In Star Wars Battlefront 2 (PC, PS4, Xbox One), the strong always get stronger. A strange concept, according to our author Schuhmann. It reminds him of physical education back in the day.
In physical education during my school days, soccer was occasionally played indoors. The problem was: Some kids were in a club and already quite good. Others couldn’t do anything with the ball at all. Also: girls and boys played sports together at my school. Always tricky.
In short: There were problems. Some were much stronger, faster, and better with the ball than others.
Back then, the gym teacher established the rule: Whoever scores a goal has to go out. The good players thus had a handicap. They then tried to avoid scoring themselves, passing the ball and attempting to assist others.
If physical education had followed the rules of Star Wars Battlefront 2, the top soccer players would have become a bit faster and stronger with every goal. After 5 goals, they would have mutated into Cristiano Ronaldo, dizzying girls with special moves and then smashing the net with a powerful shot from 20 meters.
A good example of how one can imagine it is shown here:
For the guy in the blue jersey, it’s sure a big deal – but probably not for the kids.
Star Wars Battlefront 2 makes the strong even stronger
In Battlefront 2, strong players accumulate “combat points”. For a kill, for an assist, for “playing well”, they earn points that they can exchange for upgrades.
For 2000 points, you can switch to a special class, and for 6000 or 8000 points, you can unlock a hero. That hero is really powerful; one could also say overpowered.
Against a Yoda or Darth Vader, as a “normal player”, one is scared. He can slash through infantry, just like Cristiano Ronaldo goes through a leaky defense.
I played the multiplayer mode of Star Wars Battlefront 2 for several hours over the weekend. For me, as a shooter novice, the most I can do at the end of a match is to roam around as a Wookiee for 3000 points. But even that feels much stronger and sturdier than the infantry, which gets wiped out almost casually.
Moreover: Top players not only get stronger during the match, but they also quickly earn credits and thereby loot boxes, which further strengthen their accounts and provide them with additional bonuses.
Anyone who wants to see what it looks like when a top player reaches “Cristiano Ronaldo” status in Battlefront 2 can enjoy this video of a fully equipped Darth Vader:
Don’t strong players need a handicap rather than more power?
This power economy has strange effects on Star Wars Battlefront 2:
- Players who are really good will tend to love Battlefront 2, because the game rewards them and elevates them over others, over the infantry. The game spoils them, giving them an immensely good feeling. If you read somewhere: “Battlefront 2 has become a really good game”, that statement likely comes from a really good shooter player.
- As a beginner, on the one hand, there is the lure of getting better and rising to the “Jedi ranks”, but you will have to suffer quite a bit to do so. Those at the bottom of the food chain do not have as much fun as those at the top. This applies to every shooter, but especially to Battlefront II.
Like in soccer back then, the skill in Battlefront heavily depends on experience. Many who quickly rise to Jedi in a match have years of shooter experience in titles like CoD or Battlefield. The skill difference in a normal 40-player match is enormous, as you can always see in the leaderboards and MVP awards.
Counterexample: Morphies Law – the better you are, the easier you are to hit…
Wouldn’t it be more interesting for a game like Battlefront to impose a handicap on good players?
In the shooter Morphies Law, game models become larger the more damage they deal. This makes it easier for others to hit the “top players”. Meanwhile, weak players shrink during a match, making them harder to hit and allowing them to hide in places inaccessible to the giants.
Well, that is the counterexample. Maybe a bit extreme for the mass market.
- But couldn’t we in Battlefront 2 let top players compete only against other strong players through matchmaking?
- Or is it precisely the drive to become powerful that makes Battlefront 2 something special?
What do you think?
Read more about the single-player campaign of Star Wars Battlefront 2 here:
Campaign Star Wars Battlefront 2 completed: The semi-strong power
