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About three weeks ago I returned from a weekend retreat with one thing on my mind: playing Street Fighter 4. After spending a few minutes catching up with my roommates I cheerfully turned my PS3 inserted the disc and waited… for nothing. I won’t go into the details but an hour (and much loud cursing) later it had become abundantly clear that my PS3 has lost the ability to read discs.
For the next couple of days I received quite a bit of good natured teasing about my sudden abundance of free time. I live with three roommates, all of whom at one time or another have been addicted to one of my games (Little Big Planet and Valkyria Chronicles are particular favorites) and quickly everyone began asked me how soon I would send it out for repairs. Unfortunately I’m a college student with a student’s bank account and since my warranty is expired… I’m not sure. With spring quarter almost over I’ll soon be making enough money to send the PS3 off to be fixed, but until then filling the gaming void in my life has been a challenge. Most of my friends aren’t gamers so I can’t even obnoxiously hover over their systems. For now however my gaming salvation has come from a surprising source: Star Wars Galactic Battlegrounds.
For those who aren’t familiar with the game, Galactic Battlegrounds is Age of Empires II with a Star Wars paint job. I first played the game while I was in junior high and on the tail end of a childhood obsession with all things Star Wars. Having been betrayed by many Star Wars games in the past I was understandably leery of the brand by then. A friend who knew me to be a fan of the Age of Empires series however burned a copy for me (sorry Lucas Arts) so he would have someone to play with online. Now although I play RTS games occasionally I’m not particularly good at them. Therefore most of my memories of the game revolve around be owned by my friend online. So while shifting through a pile of old PS1 games in my room, finding Battlegrounds among them surprised me since I haven’t played the game for at least 7 or 8 years and of all the PC games I’ve played it isn’t among my favorites. Even so in my current gaming starved state I loaded the game onto my low powered laptop.
What I’ve found has been a lot more fun than I first imagined. The player has a choice of playing as the Rebel Alliance, Empire, Naboo, Trade Federation, Wookies, and last but certainly least the Gungans. Gameplay follows the standard RTS mold, i.e. start with a base camp and then use workers to collect resources needed to build an army. Having played quite a bit of AOEIII it took me a while to get used to playing an older version of the franchise. But with the game play being identical to AOEII it didn’t take long for me to begin to play with some skill.
Naturally however the fun of the game comes from the Star Wars nostalgia it brings on. Beginning with the soundtrack featuring most of the best John Williams has to offer. Then there is the cheesy voice acting. All of your favorite characters are present and none of them sound anything like the way you remember. While I’m sure this annoyed me when I first played the game years ago now it just makes me laugh. Even better are the voices and lines given to the soldiers on the field. Accents are liberally used with the Imperials mostly sounding British, the Rebels are mostly American but find room for Irish as well, and the Naboo even featuring a Jamaican accent. The actual lines of dialog are fantastic. My personal favorite is frequently uttered by Imperial Walker’s when they are ordered to attack: "He won’t be back for the sequel." Battlegrounds thus far has been the most enjoyable when I’m making my own fun. Mostly this consists of sadistically slaughtering Gungans, but the map editor offers infinite possibilities allowing the player to use classic as well as expanded universe characters (Mara Jade!) on their maps.
While I’m still counting the days until I can use my PS3 again, Battlegrounds has filled the time amply. If you have a copy lying around somewhere I would recommend giving it a look. The game isn’t perfect, but still offers good time killing fun. And take it from me; destroying Gungans with the Galactic Empire is very very satisfying.