to kill but to complete a task then there isn't much to do aside from run to the objective and hope you don't die en-route. There's no way to issue orders to your fellow teammates, so you can't co-ordinate a flanking assault or double-back and ambush. More importantly; you can't choose where to respawn from, and so you can't work out a way to get behind enemy lines. You also can't force the enemy to go through one chokepoint. In fact, chokepoints are almost non-existent in these maps.
I still don't like regenerating health. The original Battlefront games had enemies drop health-packs upon death, meaning you can run along the battlefield picking these up to regain health. There were also medical bots who could heal you, and the Engineer class had the ability to deploy health-packs. This meant that when you were injured then you had to dive for a pack, or run away to find a bot. If your enemies health was low then you could pursue him/her to finish them off. Here, if your opponent manages to slip away then you might as well just leave them since otherwise their health will come back and they'll be able to turn around and pop you off with a bolt to the skull. And if you're injured then you just need to duck behind a cardboard box and sit there doing nothing for a few seconds until your guts are back behind your ribcage.
Having to find your own aid means that in the original games you had a larger pool of health. In Battlefront, you can die in just a few hits - meaning you're going to get that typical multiplayer experience when you drop dead for seemingly no reason, only to find out it was someone somehow managing to snipe you with a machine gun. You can potentially survive a one-on-one situation, but if there's more than one enemy in the vicinity then you're as good as dead because of how the health system works.
The classes are gone. No longer do you choose from a selection of specialised units. No more sniper class. No more guy with a rocket launcher, or guy with a minigun. Now you start off playing as the default soldier and you have to play the game to earn credits and XP. As you level up, you get access to new weapons that you can buy with credits. But before you can do that then you're going to get repeatedly killed by much higher levelled players who have better items and know where to find all the best powerups. There's also some card abilities that grant you resistance to damage or an increase in damage to certain types. These are the very last cards you level up, meaning that only the people who have sunk a ridiculous amount of time into this game own them. Yes, this gives you motivation to keep playing the game...but you shouldn't need this. I should be motivated to keep playing the game because I'm having a good time. If you're at a party and someones bribing you to stay then that's never a good sign.
It doesn't help that some of the weapons are useless. You can buy a heavy rifle right away, but if you wait around for a bit then you can get another heavy rifle that's exactly the same only slightly better. The same goes with the pistol. This means that when you do eventually level up then you're going to be stuck with an inventory full of junk. Can't I sell my redundant weapons like in Team Fortress 2?
This is really annoying for beginners, but actually if you stick with the game then you'll begin to get it. You can try out various weapon, item, and charge abilities to find out which combinations work for which situation. A rapid-firing pistol works best for tight situations, the heavy rifles are perfect against heroes, and the default all-round rifles are best for the rest of the maps. But you can also get that weapon that's stupidly powerful yet is useless at long-range and takes forever to recharge between shots. Combine it with a jetpack and you can blast your way over to enemies before hitting them at point-blank range in the back for a one-shot kill. This is by no means an overpowered loadout because there's so much potential for this strategy to go horribly wrong - but when it works then it's great fun.
And that's the thing. Despite being a prettied-up yet watered-down version of the original games...I was having fun. I enjoyed absorbing myself in such a distinctly Star Wars atmosphere and I accepted that this wasn't the class-based, almost sandbox-like game I love. Instead, it's similar to an RPG in how you experiment with different loadouts until you find a combination that feels comfortable. I still stuck with my trusty thermal detonator, but I always liked to keep a secondary weapon that compensated for my primary weapon's weakness. If I had a short range primary, then I would equip the pulse rifle just in case. If I had a long-range rifle then I would also take a pistol in the event of an ambush. It was only after spending a good few minutes sitting down working this all out when I realised that perhaps this isn't such a bad remake after all.
A big problem not just with previous Star Wars games, but any game featuring laser-guns, is that the combat never really feels satisfying. This problem is taken care of here. You can feel the pulse of the heavier rifles coursing up your arms as you fire. enemies stagger as they're wounded, and corpses contort as you defeat them. Although, the ragdolls are a little glitchy. Headshotting someone with a pulse rifle often causes their body to go flying up high into the air for no reason.
Playing as the heroes is the best part. Whilst the voices are clearly not the original cast (Darth Vader doesn't even sound close), their animation and playstyles feel truly authentic. Luke Skywalker sprints nimbly, Han Solo dodges, Boba Fett jets about, Leia stands her ground, and Darth Vader stomps whilst breathing that legendary breath. It's also great just seeing them move around the battlefield from a soldier's perspective, and nothing filled me with more terror than seeing the flash of a red lightsaber in the distance. I still think it's weird that The Emperor occasionally decides to fight, considering he's a weak old man who spends almost all of the movies in the shadows, dictating things from behind the scenes. Not that it isn't hilarious seeing a pensioner chain-lightning an army to death...
The polish of this game is clear. If you leave the main menu playing, then you get treated to a series of screensavers where C3PO and R2D2 wander around, occasionally having humorous exchanges. There's also little touches, such as there being musical cues when a hero enters the battlefield and the team in your earpiece saying something like "the smuggler Han Solo has arrived. Crush him!" or "Darth Vader has been sighted. Be careful!" I tried to play as The Empire whenever I could, because occasionally a commander would say something like: "Your Empire is counting on you!" or "Defeat is not acceptable!" Also, I'm impressed with how good the online service is. I never experienced any lag, the waiting times were painless, and I only ever had one instance when I joined an empty server.
But despite how aesthetically presentable this game is; it's still not worth the £40 price tag considering it doesn't have nearly as much content as Battlefront 2; which you can pick up on Steam and GOG.com for about £6. Yes, Battlefront looks way prettier than Battlefront 2; but Battlefront 2 can run in 1080p with anti-aliasing and bloom lighting (impressive for a 10 year old game). The graphics are certainly uglier, but it's not unplayably ugly like some other retro games I've encountered.
Let's compare. Battlefront 2 has 33 unique maps. Battlefront has 18, they're at least half the size, and they're multiplayer only. Because there is no singleplayer.
Wait, my apologies: there is a singleplayer mode. It's just you can get through it in about 20 mins. There are a series of 'missions' that serve as tutorials for all the various gameplay mechanics. These are all welcome, but you don't really have any reason to return to these once done. Aside from that, there's a series of modes where you pit yourself against an endlessly recycled wave of AI enemies. But that's it. As fun little extras, these are nice - but as the singleplayer? No. There's not even a practise mode against bots, so the first time you enter the multiplayer maps then it's with real players who are likely more skilled and with better equipment.
Ah, but what's this? EA have announced that they're going to continue adding new content, so by this time next year there might be just as much gameplay as the previous installments in this franchise offered. Already there's advertisements for an astounding two new maps coming in December, followed by 'full-sized' DLC next year.
This would be an acceptable approach if it wasn't for the fact that this is EA. So, of course, they intend to charge you for all this. Already you can buy a 'season pass' which'll give you access to all the DLC EA might possibly maybe one day if they can be bothered release. In fact, the first thing you see when you boot the game up is an advertisement asking you to spend £40 for the DLC. They're not even trying to be subtle with this downright con.
The game already costs £40 (actually, £50 if you buy it through the Playstation Network). What on earth do you need another £40 for when the £40 already is too much to ask for, EA? That's in total £80 for an online-only game. And if you bought the PS4 version then be prepared for a rude awakening, as if you don't pay £6 a month (£35 a year) for a Playstation Plus subscription then - SURPRISE - you can't play the online part of the game.
Nowhere on Amazon or any other online retailer is this little factoid mentioned. The only warning you get is a minuscule icon on the back of the box saying that a Playstation Network subscription is required for '2-40 player Network Play.' So; don't have a Playstation Network subscription because you don't use your PS4 enough to justify the expense? Welp, you've just paid £40 for a game that already has only 20% of it's content and now you don't even have access to that. Sorry! EA should've probably put a clearer warning on the box, but they didn't because they're EA.
There's no way I'm ever going to be able to play this game with friends. How am I supposed to convince them to pay around £100 for a few evenings entertainment? I have a hard enough time as it is trying to persuade friends to join in online, which is probably why I think developers should stop trying to make gaming a social experience and just make it what it's supposed to be: an artform. Or, at least, if you're trying to create a social experience then you should make it as simple as possible. You shouldn't add a bloody paywall, you dumb turds!
Fortunately, I was able to get a 48 hour free trial. This gave me plenty of time to blast through each gameplay mode and level up enough to get a rough idea of the options available. After that, it was back to the meagre singleplayer. Forever.
And EA are already planning a sequel, so even if you already have a Playstation Network subscription and are spending enough hours playing this game that you think dropping £40 for the DLC would be worthwhile....it's not worthwhile. In about three years or so, another Battlefront game is going to be released - and if EA call it 'Battlefront 2' then I'm going to vomit my lungs out. This means that in about four years the Battlefront servers are going to shut down and you're never going to be able to play this game again. You might want to say farewell to all your money and time wasted now before it's too late.
Maybe this game could be saved if it allowed for mod support. If EA could let people host their own servers with either maps from the game or their own custom-made maps then Battlefront could at least survive for another ten years. Battlefront 2's servers shut down in 2009, but there are still third-party servers out there keeping the game alive. Personally, I've never needed them because I had more than enough fun playing with bots; which again is why Battlefront needs an offline mode if it wants to survive for more than a few years. Even if you couldn't play Battlefront 2 online anymore then it wouldn't be 'dead' because the singleplayer mode offers exactly the same content the multiplayer mode does - it's just you're playing against AI rather than Tim from Surrey.
EA truly are zeitgeists - being the face of anti-consumerism worldwide. There is a comprehensive list of online-only games that EA has released only to kill a few years later by shutting the servers down. There's also a disturbingly long list of companies EA has bought out and then completely dissolved into nothing. And they continue to prosper because everyone, including me, keeps falling for the same old trick they keep pulling. We know it's doomed, but we still get excited about all the trailers, we buy the game the day it's released, we play it, we realise we were fools, EA raises their deflector shields as all the hate rolls in...and then they do it all over again a year later.
If it wasn't for the vastest, most unworthy paywall I've ever encountered in gaming then I would give this game a hesitant recommendation. If this game actually gave you all of the content it promises, rather than forcing you pay for the game all over again and then pay a subscription, I would say it doesn't capture the fun of the original Battlefront - but by itself it's a solid online shooter with a great polish. I enjoyed the two days I got to play online, and the single player stuff certainly wasn't the worst twenty mins of my life that I've spent. I could potentially see myself playing this game beyond the first few weeks after its release if smelly peasants such as myself were allowed onto multiplayer.
Yet, as I said prior: this is a con. Not only do I expect a Battlefront game when I pay the full-price for a game called Battlefront, but I also expect a full game when I pay full-price also. Once more, EA has ripped us all off, and it's entirely our fault because we fell for it. Again.
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| Oh, and there's also this extra minigame, which you can buy for an additional cost. |
