Da Introduction As I understand Star Wars: Battlefront was originally made for the PS2 and Xbox and then ported over to the PC. With this in mind I asked myself "how does my new favorite Star Wars game play on its respective console versions?" To find out, I rented a copy of the PS2 version and got myself a network adaptor for some serious gametime. My answer to my previous question: the game on a console plays better than ever and I find this unfortunate, as I prefer the PC version (personal bias). I have to say though, personal bias aside, Star Wars: Battlefront is a good game. Da Graphics The frame rate sticks to about 30FPS for the most part, but there are some stutters and jumpy moments that can hinder your aim. One notable difference from the PC version is the look of the game. It's not quite as detailed, to be frank. Endor and Yavin are two good examples. In the PC version, both planets are absolutely covered with bushes, shrubs and other hiding spots that can make navigating the map an absolute nightmare. The PS2 version of the maps isn't as littered with such things, which is something of a double-edged sword if you want to be technical. Yeah, it's a damn lot easier to see, but it doesn't look as impressive, and doesn't properly convey the feeling of a battle fought in a heavily-wooded area. Da Sound This part of the review is easy. If you have watched ANY Star Wars movie, then you know what sounds are in the game. Having access to Lucas Arts' vast library of sounds from previous Star Wars is a bonus indeed when making a game like this. And, from what I have seen of this game, Pandemic has made sure that they have included all the sounds associated with all Star Wars movies and this will make any diehard Star Wars Fan happy. The PS2 version of Battlefront is presented in Dolby Prologic II and the everything sounds good. However, to tell you the truth, I really wonder how this game sounds on the Xbox in the superiour Dolby Digital Format. Guess I will have to give that game a spin on that console to find out. Regardless, the PS2 version is a good sounding game overall. Da Gameplay Battlefront on PS2 is essentially the same game on PC. Objective-based missions, full-scale battles, massive vehicles, many character classes to play as and plenty of targets to kill – Battlefront has it all. And, of course, there's no way to play as Jedi. Just thought I'd get that out of the way. Please don't shoot the messenger. Now then, what is this game about, you may ask? Well, the whole purpose is to drop you down in one of the many scenic Star Wars based locales with an army at your back and another storming in at your door. Players are given objectives, such as to capture a certain base, ala Battlefield, or objective based maps - destroy the shield generator on Endor, the droid drop ships on Geonosis, or capture the carbon freezing chamber on Bespin. Capturing bases is a simple matter of eliminating any nearby enemies and waiting by the spawn point for the color to go from yellow or red to white, then from white to green, indicating that spawn point now belongs to your army for use (as long as the enemy doesn't recapture it). The game ends either when one side has captured all spawn points and holds them for twenty seconds, or when one side runs out of reinforcements. One thing I would have preferred is a little more diversity among the factions. They each have four units that are strikingly similar and only one unique. There's your basic assault unit who carries a blaster rifle, a heavy weapon that uses a rocket launcher and is the game's anti-vehicle presence, the sniper class, and the pilot class, which heals whichever vehicle he happens to be in. The pilot classes have a unique weapon depending on the faction they're with, but otherwise they are the same across the board. The fifth unit is each faction's only real distinctive factor. The clones have the Jet Trooper, droids the rolling Droidekas, Rebels have the Wookiee Smuggler and the Imperials have the jetpack wielding Dark Trooper. Each one has their own special abilities which give a little flare to the otherwise drab armies. I'm going to get started on the bad notes, just to get them out of the way. First of all, the most horrendous grievance I have against this game is the AI. Your allies and enemy AI units are dumb as a brick. And by that, I mean all of them, every last one of them have the collective IQ of a brick. A brick that ate paint chips as a kid. A brick that got dropped one too many times. A brick that liked to stick its pointy ends into light sockets just to see what would happen. In this, there's still no marked difference between the PC and PS2 versions, which is unfortunate. Too often some moron foot soldier will hop in a star fighter or some other vehicle and steal it away from you, going on to smash it into the side of a tree a few seconds later. Granted, you can enter a vehicle and kick out whoever's currently occupying it, but if they're already moving away, you'll have a hard time catching them. The short shrift of it is that the AI is pretty damn stupid, and it's especially apparent in the game's single player mode since they're all you can fight. Enemy units will often ignore players when they're standing nearby. If you happen to be shooting at them and they're not already in motion, they'll politely stand there and wait for you to finish depleting their health. An AI unit in motion is only moderately smarter, since as they're already moving, they have the ability to dodge shots...if you're blind and deaf. Otherwise, they're little more than fodder, even on the highest difficulty setting. It's slightly harder using a controller than a mouse/keyboard combo, though if you've had more practice on a controller you'll do fine. There are a few down points in the game play besides the AI. While you start out a lone foot soldier amidst a massive battle, there are vehicles to be ridden on, in and alongside. These range from the humble tauntauns to the mighty AT-ATs to the Republic gunship to the droid army's weird missile-launching two-wheeler device that was showcased at the end of Episode 2. Now, these vehicles are fun to drive, and they all have their own unique abilities, but to take them down nearly requires another vehicle, so if someone who actually knows what they're doing gets in a Republic AAT, for example, you'll have a hard time blowing it up and getting them out of it. The air vehicles, such as the X-wing, TIE fighter and various other ships are also somewhat flawed. The difficulty is not in bringing them down, but in their speed. The battlegrounds for this game are massive when on foot, moderately large when in a ground vehicle, but they suddenly shrink tremendously when you're flying above at high speed. It's nigh-impossible to fire upon foot soldiers, and it's rather difficult to hit even a stationary target when flying around. I often find myself making several passes just to blow something up. Dog fighting is much improved in the PS2 version, as the DualShock's joysticks make flying easier than with a mouse and keyboard. While that may sound strange, you have more control due to the analog nature of the joysticks, whereas in the PC version the mouse sensitivity can be set to maximum and you won't be able to turn the ship as sharply as with the strafe keys. Okay, the bad is mostly out of the way, so let's get to the good. The game, as a whole, is fun. You may be one lowly foot soldier, but you've got the rest of your army backing you up. This is, at its heart, a game that encourages team play in which you work together with your fellow soldiers to bring down a mighty foe. Fail to do so, and defeat is a certainty. Some have stated that many maps only have one way to win them. These maps include the battle of Hoth, where the best way for the Rebels to win is to get in the snow speeder and take down the AT-ATs via the tow cable. This is only possible when flying with a copilot, as only the copilot can fire the tow cable (as in the movies). Or, the fight for the shield generator on Endor - a team of Wookiee Smugglers should use the speeder bikes, traverse the forest on the outskirts of the battle, plant time bombs and capture the base there. People have complained that there was only one way to accomplish a win on these maps, and this simply isn't true. While the game does give you objectives you can complete for the win, you can also deplete the other side's reinforcements. At the beginning of a battle, both sides start with a certain number of reinforcements, usually either 200 or 250, but the number may vary. When one soldier dies on either side, the number of their reinforcements is reduced by one. So, when all the reinforcements on any given side are reduced to zero, that side would automatically lose. So, in essence, there are two ways to win any given map: the right way, and the bloody way. Personally, I prefer the bloody way. Bring on the fields of corpses! The single-player game makes an honest attempt at luring you into its clutches. You have the option of going through either the original trilogy battles (Episodes 4-6) or the prequels (Episodes 1-3). This is your basic play-a-level, kill everything, complete the objectives, win and move on to the next stage. There's also Galactic Conquest mode, a different sort of beast. Here, you select a time period, then a planet out of eight to begin your conquest. Assuming you win, you can then use a bonus provided by the planet you conquered in your next battle. These bonuses include sabotaging the other side's vehicles so they have only 10% health, jamming the enemy's radar, or my personal favorite, having a Jedi hero of the era (Either Vader, Luke, Dooku or Windu) help you in the battle. These Jedi are, for all intents and purposes, invincible, and going near them is as good as committing suicide. Galactic Conquest only ends when you've captured and fully conquered all eight planets and have total domination over the galaxy. The only problem with both of these modes again goes back to the AI. It's too easy to win a map just by shooting these well-designed statues. This game practically screams online play, and while that's not necessarily a bad thing, they could've done a little more with the AI so you're not required to seek out human life to get a challenge. The online aspect of the PS2 version is vastly improved from the PC version. It's much easier to select a server, for one thing. Less random, more controlled. In the PC version, the server list doesn't stop pulling down servers, and thus the server you clicked on a second ago may not be the same one you originally selected. It's a simplified process in the PS2 version, where you just use the controller to pick one and you're off. All right, enough of that, as I must now go into a narrative diatribe. It is a laugh and a half to be up in the massive AT-AT, raining blaster-laden death upon the fools below. It is fantastic fun to blow the hell out of droids scurrying away from your Republic AAT. It is hilarious watching some poor sap be dragged off into a Sarlacc pit because he was too stupid to keep his distance. And of course, it is always great to blast the hell out of the Gungans. Da Conclusion I'd like to believe the PC version of a game ends up the better one due to superior hardware and the ability to patch any mistake. However, when just starting out, the PS2 (and I assume Xbox) version jumps out of the gate and gets an early lead in terms of overall quality. Online play is easier. Controlling star fighters is easier. The graphics may be of a lesser quality and the frame rate may not be as stable as on a good PC system, but as someone who doesn't give a whit about graphics and only mentions them for the sake of completeness, I can say I would vastly prefer the PS2's increased ease of use over the PC's unbelievably difficult interface. Now, this could all change soon. The developers are already working on a patch for the PC version to fix certain problems, but the PS2 version is getting a patch as well. I'm not sure how the latter is supposed to work, but aside from my obvious PC bias for this game, I'm still having fun with both versions. Aside from all superficial difficulties, Battlefront is just plain great fun, on any system.