First of all, I have no positive or negative relationship with the Star Wars franchise, meaning I don't hate it, but I don't love it as well. I've seen most of the movies, but It never clicked with me. Yet, I've played this game for 100+ hours in total and loved it. That's how good Star Wars Battlefront II is.

Secondly, let's get the meaningless stuff out of the way, the single-player campaign is trash. It's there just to say It does have a campaign. That's not the main focus of the game nevertheless. The multiplayer of Star Wars Battlefront 2 is a 10/10 in every aspect. It's visually the best online TPS game, the graphics, the VFX, the sound design, the music, and the atmosphere, are still extraordinary. If It was released today instead of 2017, It would probably be the best-looking game of the year. And the performance is extremely good.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3001356440

The game is insanely fun with gameplay that feels amazing to play with various characters, classes, and weapons. There are dozens of different maps that all look beautiful, and detailed and are all very fun to play. There are also extremely fun multiplayer modes, my favorites being Supremacy and Heroes vs. Villains.

Star Wars Battlefront II is such an underrated masterpiece in its category. It's such a shame to it in its current dead state. It takes minutes to find a match, and It's so hard to find a PVP game, which is the whole point of this game. I wish EA didn't mess up the game's launch with their greediness and terrible servers back then. With new content with each update, Battlefront II could be a hit that everyone enjoyed, even today. I hope they revive this masterpiece or come up with a third game with the same quality and polish. For now, Star Wars Battlefront II remains a blast with my friends in my memory...


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Story
It's important to make a distinction first: campaigns in DICE games exist for one reason and one reason only - to prepare you for multiplayer. They don't exist for story, they don't exist for any sort of lore value, they serve purely as extended tutorials with dialogues. With that in mind, now a few words on the story itself: it's meh. Very, very meh. Brainwashed, die-hard enforcers of Imperial rule switch sides at the first opportunity, Palpatine orders everyone to do Rebel Alliance's homework and start destroying Empire instead of retreating to Unknown Regions, Rebels... Rebels just sit and do nothing. And it's hard to blame them - with such brain dead opponents all you have to do is keep refilling your bowl with popcorn. Campaign is worth a single playthrough, but I can guarantee that you will never wish to return to it.

Gameplay
Gameplay was made pretty arcade-ish to suit all audiences. Weapons overheat instead of needing to reload, there are no medpacks, ammo packs or Battlefield revive mechanic, Starfighters randomly spawn instead of taking off from hangars, etc. It seems everything was concentrated on making the gameplay as fast paced as possible, so spawning as a Clone Trooper and immediately dying while trying to punch a droid is pretty normal here (Just like Christophsis!). DICE's regular attention to detail is very pleasing to see: camera shakes when running, a sound plays when you score a hit on someone, animations are very smooth, armor slowly gets covered with mud on Kashyyyk and Felucia and much much more. The game in general just plays much better than it's 2005 predecessor. Before you scream at me, I have played original Battlefront... for more than 200 hours. All of Pandemic's Battlefronts feel like cardboard, just like old Battlefields of the era.

Progression
Progression is... odd. Thankfully, 2017 backlash did wipe the game clean of the pay-to-win system EA wanted to make (except for one remnant I will mention later). All progression is tied to classes and heroes. Want a DC-15LE? Play more as Heavy. Want a better DPS for Y-Wing's cannons? Play more as Bomber. Want a more powerful stuns for Boba Fett? Just play as him and etc. Upgrades for classes and heroes in this game take a form of cards, which can be bought, equipped and leveled up. However, there is still one odd remnant from the old days of this game - lootboxes. You get all weapons and their upgrades from lootboxes. It's weird because you're unlocking them just by playing - through actual, honest progression. You go to lootboxes only to claim your reward, essentially. Why did they leave this in the game? I have no clue. But it does mean that every time you get a new gun, you have to go back to menu, claim it, and then go back to matchmaking.

Co-op
This was actually a very pleasant surprise for me. Co-op in this game is very decent, but there is not enough of it. As it stands, co-op just mimics the Galactic Assault mode (sort-of). You have to kill everything you see, and either defend, or attack designated Command Posts. Sadly, there is no Starfighter Assault co-op, Heroes vs. Villains co-op or mimics of any other game modes, which, in my mind, would be very welcome. To end this chapter on a good note, I will mention that progression between co-op and multiplayer is shared: you can level up anyone you want through co-op before fighting other players. Neat!

Heroes
Heroes are bearable. Jedi and Sith, at least in my experience, really need highly enclosed spaces to work properly, because out in the open you just get Order 66'ed by every enemy trooper in sight. Boba Fett and Bossk seem to be an absolute overpowered meta. Han, Leia and Lando are just okay. And most importantly, the man himself - Obi-Wan Kenobi - is present in this game. And that's all you need to know.

Customization
Customization in this game is pretty generous, especially for Clones. 212th Battalion, 327th Star Corps, Coruscant Guard, 501st, Wolfpack, you name it. The only ones I feel bad for are the 41st: just what is that atrocious green paint scheme for Phase II 41st? We saw them on Coruscant in Episode III, and they looked nothing like that. As for other eras, you get a lot less: a couple paint schemes for droids, Shoretroopers and Snowtroopers for the Empire, a few races for Rebels and that's it. Overall, it's good enough. Not Halo: Reach by any means, but good enough.

Music
I will not discuss Star Wars music here, as at this point a mere sight of it makes me want to vomit. Nothing wrong with John Williams, but God his music has been overused to death.

Verdict
7/10. If you want to experience DICE's rendition of Battlefront - do it now, as the game is turning 7 this year, and it's on a timer. You can already feel the lack of people in some lobbies and game modes, and EA will eventually kill the servers. So, this is just about your last chance to give this meme a go.

Bonus (100%)
And a little bonus for achievement hunters. All achievements are very straightforward. Hidden achievements are related to campaign, and even if you didn't get them - you can go back and replay any of them very easily. In order to progress faster in multiplayer or co-op just play on weekends or Wednesdays in order to get double or triple EXP respectively. Multiplayer achievements that don't require specific game modes can be achieved in co-op. Starfighter Assault achievements are all luck-dependent, so I can only wish you patience.

I love this game but it is FLOODED with hackers and cheaters. And I'm not being butt hurt or salty. I just got the game on Steam after putting in 100+ hours on the EA store version, and I thought the cheater problem THEN was an issue. I have never seen hacks like the ones in BF2 employ. Forcing the enemy team to spawn under the map so we die as we spawn, or every shot he fires hits EVERY ENEMY ALL AT ONCE no matter where they are, or just tonight I encountered a moron who literally breaks the entire server and spams chat with cringy edgelord ♥♥♥♥ and forces everyone to watch a benchmark camera tour on the map. The only way to get out of it is to force quit your game, because they also disable your ability to click or interact with any menu.

While I adore this game, I cannot recommend it to anyone until something is done, which sadly, nothing ever will I fear. Such a shame.