Star Wars: Battle for Naboo

The story has only Just begun

You know the story by now... the nasty Trade Federation is threatening the peaceful planet of Naboo and they've sent in the huge pile of overgrown electric can - openers that are the Neimoidians to take people hostage. While it takes place around the same time as the events in the recent movie. Star Wars Episode One: Battle For Naboo has an entirely different storyline. You play Lieutenant Gavyn Sykes, a young pilot who is just one of the many soldiers on the planet rebelling against the Trade Federation invasion.

Made by the same team that brought you Rogue Squadron this game features 16 missions set throughout Naboo and its surrounding space. Controlling ground, sea and air vehicles you have to fight against Federation battle droids, starfighters and even fully-armoured battle tanks! You get to pilot a variety of craft in your battle against the invaders, including an N-1 Starfighter, a heavily - armoured Battle STAP, a Gain Speeder and a stolen Trade Federation Gunboat! This game is already looking very impressive and if the gameplay and graphics come up to the standards of Rogue Squadron then it's guaranteed to be a hit.

One of the most promising things about Battle For Naboo is that it has a dynamic difficulty setting, which means the better you are, the harder the game gets. So if you thought Rogue Squadron was difficult then you ain't seen nothin' yet! Left just hope Jar Jar Binks doesn't make any kind of appearance, except perhaps as a target!

Good old George Lucas. Not content with setting the standard for silly beards in Hollywood for the last 25 years, the great man has also created one of the most talked-about film franchises ever. The Star Wars phenomenon divides opinion like no other series of films. On the one hand, there's the kind of fan who will happily risk a fearful kicking by dressing up as Darth Maul in public to go and see the new instalment. On the other, there are thousands of film fans who would rather set themselves on fire than sit through another minute of Big George's latest waste of perfectly good celluloid.

Even confirmed fans of the Star Wars films like our team, however, could see that Star Wars: Episode One was brown in large patches from about the first scene onwards. Such opinions mean nothing though, and the fact that the film was pretty shite wasn't going to stand in LucasArts' way, was it? (Actually, I quite liked it – Roy.) So, with all the inevitability of Han Solo having 'a bad feeling' about something, we welcome Star Wars Episode One: Battle For Naboo onto the N64.

Patience, My Blue Friend...

Since the film hardly had enough plot to cover both sides of a Post-It note, only a complete doit would fail to work out what you have to do in the game. That's right, you have to defend Naboo from the evil invasion of Darth Sidious and his nasty gang. To do this, you must pilot all manner of speeders, ships and hoverbikes around the various areas of Naboo and its little area of space, taking out droids, gun emplacements and other expensive pieces of Federation hardware. You form part of a crack defence team, headed by Queen Amidala's former head of security, Captain Panaka. You and your able compadres roam around large areas of, for example, Theed, taking on (and disposing of) all kinds of Federation filth. Although you are completely independent, the feeling of being part of 'the team' is reinforced by the fact that you have to work with a wingman, and watch out for one another when things get heated. The constant radio chatter from the Captain and other team members during battle makes this possible, and is (like lots of the game's features) similar to that found in Rogue Squadron, only much better.

As well as sounding pretty brilliant, Battle For Naboo also looks gorgeous! Say what you like about Episode One's lack of decent dialogue, but you'd have to be a blind cave-dweller to be critical of the film's visuals, and the same is true of its N64 offspring! As you can see from the screenshots, all of the game environments are beautifully rendered, with the architecture and streets of Theed in particular looking absolutely awesome!

But enough about mere graphical thrills – what everyone wants to know is: 'Is it any good?' Well actually, yes, it is. In fact, Battle For Naboo is a great game – even if you don't like the whole Star Wars 'thing'. The designers have obviously taken ages getting the look and feel of Naboo's struggle just right, and underneath the impressively realistic exterior, the levels are, on the whole, pretty challenging and well designed. For example, your team is instructed to defend a farm and its occupants from hordes of Federation droids. Now, ordinarily, you would roam around the fields, sure, but all the droids would stay pretty much in the same area of the farm, right? Wrong! In Battle For Naboo, the computer-controlled enemies actually have a decent degree of AI, which makes a pleasant change, and they attempt to chase you around the gaming area. All of this added depth means that the game is more involving, and the dogfights last longer. Fantastic!

That's No Moon...

Another welcome addition to the good old Rogue Squadron idea is the ability to change ships halfway through a mission. One of the most annoying features of the scrolling shoot-'em-up genre is that the player doesn't often get the chance to change vehicles during levels, but in Battle For Naboo, you can fly into a damn great hangar at certain points throughout the game and exchange your ship for something a little more useful, more nimble or more heavily-armed. This tiny addition to the game adds longevity, because it means that more ships and weapons have to be mastered in order for you to progress in your quest.

One of the best parts of the game is when you have to do battle with the Trade Federation over Naboo's swamps in a heavy downpour. During these sections, enemies fly in to attack your wee fighter on all sides. This leads to quite immense dogfights, and thanks to the well-realised Artificial Intelligence, it can get very tricky and tense. Also, the space-and-swamp-based levels in particular force you to rely heavily on your ears, rather than your eyes. By this we mean that team members instruct you as to which direction you should be flying, and what their chosen plan of attack is, and if you ignore them, you will almost certainly fail! This sense of realism is added to by the fact that the speech, unlike most cartridge-based titles, never seems to grate or get on the player's nerves, even when the game has been running for some considerable time.

The level of involvement with your team members not only helps you through difficult sections of the game, but it is also at the centre of another of the game's key features: teamwork. From the very first level onwards, obliterating Federation gun towers, AT-ATs or droids, only to get the call from a stricken team-mate for assistance. Funnily enough, Captain Panaka always seems the most desperate and panicky when he summons you – not too reassuring, when you think about it. Personally, the fact that your team-mates rely on each other, and don't just fly off and act independently, was my favourite part of the game. This idea had been striven for in Rogue Squadron, but never seemed convincing. It now seems that LucasArts and Factor 5 have evolved the Artificial Intelligence to point where the team-work facets of the game engine work properly – and Battle For Naboo is all the better for it!

Take That, Rebel Scum!

Like all games though, Battle For Naboo is not without its faults. Personally, I think that anyone who confesses to being a massive Star Wars fan is going to end up absolutely loving this game, but the casual SW fan, or someone with absolutely no time for George Lucas' 'Cowboys and Indians in space' lark, might see through Battle For Naboo immediately. While this title has no graphical or aural shortcomings, seasoned players might just find it a tad on the repetitive side after a while. This was the main problem with the likes of Lylat Wars, Rogue Squadron and Forsaken – while they were undoubtedly great examples of the 3D shoot-'em-up genre, question marks loomed over their long-term appeal. Personally, I think LucasArts and Factor 5 have gone to great lengths to improve upon Rogue Squadron's fine example. However, they haven't quite cracked it yet – it still feels as if you're being guided around a linear environment, despite the copious amounts of window-dressing and scene-setting guff that the game throws at you. For example, when levels or sub-levels are completed, you're treated to arty-farty animations, such as the STAP Fighters flying to another area of the besieged city of Theed, or Naboo Starfighters engaging with Trade Federation fighters up in space. When you fly into a hangar to change your craft, another polished, well-rendered piece of film appears. This is all well and good, and ample proof that the companies responsible know how to program for the Expansion Pak, but what intelligent gamers wanted was interesting levels with ingenious challenges, or just loads to do, all the time.

Yoda... You Seek Yoda

Another problem I had with the game as a whole was the simple fact that the licence seems secondary to the whole gaming experience. Yes, the developers have accurately rendered Naboo, and all the ships look right, and the sounds are cinema-perfect, but where are all the famous characters? Apart from the Queen's former head copper, whose role in the film was fairly minor, there are no 'main' characters from the movie present. This came as a bit of a surprise to us all: why would a software company release a game licensed from a Star Wars film, and then not include recognisable segments from the film, or FMV interjections from, for example, the Emperor? The inter-level cut-scenes are all impressive, but none of them particularly give what all Star Wars fans will want from this game: the sensation that you're 'playing the film'. This could have been reached if the developers had intercut levels on the planet's surface with sinister shots of Darth Sidious and his cronies planning the invasion from their fleet in orbit, but this doesn't materialise – instead, we get a long, fairly dull shot of two STAPs chasing each other down a river: hardly what we had in mind when we pictured 'Star Wars game cut-scenes'.

Run Luke, Run!

Sin And Punishment proved that you could use the Expansion Pak for more than just hours and hours of extra scenes that you will only really be interested in watching once or twice. As someone who initially had doubts about the usefulness of the Expansion Pak, I have to say that I've been impressed with the way it has enhanced games like Sin And Punishment, Perfect Dark, and Banjo-Tooie. Having said that, all three of those games have excellent playability and cunning, intuitive level design. After a while, I got the feeling that what I was playing wasn't Star Wars Episode One: Battle For Naboo, but Rogue Squadron: The Director's Cut With Extra Bits And Bobs.

Don't get me wrong – Star Wars Episode One: Battle For Naboo is a great game, and if you enjoyed any of the games mentioned elsewhere in this review, then this new title is definitely worthy of further investigation. At the end of the day, the game works well; the controls are snappy, the craft are designed to be easy to pick up, but difficult to master – like all good space shoot-'em-up craft should be – and, if you can forgive a fair bit of the deja-vu that creeps in after a while, the game's definitely worth sticking with. What annoys me slightly is that all of the above is true because Rogue Squadron had all the same strengths and weaknesses. Sorry to sound harsh, but that's the way it appears to have worked out for the developers, who, to their credit, have produced a step forward from their previous work – just not a very big one, that's all.

Welcome to the world of Star Wars. A world inhabited by brave heroes and evil enemies, where cute Ewoks, fat monsters and disgustingly annoying CGI monstrosities live side by side. The future of the galaxy hangs in the balance and this self-same galaxy is littered with massive star cruisers, vicious bounty hunters and menacing space stations. To successfully create a videogame that appeals to the fans of this space opera, you must ensure that it contains at least some, if not all, of these aforementioned elements. Fortunately, in Star Wars Episode 1: Battle For Naboo, LucasArts has chucked in almost everything but the kitchen sink with the result that if you were a fan of Rogue Squadron then this game should definitely put a spark in your lightsaber.

Battle For Naboo is set in and around the events of the 1999 Star Wars movie. Your character is Lt Gavyn Sykes of Naboo’s Royal Security Forces and it’s his job to scour the planet to help people escape attack and to find pilots, smugglers and fellow officers in order to form a resistance movement against the evil Trade Federation. The various stages are split up into self-contained adventures which require you to choose the appropriate spacecraft/vehicle for the task at hand. Most of these mission objectives are divided into such things as simple ‘search and destroy’ missions, sabotage, reconnaissance and convoy escorts. Each one tests your ability to engage the enemy, understand the radar, protect your comrades and even use stealth to a certain extent in order to save your planet.

May The Fourth Be With You

From the very start, Battle for Naboo is visually very impressive! The scenes and sets from the George Lucas movie are all faithfully recreated and provide a great backdrop for the subsequent action. From the streets of Theed (Naboo’s capital), through the swampland and beyond into outer space, Battle for Naboo delivers some stunning environments. While the game looks excellent without the Expansion Pak, if you are lucky enough to own one then the whole thing becomes even more startling. The added value of the Pak means you get more detail and improved texture to the surrounding areas – all of which improves the look of the game enormously. Every explosion looks fiercer and every craft looks smoother, meaning the overall effect is very pleasing to the eye!

But what about the sound? Well the audio side of things is certainly up to scratch. As with most Star Wars games, this one opens with John Williams’ booming score which sets the scene perfectly. Coupled with some great music which adds a lot to the gameplay (and by this we mean the action is suitably accompanied by the appropriate piece of music), the sound effects and speech are also rather special. In some respects, there is so much music and sound going on that it may be a bit hard to take it all in. At any one time you can hear rousing music, explosions, the roar of engines, speech from droids, radio transmissions and laser blasts pouring out of your speakers and coupled with the stunning graphics, it all combines to perform a powerful assault on your senses! It can be so immersive that at times it’s almost that you’re not just playing the game, but seemingly part of it!

Yadda Yadda Yoda

The actual game itself is relatively easy to get into and extremely hard to drag yourself away from. There are 15 missions for you to battle your way through using any of the seven vehicles you come across. These vehicles range from basic landspeeders through to Trade Federation gunboats and starfighters. Each of these machines uses the same basic control system as explained to you in the instruction book, but each one also handles slightly differently. For instance, while a landspeeder brakes hard and comes to a stop, a police cruiser merely slows right down. Even moving left and right is different between vehicles, with many vehicles swooping and dipping as they move while others handle like any regular car. And how you move also determines how you aim. Land-based machines can aim up and down with ease but something like a starfighter has to be directed straight at its target in order to secure a direct hit! Handling these craft is certainly not difficult, but it can take a little time to readjust to the controls in order for you to manoeuvre your ship around the level with ease.

Although there are many diverse and challenging missions, after a while you can’t help but feel that the game is a little too repetitive. Ultimately, the gameplay comprises roaming vast areas protecting your allies or blowing up the enemy. While there is nothing particularly wrong with this, after a while you do feel the need for a change in style. In the midst of a really good battle, it is all too easy to get carried away as the action never lets up and it’s very rare to find a dull moment. In many instances you lose a mission, not down to the fact you’ve taken one too many hits, but because of an element in the game that is slightly out of your hands. It can get quite annoying when the group’s erstwhile Captain has got himself killed for the fourth or fifth time, because you fail the mission as a result. This is one downside of including a strong team element in the game – sometimes you’ll fail, and it isn’t your fault.

You have to be extremely alert in order to progress through the game, and although this means that the game isn’t going to be too easy, your patience may end up a bit stretched!

Blue Harvest

For those of you who enjoyed Rogue Squadron, this should certainly be on your ‘most wanted’ list, but it’s important to note that Battle For Naboo is slightly more linear than the previous Star Wars title from Factor 5 and doesn’t give you quite as much room to explore. Despite this, Star Wars Episode 1: Battle For Naboo is a solid title that delivers great gameplay and is, when all is said and done, a really ace game. Whether you’re a Star Wars fan or not you’d be well advised to give this the once over!

Even though the words "Rogue Squadron" are nowhere to be found in the title, Battle for Naboo (coming out this fall) could be considered a follow-up to the popular Nintendo 64 shooting title in almost every way except story and setting. Naboo has the same type of flight/shooter gameplay, but this time it takes place during the events that surround Star Wars: Episode 1, plus graphics that make its predecessor pale in comparison. (That nasty fog has been pushed way back.) LucasArts has also added a feature that allows you to switch between two vehicles in the middle of a mission, so you might start a mission in a land cruiser, and end the battle flying through the sky in one of those freaky-looking Naboo Fighters.

Overview

It is a time of turmoil. The Planet of Naboo has become a pawn in a grand chess game orchestrated by the Dark Lord, Darth Sidious, using the Trade Federation as his tool. Trade Federation forces have begun landing on the planet in various attempts to control strategic bases and supply lines to the various regions of the planet. As Queen Amidala races to defend her world at the Senate Council on Coruscant, Trade Federation forces have dramatically increased.

Lt. Gavyn Sykes of Naboo's Royal Security Force finds himself one of the instrumental pieces of this chess game. From piloting a Gian Speeder to flying a Naboo Starfighter, Lt. Sykes must accomplish various missions, from Search and Rescue to Convoy Escort to all-out space battles as he valiantly attempts to defeat the Trade Federation.

Star Wars: Battle for Naboo is a flight combat game for the Star Wars fan who lives, breathes and dreams of being a part of the Star Wars universe daily -- the type who watched Episode 1 at least twenty times a week on the big screen. For everyone else there are few, if any, groundbreaking, mind-blowing features to this game.

Gameplay, Controls, Interface

Battle for Naboo was brought to you by the developers of Rogue Squadron. Folks, I thought Rogue Squadron was a fun game. It didn't have all the dials and screens like the X-Wing or TIE Fighter simulation games, but it had that "arcade" feel -- minimal learning curve, sit down and start shooting. Battle for Naboo is an image-swap of Rogue Squadron: different vehicles, different scenery, different music, different mission objectives, same game.

The gameplay is straightforward. You fly one of seven vehicles ranging from a Heavy STAP to a Trade Federation gunboat to the Naboo Starfighter. You will not have access to all these vehicles at the same time -- as you progress through each mission, you will get the opportunity to choose vehicles appropriate to each mission. This is understandable -- after all, flying a Heavy STAP in space without any way to breathe would be dumb -- but in order to fly the various vehicles, you must complete each mission and survive each area to reach a hangar where you can change to a different vehicle. You have three lives for each mission. Use them wisely; if you die, you start the mission over. And over. And over.

How does each vehicle handle? The same as every other vehicle in the game -- throttle forward, bank left, bank right, roll, sharp turn. There's a problem when you reach the imaginary boundaries of the outer space world and rudely bounce off. Trying to see or track the enemies becomes a difficult task, especially when you are zooming around at breakneck speeds. The radar tells you where the enemies are and whether you are facing forward or backward, but it is often unclear whether you are above or below your enemies until you run right into them or scream past them.

You have primary and secondary weapons. Use your secondary weapons sparingly because you never know what the mission will require, like blowing up a tunnel or taking out tractor beam installations. You also have a selection of three views -- the standard "Fly from Behind View," the "Fly from the R2-D2 View" and the "Fly from the Hood Ornament View." There is a target sight which I never used. Why, you ask? It doesn't really help, especially when trying to lead your shots. My eyes did much better than the sights.

The missions are interesting at first, but then become just plain annoying. I like to fly in and kill everything! Sometimes this is good, but mostly it isn't. You have to complete the mission. If that means letting the Battle Droids in their STAPS kill the civilians, then so be it. Some missions seem impossible -- protecting a convoy of four speeders when twenty ships are flying down your throat, for instance. Granted, if you are an ace pilot who can kill all enemies with one shot per baddy, destroy the tunnel before more baddies arrive and save the town all while drinking a Dew, you must be a stick jockey -- more power to ya! But once again, the mission is all that matters. If you get through with one hobbling speeder, Mission Complete. So it goes with the 15+ missions.

This brings me to a quirky addition to the game. After completing a mission, you are given a tally of kills, how long it took to complete the mission, how many civilians you saved, etc. You are then awarded a Gold, Silver or Bronze ranking. Does this encourage you to try the level again? Not really. Well, it does open up some bonus missions and the Sith Infiltrator vehicle. Oh, and a cute little gallery of concept art and music scores. Sorry to say, that's not much.

Graphics

Take the original Rogue Squadron game, switch the vehicle images, change the colors on the scenery and you have Battle for Naboo. Why so little commentary on the graphics? There is little to say except "Seen it, done that!" Let's move on.

Audio

When I think of Star Wars, I think of the "THX: The audience is listening" introduction which we've all seen before every Star Wars movie. Lucas pioneered the technology, so I expected at least something mind-blowing, if not eardrum-bleeding. To be honest, though, there was nothing at all remarkable about the sound. I flew half the game with the sound turned down. Hearing "I've lost my droid!" twenty or so times got tedious and annoying. There were no screaming TIE Fighter sounds or window-shattering explosions. I love John Williams' music, but "Duel of the Fates" can really make you go crazy after a while!

Multiplayer Support

Sadly, there is no multiplayer support for this game. It would have been excellent if there were -- working with a real person on protecting a convoy, or taking out the battle station while talking out your strategy on a microphone? Cool! Missions would have more substance. Instead, the computer AI has your "teammates" flying off in some other direction. Hello? Need help from a wingman here! Frankly, multiplayer support would have made this game worth the money. LucasArts has done so much better with games like X-Wing Alliance, offering a multiplayer option. This would have made the game for me.

System Requirements

Windows 95/98/2000/ME, Pentium 2 or Athlon Class 233 MHz or higher (266 MHz or higher recommended for Windows 2000), 64 MB RAM or higher, 8 MB PCI or AGP 3D hardware accelerator, 100% DirectX 3D accelerator card, 16-bit sound card, 4X CD-ROM drive, 100% Direct-Input compatible input device, DirectX 8.0 or higher (included on CD)

Documentation

It's your standard jewel case slip booklet. I didn't even read it. No loss, no gain. I miss the TIE Fighter documentation that showed details about every ship. It gave you that "Mission Critical Briefing" feeling when you first got the game.

Bottom Line

This game is a direct sequel to Rogue Squadron. I'll go so far as to say that this game for the Star Wars prequel follows in the same line -- it seems that the developers at LucasArts stepped back in time while technology stepped forward. Nothing original, same old same old. Sorry, George, can't say I'm impressed.

If you are a diehard Star Wars fan -- if you bought every Episode 1 toy and game AND enjoyed them all -- this is your game. If you loved Rogue Squadron and still play it on a regular basis, this game is for you. For everyone else, I guess we can wait for the next episode in the Star Wars saga -- and the next LucasArts flight combat game.

"We will be watching your progress with great interest." --Chancellor Palpatine