New game channels childhood
Star Wars Battlefront due out in November and puts fans in grunts’ boots
LOS ANGELES — Oh, if my seven-yearold self could only see me now.
I’m a Rebel soldier on Tatooine, Luke Skywalker’s twin-sunned homeworld, valiantly trying to defend a network of interconnected canyons from an invasion of Imperial forces. First it’s just Stormtroopers, who I easily cut down with my blaster rifle. But as time goes on they’re joined by snipers, more powerful Stormtroopers with jetpacks and energy shields, and even a gangly (but deadly) ATST walker.
Ah, but I have tricks up my sleeve too.
I’ve got a co-op partner backing me up, a jetpack of my own that I can use to leap across chasms, and even an orbital strike that I can call in to vaporize the AT-ST in a huge blast of energy.
It’s the most realistic Star Wars world ever created in a video game, and it’s a huge kick to be inhabiting it. Let’s just say that ain’t a lightsabre in my pocket right now.
Star Wars Battlefront — a reboot of sorts for a franchise last seen with 2005’s Star Wars Battlefront II — is coming to the PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC on Nov. 17. Where the previous games were created by the now-defunct Pandemic Studios, the new Battlefront is being developed by DICE, the Swedish subsidiary of Electronic Arts that’s responsible for the popular Battlefield series of games.
While the game will feature appearances by iconic characters like Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader, for the most part Battlefront puts players in the boots of the grunts waging war for either the Rebel Alliance or the Galactic Empire, spanning several familiar (and some not-so-familiar) worlds and encounters from the original trilogy.
“We’re doing some crazy stuff that’s not in the movies,” said DICE general manager Patrick Bach during a chat at this week’s E3 video game expo in Los Angeles.
“We want to do the things you didn’t do in the movies, as well as the things you did in the movies.”
While Battlefront is set entirely during the period of the original trilogy, it will share some connective tissue with this December’s Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
An add-on mission in the game takes place on the planet Jakku — homeworld to The Force Awakens’ Rey — and we will see how a giant Star Destroyer ends up crashing onto the desert world. (The hulk of that ship can be seen in the opening shot of the latest trailer for the film.)
Which means Bach and his people, who have been working closely with Lucasfilm for the past two years, have probably seen all kinds of cool footage and props and assets from the new movie, right?
“I can’t speak of that,” Bach said with a sly smirk, and no amount of Jedi mind trickery could convince him to talk.
My battle on Tatooine was part of a Star Wars Battlefront mode called Survival, which pits players against waves of enemies that increase in numbers and power.
Later on I dove into a chaotic 20-versus-20 multiplayer battle on the icy world of Hoth, this time as an Imperial Snowtrooper trying to overrun the Rebel scum.
Come this November, as I’m jetpacking through canyons on Tatooine or taking cover in trenches on Hoth or riding a speeder bike through the forests of Endor, I have a feeling that I — and my seven-year-old self — will be pretty pleased.