Almost since the beginning, Star Wars

see deal Star Wars Battlefront II [Online Game Code] $59.99 on Gamestop

Every IGN Star Wars Game Review 112 IMAGES

“ Crucially, DICE absolutely nailed the basics.

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Microtransaction Reaction Shortly before Battlefront 2 officially launched in 2017 it was filled with egregious microtransactions that were not only greedy, but disruptive to the game as a whole. If you didn’t want to grind for hours to unlock playable heroes then you had to pay actual money. Star Card upgrades were locked behind similar time-sinks and pay walls that made multiplayer feel like more of a chore than a game. Thankfully, EA listened to feedback and removed those just ahead of launch, but the grindy progression remained. Fast forward a couple of years, though, and, all of that’s now been removed as well. Today, the only things you can buy are cosmetics like new outfits and emotes, so there’s no hint of pay-to-win in play. Star Cards are completely gone, leveling is now based on linear XP gains, and all heroes are open from the beginning.



Alternatively, you can earn these cosmetics through loot boxes you can’t pay for. It’s a good, fair system, and thankfully entirely separate from progression – that makes these boxes exciting to open because the cosmetics don’t come at the cost of character upgrades and unlocks. Or, if you buy or upgrade to the Celebration Edition of Battlefront 2, every paid cosmetic, emote, and victory pose is unlocked from the very beginning.





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“ These fights can be truly the stuff of Star Wars “What If?” fan-fiction, brought to life on screen.

Every Planet and Location in Star Wars Battlefront 2's Multiplayer 18 IMAGES

“ Capital Supremacy mode is both one of the busiest and one of the best.

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“ Galactic Assault can take a while, but it’s the only game mode that spans all three eras.

A Lackluster Campaign The campaign in Battlefront 2 is unchanged since our original review, other than the addition of a new epilogue chapter, titled Resurrection. Unfortunately, this doesn't add much more than an extra two hours to bridge the gap between the main campaign and the sequel trilogy of films. Overall, it's no better nor worse other than being slightly longer. Everything else Tom Marks said in his original review about the campaign rings true to this day: "It mostly follows the story of Imperial Special Forces commander Iden Versio – a fierce leader who still manages to express compassion from her position within the Empire – from the final moments of Return of the Jedi into the era of The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi. Despite its darker choice of perspective (we haven’t seen much from the Imperial soldier point of view since 1994’s TIE Fighter), the plot moves forward in a fairly unimaginative fashion from there. It’s a shame Iden doesn’t get more time to develop as a character because Battlefront 2 does a decent job of introducing her (outside of some stilted dialogue in the opening scene) as a competent, sympathetic person. But Battlefront 2’s campaign doesn’t really have much of a cohesive story to speak of in which for her to complete a believable arc. Instead, it feels more like a series of barely connected missions across a smattering of recognizable locations, featuring the major characters you’d expect. It’s essentially digital Star Wars tourism tied around the loose concept of Iden’s battles in the final days of the Galactic Civil War. Not enough time is devoted to Iden and her relationships to give her pivotal decisions the context they need."





Crucially, DICE absolutely nailed the basics. Take the mechanics of firing a blaster: It feels just a bit chunky, as it should, with that signature sound bursting with each shot. And even though every weapon shoots similar-looking bolts, they all feel extremely distinct out of the box and can be customized further.I gravitated towards the Heavy troopers because of their powerful LMG-style weapon, mobile shield, grenade, and a special that let me shoot continuously like a minigun without overheating. It’s excellent for suppressing fire, especially if you’re on the defending end of the final phase in Capital Supremacy and need to keep the enemy back at all costs. In between the main classes and the big hero units are specialty units like Arc Troopers that get electric mines and dual pistols, or rolling Droidekas with heavy armor and deployable shield domes. Coordinating attacks between the practicality of the standard troops and flashiness of heroes is a lot fun and makes Battlefront 2 feel special.What’s great about Battlefront 2 is that it lets you play with all of its toys, no questions asked. Every character class and playable hero is available from the start, and the tedious unlocking grind from launch has been completely removed. Luke, Vader, Boba Fett, Rey – you name them, they’re all here.As you level up you unlock new ability cards with passive upgrades such as increased health regeneration speed or a bigger grenade blast radius. They’re designed as ways to refine your playstyle, rather than make you dramatically stronger, and it’s a fulfilling system that rewards sticking with a class without forcing you to.You’ll spend most of your time as Battlefront’s basic soldier classes, but as you play you earn in-match points that you can eventually spend to spawn as a hero. That can seriously turn the tide. These iconic characters are absolute killing machines, and when you clash with another hero it’s extremely memorable. The list has been growing since launch and now includes everybody from Obi-Wan and his Force push to lesser favorites like General Grievous, including his ridiculous saber windmill attack. Pitting original trilogy Darth Vader against the prequel trilogy Anakin Skywalker hero is far more entertaining than it should be.It doesn’t feel like an exaggeration to say that, in terms of scope and breadth, EA and DICE have released just as much new, free content for the multiplayer side of Battlefront 2 as it already had at launch. They’ve dished out new maps like Felucia and Geonosis, exciting new game modes, a litany of heroes and villains, new ships for aerial combat, and dozens of cosmetic skins.Battlefront 2’s maps now feel like a Greatest Hits selection of the entire Star Wars galaxy, pulling from all three movie trilogies plus one-offs and the cartoons. The dense greenery of Felucia is a great contrast to the brown wastelands of Geonosis, and fighting across the Cloud City in Bespin is a blast. Naboo’s capital city, Theed, is one of my favorites, since it’s an outdoor urban setting, unlike most of the other battles, and is full of buildings that make it a great stage in the larger 40-player game modes. Every mode has an extreme level of map variety, and that makes it easy to fall into that “just one more game” mentality because you’ll see something new every time for a long while.The catch is that finding a match is hit or miss depending on the game mode and time of day. It’s not very difficult to queue up for the main modes like Capital Supremacy and Galactic Assault, especially on PS4. But smaller modes, like Hero Showdown and Hero Starfighters, can take a few minutes of waiting before you can enjoy them, which is a shame. They’re not the main attraction by any means but I’ve had some good fun with them.In Hero Showdown, two teams of two heroes each face off without respawns for multiple rounds. It’s a bit like Gun Fight in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, but instead of guns and knives it’s blasters and lightsabers. Similarly, Hero Starfighters pits two teams of four hero ships against each other, but this time dying brings you back as a standard starfighter until one team has lost all their hero ships. Letting you immediately take control of these recognizable characters is awesome, putting a fun spin on the standard modes, but they don’t seem to command the same amount of popularity. Having so many different modes to choose from seems to have split the player base thinly across the best ones. The least popular modes, like the capture-based Jetpack Cargo or Blast (which is just team deathmatch), are often complete dead zones with no players at all – they were never as thrilling as the larger-scale battles, but I don’t always want to spend 30-40 minutes in a single match, so having something quicker and faster-paced available would have been nice. I was never left unable to play, though, because the Quick Play option is a reliable fallback that will always drop you into what’s hot if you aren’t picky. That said, the limited choice queues cause can occasionally be disappointing all the same. It’s also a bummer when the only active mode is something you don’t want to play at all, like Ewok Hunt or one of the Starfighter battles for the third time in a row.Galactic Assault evokes a similarly grandiose feeling, but instead of changing maps partway through depending on progress, the levels are more multifaceted from the beginning. In Galactic Assault, all three types of warfare are happening at the same time: aerial fighters, ground vehicles, and foot soldiers. The objectives vary depending on the map, but usually involve capturing points, escorting large ground units like walkers, overriding systems, or planting bombs.Note that while Capital Supremacy currently only covers Clone Wars locations, it’s getting updated in early 2020 to include sequel trilogy content in addition to other Rise of Skywalker-related updates coming to Battlefront 2. The fact that EA continues to push out updates for a game that’s over two years old, especially after such a rocky launch, is extremely commendable. We haven’t seen that new content yet, but if it’s of similar caliber to past updates then it will only serve to make Battlefront 2 even better.