It was supposed to be a perfect celebration of the original Battlefront games. 20 years of one of the best Star Wars series there has been. Instead… Aspyr, what have you done? It’s a mess, riddled with bugs and other issues. And the main reason to buy the collection – the multiplayer… Well, so much for that. But, while I could talk about all those issues plaguing the nostalgia of these games, so many places are already doing so that I want to offer something else.
These games are classics. Some of the best of the entire Star Wars franchise. As such, I want to focus on the positives of what made them so great to begin with. Sure, there’s things in the Classic Collection that dull the experience somewhat (I’m certain the control of… everything, is messed up), but that’s not going to stop me from enjoying the positives of what these games can offer.
Starting with the first Star Wars Battlefront, this wasn’t my first. But it’s still one I love very much. A variety of maps from across the original and prequel trilogies, including the original location of Rhen Var. Aside from a few era-locked locations, both eras are playable on them all. While conquest is the only mode available, it is a lot of fun, with each map having its own major activity points.
The caverns of Rhen Var Harbour, the central platform of Bespin Platforms… there is a part of every map where furious battles are held. The more open maps having multiple. Tatooine Dune Sea is one such map. And that one is such a unique one for not only having third party control points, but also the sarlacc. Get too close to it, and there’s every possibility you’re going to be grabbed by it and need to respawn.
Those third party control points are owned by the Tuskens, who have no vehicles of their own but can still put a dent in the reinforcements of both sides. Speaking of vehicles, the first game allows spaceships to be flown around some of them, with the Dune Sea being one of those maps. Get good at controlling them, and you can easily give your side an advantage.
Since everything in this first game relied on conquest, the extra modes feel like side distractions than anything else, but are still fun to play. Galactic Conquest with this game is a simple winner stays on scenario. As such, it can be won very easily. Even easier once you take control of the planet that allows you to bring the faction’s hero into play. They can’t be killed in this game, after all.
As for the campaign, it simply is conquest on maps in a set order, with both Clone Wars and Galactic Civil War campaigns. Pretty much all of them feature the two factions of that era, but a few feature third party factions. Especially for those of the Clone Wars one before the Clone Wars actually kicked off. The story just loosely follows the plots of the films with a few bonus missions to lengthen them.
Battlefront 2 is the one I remember most fondly, having been the one I first played. The one that got me into Star Wars in the first place. And the one I spent who knows how many hours playing. There’s a lot to this one. More than just conquest, even if that is the basis still for both Galactic Conquest and the campaign. Battles now can take place in space, with maps for the ground battles including more from Revenge of the Sith.
Along with conquest and space assault, hunt and capture the flag are also here. Depending on the map, that capture the flag could be one flag or two. Either way, you’d be heading for the enemy spawn. As for hunt, this pits one of the regular factions against third party ones such as wampas, gungans, or ewoks. Or, for Tatooine, jawas vs tuskens. Since heroes can now be controlled, an assault mode focused exclusively on them also exists. Originally just on Tatooine, the Classic Collection has brought it onto every map.
The standard conquest remains the same, just without the spaceships on certain maps. The almost sandbox nature of conquest allows battles to be what you want them to be. Duke it out as a regular trooper, take one of your faction’s vehicles and gun down the enemy, or sneak to their base and take one of the other faction’s vehicles. Sit in a turret, stay back and defend your own capture points, or take a frontal assault to capture some of the enemy’s.
All the other modes operate on a point system rather than a reinforcement one. Hunt also has a timer just in case battles go on too long with little action. Not that such will be the case in most instances. Capture the flag is my favourite aside from conquest and space assault. Just a singular objective, and without using heroes a tough one. Also available in space maps, the focused action always provides a lot of fun.
Galactic Conquest with Battlefront 2 employs a proper galactic map with cruisers that move around it. Turn-based, and with more strategy involved, it is always a fun if lengthy one to play. Instead of planets providing bonuses, they now supply credits. Those credits are used to buy the bonuses. Along with all other classes except the regular trooper. This was a mode of many tactics, where a single mistake could potentially give the enemy an advantage.
For the campaign, it might once again tell a story closely linked to that of the films, but how it did so was different. From Geonosis to Hoth, the battles featured have beginning and ending cutscenes narrated by a clone trooper of the 501st. Each mission is no longer just a conquest, but instead have various missions such as defending an area, collecting something, and destroying emplacements. It even includes space battle missions, which for some reason it allows you to skip.
Both of these Battlefront games – but the second especially – have been highly rated by me since I first played them. I have no experience of playing them online against many people. Just the many hours of splitscreen on the PS2 version of Battlefront 2, and later online with a friend on PC. There is just so much genuine joy I get from playing either of these just against the bots. And now I’m doing that on the Switch. And in handheld!
Which does bring me back around to the Classic Collection. To the many issues it has. And even though I absolutely love the Battlefront games of this collection, I couldn’t recommend this to anyone. What Aspyr have done is stain the brilliance of these games. What should have been a new generation seeing these game in their prime is instead a new generation seeing the flaws that should never have existed with them. Flaws that have only been introduced because of what Aspyr have done to them.
Yes, they have all the Xbox DLC of the original versions, but so does the Xbox backwards compatibility versions. So does the PC versions through mods. If you can get the games on either of those platforms, I’d advise you to do so rather than relying on this collection. I can only hope the many issues it faces do get fixed, but I’m not exactly confident that will happen.
Images Taken From:
Star Wars: Battlefront Classic Collection | Nintendo Switch [Docked]
