Friday, September 24, 2004
The game is available in PlayStation 2, Xbox and PC versions.
By MATT SLAGLE
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader may get all the glory, but a new Star Wars video game finally gives credit to the everyday grunts who couldn't summon the Force for help.
The aptly named "Star Wars Battlefront" takes you on a tour of duty through some of the fiercest fights in the movies, plus some you've never seen before.
You'll take charge in epic conflagrations ranging from Hoth and Tatooine from the original movies to Geonosis, scene of heated clashes during the Clone Wars, and Kashyyyk, home world of the oversized Wookies.
I've long wondered what it would be like to relive those silver screen moments.
Based on my experience with the PlayStation 2 version (it's also out for Xbox and PC), life in the trenches is apparently fraught with frequent dying. At least there's no drama of finding out your attacker is your sister or father.
At its core, "Battlefront" is a team-based shooter like "Battlefield: 1942." You lead packs of warriors into battle with the goal of grabbing and holding checkpoints scattered across the theater of war.
There are two ways to win: seize all checkpoints, or obliterate the hundreds of enemy combatants.
Don't go it alone
Unlike the occasional Jedi or Sith warrior you'll see darting around with a lightsaber, you won't last long trying to be the lone hero. Bark orders at your comrades instead. They'll dutifully defend a position or accompany you on an assault.
Each faction -- four in all -- has a variation of the same basic troop types. There's a sniper for long-range covering fire, a heavy artillery troop for blasting turrets and a pilot which dispenses health supplies and ammo and can rebuild damaged vehicles and other machinery.
"Battlefront" lets you control much of the battle machinery, but I particularly enjoyed playing as some of the more ominous robots.
Rolling into war at high speed, I flanked the hapless Republican Clone Army on Naboo before unleashing a hailstorm of laser fire and securing a checkpoint.
While trying to protect the power generator on Hoth, I patrolled the icy landscape in a snowspeeder, tripping up a towering, four-legged AT-AT walker just like Luke and his ragtag rebels did in "The Empire Strikes Back."
As an imperial pilot with the Galactic Empire on the forest moon Endor, I sadistically blasted rebel scum and hordes of cute furry Ewoks with gleeful abandon at the controls of a two-legged AT-ST.
Spacecraft
You can pilot spacecraft such as X-Wings and Tie-Fighters, too, though you're limited to the horizon above the battlefield and can't take them into space.
Side races from the Star Wars pantheon do their best to mix things up in some battles.
Jar Jar Binks' floppy-eared Gungan buddies back on Naboo toss exploding "boomer" balls at the marching droid masses. On the baking desert planet Tatooine, rag-wrapped Tusken Raiders swarm from their encampments with blasters firing.
The game's single-player missions are great for re-enacting the movie battles, but the game's multiplayer feature is what should keep this game fresh and interesting for months to come.
The PS2 permits 12 fellow humans at the same time, while the more powerful Xbox boasts 24 simultaneous players. The PC, meanwhile, can have as many as 32 players.
LucasArts no doubt timed release of "Battlefront" to coincide with this week's release of the original film trilogy on DVD.
Those films will surely forever be an important piece of cinematic history. But for all their bonus features, all you can do is sit back and watch.
For the same $50, "Battlefront" lets you decide whether the dark or light side of the Force prevails.