Due to last-second changes to Star Wars Battlefront II's hero costs, I decided to hold my review, and won't post it until I have firm grasp on the new flow of the game. Electronic Arts clearly heard the uproar from the gaming community about the inflated costs of heroes, and slashed their prices by 75 percent. This is not a small tweak. It completely changes my take on the game – moving from an evil time sink to potentially reasonable. I need to dive back into all of the modes to see if any other changes were made.



For instance, during my review, completing the campaign earned players a unique loot crate that contained 20,000 credits. That reward is now 5,000 credits. A big change. What else is different? I need to find out. One thing I hope EA is addressing is Arcade rewards; after completing five challenges, I was alerted that I could no longer earn credits in this mode and that more would be available in 14 hours.



The cost of heroes and the push for players to buy loot crates were my two biggest complaints. The loot crate hook may still be there, or maybe it isn’t. I can’t say definitively at this point. I need to play more of the game, which I will gladly do, as I think all avenues of multiplayer are fantastic. It delivers that Star Wars fantasy in a big way, both in gameplay and the visuals. This is easily one of the best-looking games out there.



I can also say I didn’t enjoy the single-player campaign. Iden Versio’s story starts on a strong note, but quickly falls apart. For the sake of spoilers, you may want to stop reading here. EA doesn’t follow through on the promise of seeing Star Wars from a different perspective. Iden has a big change of heart that completely sucks the soul out of the experience. It ends up becoming a cookie-cutter Star Wars story that is upended even further by lengthy, player-controlled hero cameos.



How long I’ll have to spend with the game again remains to be seen, but I am looking forward to jumping back into the multiplayer and the awesome space combat. Yes, you heard right: The space combat is quite good. Think Rogue Squadron, people.