Star Wars Starfighter

"LucasArts earns a little redemption."

Not being a big fan of Episode 1, and not very impressed with LucasArts' offerings as of late, I wasn't exactly following this game's development. But, being hard up for something new to play, hearing good things about the title, and having been impressed by Rogue Squadron on a friend's N64, I decided to take the plunge and try out Starfighter. Thankfully, LucasArts has delivered a great game blessedly free of Gungans or charmed little brats.

Video: 8/10
As with most PS2 games, Starfighter looks great. I'm still waiting for a game to really and truly take advantage of the PS2's power, but this is a very good first-generation use of the hardware. Draw-in distance is never a problem, and while objects themselves are a little bland, it's more than made up for by just how much crap is thrown onto the screen. Swirling dogfights of 20+ fighters, around half a dozen capital ships or perhaps a huge base, are par for the course during later stages of the game. Unfortunately, framerate and game speed can take a hit when a large enough battle is going on, but it's never enough to be a real nuisance. The zoom-in effect of the ''sniper'' mode is also done really well.

Audio: 8/10
I swear, the audio must be the easiest part of developing a Star Wars game. Put some of those brilliant John Williams instrumentals in the background, pillage the Star Wars foley disc (you know LucasArts has one) for sound effects, and you're done. The only thing that's left is voice acting, and Starfighter handles that pleasantly as well, with dialogue rarely coming off as too bland or cheesy. It's all good. I guess the only thing that bugs me is that there's nothing new here. We've all heard ''Here They Come'', ''Duel of the Fates'', and everything else; it would have been nice to be treated to something all-new.

Control: 8/10
Starfighter controls smoothly and fairly precisely. If you use the default control setting (there are three others), the left analog stick controls pitch and yaw, and the right stick controls roll. Sensitivity of the analog sticks is customizable in the options menu. Face buttons fire your weapons, the D-pad is used to order your wingmates around, and shoulder buttons control boost, brake, and sniper mode. Sniper mode is one of the nicest features of the game--hold down R1 and you can zoom in for precise aiming and leading of faraway targets. It saves a lot of time boosting towards targets and is often the only way to kill enemies fast enough. Targeting is ingenious, as well; an auto-target function will select the nearest enemy or threat that's been called out by your wingmen, or you can manually target by holding down square and placing the gunsight over the new target. Once an enemy is targeted, your wingmen can be ordered to attack or defend it with the D-pad. The wingmen are very intelligent and will follow your orders to the letter (thank goodness).

The only drawbacks of the control are that it's kind of easy to lose your orientation on planetary levels, resulting in you flying upside down. A quick push down on R3 can remedy this, but it's still distracting. Similarly, there's a ''ceiling'' on some planetary levels that can be a pain when fighting high-flying targets. Also, the game occasionally ''forgets'' inputs when multiple buttons are pressed--if you zoom, boost, charge your secondary weapon, and fire at or nearly the same time, a second press of one of the buttons might be necessary. Finally, braking and turning causes your ship to ''slide'', which can be useful for skating around corners and throwing off enemy fire, but it can also kill you if you were braking to get a tight turn in a canyon run. These are all small nuisances, though; on the whole it's easy to acquire and lead targets, and flying through tight spaces is rarely a problem, even using the in-ship view.

Gameplay: 8/10
I mentioned Rogue Squadron earlier in this review, and Starfighter seems to play mostly the same way. For those unfamiliar, the game is a mostly free-roaming flight simulator/shoot-em-up, but it's clearly an arcade-style game. Those looking for authentic flight simulation should go elsewhere. You can choose a viewpoint either just behind or inside the cockpit of one of three ships, from which you acquire targets, shoot, and destroy them. At first, you'll be required to use a particular ship for each mission (as the storyline dictates which of the three characters is participating), but bonus items can be unlocked that will let you use any ship in any mission, or use a fourth hidden ship. Oh, and for fans of the original trilogy, sorry, no ''traditional'' ships here, just stuff from Episode 1. The ships are really only somewhat unique, with speed/maneuverability and secondary weapons being the only real difference between them. Though using each ship's secondary weapon effectively is necessary, I think a more drastic difference between the ships' capabilities would have made for better playability (and replayability).

Credit has to be given to the PS2's power for making this game possible. Never before (at least in my experience) has a game done such an excellent job of really making you feel like you're in a Star Wars battle. Missions take place both in outer space and on planetary surfaces, with a variety of goals like protecting targets, taking out particular targets, and just plain surviving against onslaughts of enemies. It's not just you against the enemies, either--wingmen accompany you on some missions and will respond intelligently to your orders, attacking or defending targets as you designate. Not only that, but the wingmen also provide useful information about the how the battle is evolving, barking out new targets and warning you if they're being overrun. The various scripted ''events'' of the battles come off without a hitch--it really feels like the battle is going on in real-time around you (which, for the most part, it is).

Things can get a little bit repetitive on the outer space escort and dogfight missions (find target, aim, destroy, wash, rinse, repeat) but the planetary and assault missions require quick reactions to changing battle conditions (listening to your wingmen's updates is vital for selecting the greatest threat), and careful selection of which targets to destroy. Letting auto-targeting select your targets for you on these missions will likely not work too well on the higher difficulty levels. Fortunately, looking at the bonus objectives will give you some indication of tactics that would work in your favor.

In addition to the basic objectives of the missions, the bonus objectives are what award bonus items. Each mission has three bonus objectives, and completing one, two, or three (whilst still completing the mission objectives) will award a bronze, silver, or gold medal. These medals unlock the bonus missions and ships. There are fourteen missions in the main storyline, that can each be played at three difficulty levels. Six more missions, as well as two-player capture-the-flag and race modes, can be unlocked by earning medals. Playing through the game on Easy will likely only last a few hours; the difficulty levels and bonus objectives give the missions some replay value for those who are interested, but how much is debatable. I unlocked everything, and completed almost all the missions on Hard, within a few days of dedicated playing. This could make the game more suited to a rental for those that don't think they'll get a lot out of the two-player option.

Overall: 80/100 (gameplay score weighted x4, each other score x2)
Starfighter definitely redeems LucasArts' lackluster recent performance somewhat. It's a solid game, and I can't emphasize enough that there's a real rush to be had from the sheer scale of the battles--this is the closest a game has come to providing the feeling of being locked in a massive, hundred-ship Star Wars battle. It is a must-experience for fans of Star Wars and flight-action games like Colony Wars; however, since the twenty missions only last so long, a rental might be enough to get everything out of this title.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 03/05/01, Updated 04/25/01