I played the first two Battlefronts A LOT because they offered a lot of repeat entertainment when I was a poor college student (and because I was only coming down from my Star Wars fan high. Hard to quit cold turkey you know?). Neither of them are really great games, but they are enjoyable and worthwhile for the price. There isn't a lot too them, but I feel like I got my money's worth.
So why is it, that the new Star Wars: Battlefront feels so....shallow? The first two were just as shallow, especially the first one which didn't even have online multiplayer. Is it maybe because what we get is what we expected a decade ago? Or maybe, because this concept still hasn't moved past the novelty of playing famous Star Wars battles?
For $60 dollars, or $120 if you're an idiot who bought the Premium Addition (Are you gonna tell me there is a SECOND game's worth of DLC coming? Get the fuck out EA), SW:B is maybe half a dozen maps, another half a dozen maps for the modes with small maps, and 10 modes that have been used over and over since Unreal goddamn Tournament. It's just the same shit...but it looks and sounds great!
Here are the modes:
- Supremacy - A large map mode where you try to capture control points like any other Battlefront/Battlefield game.
- Cargo - Which is capture the flag on small maps.
- Droid Run - Which is capture three droids and defend them. Basically a randomized, small map, Supremacy.
- Drop Zone - Which is the exact same thing as droid run but no defending needed.
- Hero Hunt - King of the hill but with Star Wars heroes.
- Heroes vs Villains - An awful mode where you need to keep your hero alive as long as possible but anybody playing as a hero just wants to fight everybody.
- Blast - Deathmatch
- Turning Point - A variation on Supremacy except Rebels are offense and Imperials are defense only with a time limit. I like it but it has ONE FUCKING MAP. One. Hard to find a fullish server since people tire of playing the same map over and over. (this is only available on a free DLC too).
It's Tatooine with wreckage
The other two modes are Fighter Squadron, which is blegh*, and Walker Assault which could have been cool. Walker Assault is a mode where the rebels try to activate nodes so that their bombers can, well, bomb an AT-AT Walker. The Imperial side's job is to shut those off and defend the walkers. It sucks. The maps always put the Walkers on the very edge of the map making it impossible to defend or to even use the map strategically on the imperial side. The rebel side can just activate nodes and camp, forever. It's so poorly scaled.
*Fighter Squadron is just X-wings vs Tie fighters in the air kill, kill, kill the end. Oh, there are transports you need to defend or destroy but goooood fucking luck defending one. It's impossible. It's like shooting a slow moving sky whale. Also, flying in Battlefront has always been weird. I SUCK hard at it and according to end game leaderboards, so does almost everybody else. Funny how one of the mainstay aspects of Battlefront is it's wonky flying. The few that are good though absolutely DESTROY on Supremacy maps with their air strike runs. It's almost unfair.
More like: "AAAHHH, AAAHHH, WHAT DO I DO? WHAT DO I-" dead.
The combat mechanics are casual, as they should be for a Star Wars game like this. It's not a complaint just, whatever. Although I must say, 1st person is the default but I play in 3rd person like a Battlefront game is supposed to be played. Unfortunately, the game is not optimized for 3rd person so I spend a lot of time shooting into my cover. It's so dumb. So many games get 3rd person shooters right so if the option is there, what's Battlefronts excuse? It's worse than previous Battlefront games!
As for those hand full of maps, they're meh. Jakku and Hoth are my favorites even though they both have easily exploitable weaknesses with a good team. The "lava one" is heavily in favor of the imperial side, but it's okay. The wastes are just a shooting gallery with narrow corridors everywhere. Then there is Endor.....FUCK this map. It's too big. It's so easy to flank and so easy to get murked in the middle. You can walk out to the edges of this map and never see another person. How do I know? I DID IT, just as an experiment. I thought something was off and decided to try it. That was a fun 0-0 kill/death ratio for 15 minutes.
This feels more like Predator than Star Wars.
So far....everything I've said is about on par with the first two Battlefronts, but here is why THIS Battlefront sucks. Missing content and my own personal gripes with multiplayer. I know, one can't be helped, but the other can.
Starting with the ladder, I get annoyed when other players ignore the objectives in multiplayer. I never want to be a guy that wants to tell another how to play, but this is stupid. One time, our team was losing so I singlehandedly rushed a control point to capture it and win in the last two minutes. I was there, alone, thinking maybe some of my teammates would come help me capture it faster. I sat there, for a full minute, watching the point get slowwwwly captured since I was the only one there. One minute later, instead of reinforcements, I get attacked by six players from the opposing team who knew I was about to steal their win in the last minute. I took out two of them and went out in epic glory at the very least. More importantly, WHERE WAS MY TEAM? This isn't a complex MOBA. Capture this ONE point and win. The fuck were the rest of them doing?*
*Before you ask, you can see teammates on your minimap and they weren't even trying to help. It wasn't like they were pinned down and just couldn't get to me.
In an opposite scenario, most of the best players typically have around 35-45 kills to 10-15 deaths. For four straight games, I played against possibly the best player ever who topped the leaderboard around 75-3. A K/D ratio like that in a casual game is unreal....anyway, that dudes team lost, every, single, time. What did this guys amazing play do to help his team win? Nothing.* This has always been a something I've hated in multiplayer games. Sure, it works for Counter-Strike but for little else. And if all he wanted to do was rack up a kill count, THERE IS A DEATHMATCH MODE FOR THIS GAME.
*Why not play a MOBA you ask? Well....that's a whole other argument. The team aspect still gets lost there when most of them build with RPG like skill trees yet "there is only one build you are allowed to do otherwise you're the worst."**
**I know some of my Twitter buds are looking at me funny right now. MOBA's just aren't my thing okay. Also, I really don't understand jungling and bots? Why are there bots? Also, also, there are going to be 14 shooter MOBA's coming out in 2016 and they all have the 3 lanes, towers, jungle, minions thing going on.....we sure there is NO OTHER WAY to do this??????
Finally, the missing content. Where are space battles? Where is goddamn Galactic Conquest, aka, the main mode of previous Battlefronts? I know it's just a singleplayer version of multiplayer except it's with and against all bots but common. It had some depth and ideas to it. The singleplayer in this game!?!? Yeah, it exists, I guess, like strapping a dildo to a horses head means Unicorns exist. The fuck is this? Fight some bots with the WORST AI I have seen in years, collect the tokens over their bodies and oh hey! Look! A Tattooine map only available for this stupid ass mode......Wh....wha....what the fuck?
Like it. Love it. Fuckin pay ALL the money for it. Yeah baby.
Why is this here instead of a Galactic Conquest mode? For as shallow as the Battlefront games have always been, this is even more shallow. It's 2016. Why does this game feel worn out after 10 hours of play? People complain about linear games being too short but what about multiplayer only games? Why does the media give these kinds of games a pass? You can do every mode on every map in maybe 3 hours. This is a game that once sold at $120 for more things to come because apparently they released half a game....but at full price.
I don't usually review games this way but EA wants us to treat Battlefront like a toy so I'm reviewing it like a toy. Games don't have to be like this. Even if some games are nothing but toys, they shouldn't be ripping us off.
Fuck this game. It's an okay game as is, don't get me wrong, but it's everything I hate about modern AAA development. At least there are no microtransactions. What a pathetic win for us.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Here I am being way nicer to another Star Wars property.
No comments:
Post a Comment