Star Wars Battlefront on Xbox One

For the past year, video games without campaigns have been struggling to hit their mark on gamers. Star Wars Battlefront is another game that excludes a single-player experience, yet DICE has been fully committed to making the best Star Wars multiplayer experience that gamers have ever experienced. Have they achieved that? Oh yes, Chewie, we’re home.

The most striking thing you’ll notice upon entering Star Wars Battlefront is the game’s gorgeous visuals and stunning sound design. DICE has gone on record saying they wanted to give players an authentic Star Wars experience, and they’ve done just that. In terms of immersion, playing Star Wars Battlefront is the closest thing you’ll ever get to stepping onto these planets yourself. They look, sound and feel just how you remember them in the movies.

Stampeding through the forest moon of Endor, I’d never been in a more engrossing game – Stormtroopers buzzing past me on speeder bikes, Darth Vader leading the charge with his moody lightsaber. It was enough to stir a new devotion within me; I felt compelled to make the Empire proud.

Star Wars Battlefront offers plenty of variety when it comes to shooting, slashing or running over enemies. Just like DICE’s other well-known shooter, Battlefield, Battlefront has a lot going on in the war zone. Unlike Battlefield, however, Star Wars Battlefront’s shooting feels more arcadey – which isn’t a negative whatsoever.

With the arcadey feel, you never have to worry about reticle bloom, bullet-drop, or running out of ammo — which is actually a delight amidst all the action. This makes the action fast paced, frantic and above all, balanced. Most of the time, when you lose in a 1v1 situation, it’s your own fault and there wasn’t a time where I believed it to be unfair.

What some players may find striking is the ability to draw the camera back and play in third-person. This can even be advantageous, as players who master this camera style will have a better field of vision. That’s not to say the first-person camera angle is shabby either; it feels just as good.

A new and intriguing concept is Battlefront’s Star Cards, which players can activate during matches to access various equipment like grenades, rocket launchers and sniper rifles. There are also Charged Star Cards, which give boosts to things like accuracy, vehicle damage and the like. To balance things out, cards have an activation cooldown as well as charges for each card. You can replenish charges by finding some on the battlefield, or buy them with credits in the main menu.

One of the main issues with Star Cards so far is that some lead the pack as must-haves. With gigantic open spaces in Battlefront, it feels almost necessary to opt for the Pulse Cannon – a charge-shot sniper rifle. While all Star Cards are useful, there’s definitely ones that aren’t as powerful in battle as others.

Also interesting is Star Wars Battlefront’s power-up concept. Throughout the map, there will be tiny blue emblems on the ground that a player can pick up. These can be vehicles such as an AT-ST or even a hero character to take control of. This concept works considerably well and allows even the less-skilled player to make a difference in a match. It’s a random mechanic, but still a fun one.

Perhaps the most desired power-up is the hero summon. Here you can call down a hero character such as Luke Skywalker, Han Solo and even the notorious bounty hunter, Boba Fett. These characters are by far and away the most fun action I had in Battlefront. Slaughtering enemies with famous Star Wars characters is gratifying on an entirely new level, and will make anyone feel like a badass. I only wish there were more of them. Four more heroes will become available with the $50 season pass, but so far, with only three heroes on each side, it made the selection feel bare. Where’s Chewbacca or Lando?

Since Star Wars Battlefront is lacking a true campaign, DICE threw in some cooperative missions and game modes. These feature Survival and Battle mode, which is similar to Call of Duty’s Kill Confirmed mode. All of these missions are fairly forgettable and nowhere near as fun as playing online.

It’s a real shame that Star Wars Battlefront lacks a dedicated campaign mode. With the power of this engine and the engrossing sequences in the game, DICE could have created something truly spectacular. The multiplayer is stunning, players may yearn for something to play by theirselves, something similar to the original Battlefront’s Galactic Conquest mode.

Coming back to the multiplayer side of things, easily the best mode available in Star Wars Battlefront is the Walker Assault variant. This was the premiere choice in the beta, and still remains the most endearing mode of Battlefront. The strengths of this level stems from the variety in gameplay. You have vehicle engagements, hero clashes, and enormous 20v20 multiplayer maps. This is the way Star Wars Battlefront is made to be played.

There are other modes that you’ll be familiar with if you’ve played other shooters, such as Cargo, a Capture the Flag styled game mode. There’s more unique matches as well, such as the Heroes vs Villains gametype, where three random members of your team are chosen to be the movie characters. Once all three heroes of either team are defeated, a point is awarded. First to five points wins the match.

The most fun I had besides Walker Assault was Battlefront’s Fighter Squadron. Here you face off against enemy players and AI alike in the sky. There’s also hero characters in this mode as well, like Boba Fett’s Slave-1 and Han Solo’s Millennium Falcon. Each of the planet’s aerial landscapes is breathtaking, especially if you’re in your ship’s cockpit view.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjpId5mGfRs

The only weakness with these game modes is the maps. Granted, there’s twelve of them, but more planets would have been much more welcome than the four on which they take place. Where’s the prequel love? Seeing a battle take place on Coruscant’s streets or its skyscrapers would have been thrilling. Why settle for Sullust when we should have had ground battles on Mustafar? There’s still immense variation with different maps on each planet, but I’m sure we’ll eventually see plenty of DLC – for better or worse.

One part of the multiplayer that still needs work is the spawn system. There were multiple instances where I simply snuck around enemy players and slaughtered them as they came in (forgive me). I’ve never pitied anyone that I’ve killed in a video game, but this massacre of online players made me consider putting my weapon down. It doesn’t happen that often in Battlefront, but it’s extremely difficult to get out of the camper’s line of fire once it does.

As a massive fan of Pandemic Studios’ original Battlefront titles, it was disappointing to see that DICE didn’t have any space battles in their iteration. Space Assault from Battlefront II was good fun, in which you had dogfights in deep space while also trying to take out the other team’s capital ship. DICE could have knocked it out of the park, and hopefully we see this mode in a future installment.

Despite the lack of space, Pandemic Studios particularly succeeded with their blend of new and old Star Wars. Sure, the original trilogy is vastly superior, but prequel content is appreciated too. Granted, with Star Wars Episode VII right around the corner, it’s a good marketing move to stick to the originals. Hopefully, though, we can see more content from the newer movie other than just the planet Jakku.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HeVbX8m8xVc

The elephant in the room for Star Wars Battlefront – is it truly worth the money? With extremely limited cooperative missions and modes, Battlefront is all about multiplayer. I was extremely disappointed when they announced it wouldn’t be shipping with a campaign, so I was genuinely surprised to have fallen in love with the multiplayer this much. How valuable and attention-holding a competitive, online experience is to you will be key, but DICE has done well to package this multiplayer game with the sights, sounds and action to impress.

It’s easy to wish so many different things for a Star Wars game. There is so much content in and love for this universe. Easy all the same to imagine how beautiful a campaign or space battles would be; but these wishes felt like a craving for more rather than an upsetting lack, and this is because of the accomplished, immersive experience Battlefront delivers. For a Star Wars fan, or anyone who loves extremely polished multiplayer action, Star Wars Battlefront is a must buy. Even though it looks limited from afar, you’ll immediately realize that Battlefront has quite a bit to offer. Although the game only features four planets, all the maps available are tremendous amounts of fun. It’s refreshing to see the Battlefront franchise back and in great hands with DICE.

Score: 4/5