Formal disclaimer: This Guy is a Star Wars fanatic. He will attempt to get through this review of Battlefront 2 with as little bias and fanboy ranting as possible. You have been warned.

Like any reasonable fan, this Guy has been ecstatic to see Star Wars reenter the mainstream public consciousness these last couple of years. Millions of people around the world get to re-experience being a kid, and diving into that marvelous space opera, and some even get to introduce their own children to the franchise for the first time. It’s great. of course, when there is an awakening in the Force, there’s always a light side and a dark. A balance. Always 2 there are. . . I’ll stop. The point is, reawakening the franchise means new Star Wars games, and that’s always a good thing! The Force Unleashed, Knights of the Old Republic, the original Battlefront 2. And this one does have some good qualities, but overall is a rather middling entry into a franchise that deserves better.

“I still remember my last orders. The day the real war began.”

There is a lot of good here. EA made the first Battlefront with solid, smooth gameplay, but the lack of content was the biggest gripe people had with it. No no campaign. No space battles. And only a handful of maps to play on. Battlefront 2 fixes these immediately. There is a solid single player campaign. Space battles return, better than ever. And the game launched with 11 multiplayer maps, with more planned through free DLC. Heroes are also back, and will remain free as well. But there are more problems there. We’ll get to that.

The campaign itself, taking place just after Return Of The Jedi, follows a Stormtrooper Commander, Iden Versio. After the destruction of the second Death Star, and the death of the Emperor, Operaton Cinder into action. Iden’s missions become shrouded in mystery, and the Emperor’s final intentions remain unknown to all in command. Iden finds herself torn between her duty, and her conscience. You can guess the rest. Derivative and predictable as it is (when is Star Wars really not anymore?), the campaign is a hell of a lot of fun. We get a lot of familiar locations, the return of our favourite OT heroes, and multiple awesome space battles.

The gameplay itself is everything Battlefront was and more. The action is smooth and the graphics are great. The cinematics look terrific (and even better on a 4k HDR capable screen). The multiplayer ranges from 16 players to 40, and never loses a step to lag or frame rate drops (playing on the Xbox One X at least). Where the game does suffer is its insanely frustrating load times. Everything from the campaign levels, to the Arcade mode, to the multiplayer takes what seems like forever. And if you leave multiplayer, you’re treated to an equally long load back to the main menu.

“Today, the Rebellion dies.”

Now, EA has gotten a lot of flak for Battlefront’s shaky release, including a sharp drop in stock value, temporary though it may be, and it’s for good reason. They seemed to have thought that delivering free DLC, something many respectable developers are doing nowadays, entitled them to rip off players in other ways. Battlefront 2 has loot crates, and not simple cosmetic ones either. Loot crate to collect crystals, in order to unlock Heroes for multiplayer, and certain small gameplay advantages. You were also able to purchase (with real money) extra crystals to unlock these things sooner. After the hugely negative backlash they received, EA suspended the ability to purchase crystals just prior to release.

They also received bad feedback for the inordinate amount of time and credits it takes to unlock certain heroes. 15,000 credits gets you Luke or Vader. And just prior to release, EA lowered the amount of credits you receive for completing the campaign. On top of that, credits earned from playing Arcade (offline) are capped at 500 PER DAY. Now, This Guy understands the need to limit some of these credit earning avenues. A player could create custom games, where you win in 10 seconds with 1 kill and rack up credits all night. But the limit extends to their “Battle Scenarios” as well. These are small mini campaigns EA created themselves for you to play. If you choose to play through this secondary campaign BEFORE hitting the multiplayer, you’re literally forced to play it over a number of days in order to receive any benefit of it. No all-nighters for Star Wars fans this time. A player who insists on finishing the Arcade scenarios prior to multiplayer, would need an entire month to unlock one of the top 2 heroes in the game.

Now, if you can get past the credit bullshit, and the loot crate nonsense (which WILL come back once they finish “balancing” it), and the insane load times, Battlefront 2 has a lot to offer. Overall, you can tell a lot of effort and love went into the game. The characters are respected, all the old favourites show up. The level design is authentic to the films, and the space battles are epic and intense. That said, there will forever be an air of controversy over the awful decision for the pay-to-win direction the EA tried to take, offending fans worldwide. It’s an unfortunate misstep, since at its core the game is a lot of fun, with a solid campaign and ridiculously smooth multiplayer (even if the load times are atrocious). All said and done, it’s an acceptable installment into the franchise, but don’t be surprised if there is a sharp turn in the next Star Wars game we get; maybe even a new developer. We could do worse than EA, but then again, we could do a hell of a lot better.

This Guy Scores: 6.8/10