Star Wars Battlefront Review

[Shredder]

Star Wars Battlefront reminds me why I love Star Wars. Its skirmishes unfold across iconic planets, with gorgeous landscapes and sweeping vistas on a massive scale. Endor's trees dwarf us. Tatooine's desert stretches for miles. And when the battle music reaches its peak, and I glide over Hoth's frozen trenches, I'm right back in my childhood living room, watching The Empire Strikes Back for the first time.

 

But Battlefront lacks the longevity that makes its source material great. It offers initial engagement, and for the first 10 hours, it swept me through its harrowing firefights at a rapid pace. But then the cracks began to show. In the end, Battlefront feels more like an homage to Star Wars than a substantial Star Wars game in itself.

 

And yet, what a beautiful homage this is: dynamic lighting, vivid textures, windswept forests--developer DICE has crafted a nuanced, detailed world begging for a closer look, enveloping you at every turn. Rain glistens on drooping leaves. Icy crystals extend from cavern walls. You can even see clouds of dust billow across Tatooine's arid scenery.

 

This is all stunning, of course, but it's Battlefront's sound design that truly reels you in. The ambient wildlife surrounds you and explosions carry through bunker walls, even as the pitter patter of rain strikes ferns in the wind. It speaks volumes that I considered turning the ubiquitous soundtrack off at times, just to hear the detail in Battlefront's world.

 

Luke's force push is best used against groups.

Luke's force push is best used against groups.

Beneath all this grandeur, however, are shallow experiences. Maps look fantastic, yes, but they lack focused design. Endor's undergrowth lends cosmetic appeal, but not much cover. Hoth's barren fields impart a sense of distance, but few creative sight lines.

 

There are exceptions in some of Battlefront's locales, however--Tatooine's blend of exterior and interior environments, for instance, creates engaging battles from one match to the next. By darting into a nearby bunker, I avoided AT-ST fire. This also allowed me to flank a trio of enemy soldiers at a nearby capture point, and with a barrage of grenade launcher rounds, I cleared them out. Battlefront's best maps encourage these tactics across its various game modes.

 

And make no mistake, there's an abundance of game modes here. Star Wars Battlefront offers nine competitive variants, each of them distinct, for better or worse.

 

There's the spectacular Heroes vs. Villains, which plays out exactly how it sounds: as if a box of Star Wars action figures came to life and, unsure of what to do next, resorted to violence. There's Droid Run, a unique variation of zone control in which the zones shift locations throughout the match.