After having over 20 hours of game time on the original Battlefront, the second edition in the series was impressive. The game is obviously unfinished, as clear from the many bugs and glitches. Despite this, the game was still enjoyable.
Battlefront II changed almost every frustrating aspect from the original. The physics were strange, some maps were poorly developed, and the heros and pickups were very unfair. Battlefront II changes all of this. Instead of running around looking for pickups, you get battle points to spend on reinforcements and heroes. Every time you defend an objective or eliminate an enemy, you get a certain amount of battle points. The beta featured 4 playable ground heroes and 4 playable ship heroes. Both Darth Maul and Rey require exceptional skill, as they have very strong abilities, but low health. Han Solo and Boba Fett were two other playable heroes, however they were rarely open. There were two new ground maps in the Beta, Naboo Theed, and Takodana. The Strike game mode felt very unfair. The First Order would rarely win due to the five seconds it takes to pick up the objective and bring it to the drop off. If a player drops it, it takes another trooper 5 more seconds to pick it back up again. If this time were to be shortened, the game mode would be a lot more fair. Thankfully, EA has addressed this issue and says, “We’re taking a look at some of the most discussed topics, from crates and progression, to Strike mode.”
Battlefront II features several different types of reinforcements. The cheapest in battle points being the rocket trooper. It has a jetpack and rocket launcher, perfect for aerial shots. The second type of reinforcement for the flametrooper/Wookiee. The Wookiee has a bow caster and a thermal imploder making him one of the strongest reinforcements. The flametrooper has an incendiary grenade and a flamethrower. However, many people have said that the flametrooper is weak compared to the Wookiee. Again, EA addressed this complaint and says, “The First Order flametrooper needs some work – we agree he could use a little more… fire power.” As a droid on Theed, you can play as a B2 battledroid or a B2 jump droid. Both of these do the same as the others. Flying has also been completely redone from the first game. No longer will there be overpowered ships that everyone uses, now each ship has their own abilities and play style. You can play as a bomber, interceptor, and assault.
The multiplayer on Xbox worked smoothly. However, the in-game party system was pretty shaky and often would kick your friends for no reason or wouldn’t let you join games with your party. For example, when one player tried to launch the game, it wouldn’t allow them to skip the four minute long intro and they had to watch it every time they launched the game. Several visual glitches would appear at the very start of the game. The textures would be slow to load in an sometimes would break and cover the entire screen. These are, however, just beta glitches and hopefully will be patched for the full game. Other missing features of the beta will be included in the full game was the single player arcade mode, and the single player campaign. Several maps have also been announced in the full game, being nearly triple the size of the first game.
The Battlefront II beta, while currently filled with glitches and bugs, is showing miles of potential. This might be game of the year if EA fixes these bugs correctly. There has been talk about an in game pay to win crate system, which is putting many people off buying. This, however, will not affect the overall quality, as it is not play to win. The official release date for Battlefront II is November 11th, and many people are excited for the rest of the content being released in the full game.
