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SW: Empire at war
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Reviews |
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This Page has been viewed 17,217 times
GameDaily
Score: 4.5/5 Stars
Snippet: This game has its presentation down. From the game box through to the very units and ships themselves, everything feels like Star Wars. Playing Empire at War is a great deal like taking control of every actor in the movies. In fact, there is a button on the console that allows you to watch the action you're commanding in a cinematic camera mode. The game becomes very, very cool at that point - even more so than it was. Sending in a fleet of Y-Wings to take out the shields on a Star Destroyer looks cool in normal mode, but in cinematic mode it's downright awesome.
Yahoo! Games
Score: 4/5 Stars
Snippet: As for the range of spacecraft and ground units, if you saw it in the original trilogy, you'll most likely see it in Empire at War. From speeder bikes to Death Stars, it's all here, and implemented with considerable sensitivity to its source. It's certainly the Empire that comes out on top in the cool gadget stakes, as the movies don't provide many Rebel ground units beyond soldiers and Ewoks. Also, the Empire's various classes of Star Destroyer all come with multiple squadrons of TIE fighters and bombers ready for use, so their fleets require less on-the-fly management.
1up.com
Score: 8/10
Snippet: The unit balancing on the ground lacks the depth that having an "air" plane of combat would introduce, and all combat lacks upgrades for resources or experience, which could have given more strategy to your choice of units (and upgrades). Combat can instead come down to whether you twitch one second faster and wipe out your enemies' counterunits before they wipe out yours, and an entire battle can snowball from an unlucky first encounter when a key unit is destroyed right off the bat.
IGN
Score: 7.6/10
Snippet: In keeping with the spirit of the franchise, the two sides in the conflict have unique advantages and limitations. The Rebels, for instance, have ready access to all kinds of information on the status of Imperial forces. The Empire enjoys no such luxury. In order for the Imperial player to discover what's going on, he or she will have to send out bounty hunters or probe droids to gather information. The Empire will also find it a bit easier to build up massive armies to smash their way through the Rebellion's defenses.
Gamespot
Score: 8.7/10
Snippet: After you get a handle on all the activity going on across the galaxy, Empire at War boils down to amassing raid fleets and invasion parties and knocking over one planet after another while trying to hold on to the ones you've gained control over. The larger and more sprawling your sphere of influence becomes, the more difficult it is to keep tabs on everything, and you'll probably find yourself swearing under your breath when your opponent raids a lightly defended planet that you forgot about.
Gamespy
Score: 4.5/5 Stars
Snippet: The good news and the bad news is that Star Wars: Empire at War is not a conventional real-time strategy game. On one hand, this is a great way to stand out. It does a wonderful job of bending, breaking, and often reinventing the normal RTS rules to create as Star Wars a feel as you could possibly hope for, short of sitting in a theatre and being fourteen years old.
FiringSquad.com
Score: 83%/100%
Snippet: The graphics in Empire at War are gorgeous. This is easily one of the most attractive games we’ve seen, which takes great advantage of modern graphics cards. Perhaps the only missing major feature is support for HDR lighting, but given how rare that is anyway, I wouldn’t be inclined to knock Petroglyph, the game’s developers, over the head with it. Long gone are the days of inferior graphics for a Star Wars title.
Gamepro
Score: Fun Factor: 3.0/5.0
Snippet: Empire at War's multiplayer games are disappointing. With bland maps and virtually no opportunity for base customization, the land battles are really only interesting when hero characters join in on the action. It's cool to see The Emperor blow through squadrons of soldiers with his force lightning, or corrupt enemies to fight for the dark side.
Bit-Tech.net
Score: 8.7/10
Snippet: Because you're not producing units within the map - all your unit allocation and production is handled at the galactic level, if you remember - there's the ability to bring down reinforcements, if you control a suitable landing area. However, there's no real strategic important to the landing areas: one would have hoped that getting to the centre of an Empire base and controlling a reinforcement area there would enable you to bring down troops and destroy the tyrannical bastards from the inside out. However, that's not really the case: areas are inevitably stuck out on a limb somewhere.
Gamerz Edge
Score: 9.0/10
Snippet: For me, EAW had about an hour learning curve including some time spent reading their very well put together manual. The in-game tutorial was also welcomed and quite helpful, as was R2’s pop-up information in the HUD. Had I played more AoE 3 or Rome Total War, I would have probably been a bit better prepared for some of the elements in EAW that I personally was not very accustomed to, like the flexibility and strategy behind the Galactic Map and shifting units around to different planets. These tasks were hardly grueling, and actually contributed to the enjoyment I had with this game.
Hooked Gamers
Score: 7/10
Snippet: I was incredibly disappointed by the lack of an opening movie. That said, the main menu more than made up for it. And what a bold statement: it's the cockpit of a TIE Fighter, and through the front panel you watch as a space battle unfolds. If you were lucky enough to be a PC gamer (and Star Wars fan) in 1995, the imagery will stir within you the memories of the best space combat game ever made - Star Wars TIE Fighter. I refuse to believe this is just a coincidence; Petroglyph wants the player in that frame of mind when they start playing Empire at War. It's a bit of a double-edged sword though, as the later Star Wars space combat games never lived up to their predecessor. Empire at War suffers from a similar fate - despite having many good qualities, it doesn't manage to fulfil its potential.
Gamers With Jobs
Snippet: Star Wars: Empire at War is a game that flirts with greatness, but one that ultimately struggles to find an identity, pace, and cohesion. Empire at War promises epic battles across multiple Star Wars worlds. It offers players the freedom to dominate or liberate the galaxy as they see fit, or follow a story relatively parallel to the events leading up to and encompassing Episode Four. And, in the first dozen or so hours you spend with the game, you’ll likely recapture, if briefly, that Star Wars magic that once held you (I presume) so enthralled.
PC Gameworld
Score: 90/100
Snippet: Rarely have I seen an RTS game with such an adaptable AI component. It will hit you where you're weak and avoid the planets where you have half a fleet of Star Destroyers waiting to crush all comers.
Gamerati
Score: 8.0/10
Snippet: The beauty of the game is simply that - it's astounding. On our test rigs, the game shows shockwaves and heat ripples when there's an explosion. The water shimmers and splashes when units travel across it. The dust storms are, in fact, dusty. As far as visual quality goes, I couldn't ask for more from any real-time strategy game.
JustPressPlay
Score: 9.36/10
Snippet: Although the game overall might not be challenging enough for hardcore RTS fans like I mentioned, most gamers and especially Star Wars fans will find this game very appealing with a lot of longevity.
Action Trip
Score: 84/100
Snippet: As you'd expect, the audio design is first-rate. When ordered around, units and heroes react with a variety of vocal responses and you'll also find the usual array of familiar sound effects from the Star Wars universe. The whole game is accompanied by J.W.'s well-known score, with an additional theme or two that was done by veteran sound editor Frank Klepacki.
GameAxis
Score: 7.8/10
Snippet: All the units that you’ve seen before in the movies look pretty close to their cinematic parents. The new units, in particular rebel ground units, less so, but then I suppose you could rationalize that as the Rebels using whatever they can get. However, for a place as large as a galaxy, it's pretty odd how the planetary surfaces themselves start to all run together. Oh look a swamp planet. Oh look, another swamp planet. Hey a water planet that looks suspiciously like the water planet we just conquered...
Euro Gamer
Score: 7/10 Stars
Snippet: That's the problem with multi-tiered strategy games like this: even in Rome Total War, in which the real-time sections are exquisite, the temptation is just to auto-resolve so that you can get on with the conquest. Unless you're really bent on making all those fiddly battles bend to you whim (as many Rome players are) then you're simply going to give up after a few goes. Empire At War doesn't have the visual flair or the tactical titillation to keep your nose to the grindstone, and those planetary fights become a ticklist of reinforcement balance and turret erection.
Empire-At-War.com
Score: 6.9/10
Snippet: If you've played the demo before the full game, then you really won't find much here than what you've already seen. The game grows tiresome after such a short while and you just wish that something exciting will happen, but it doesn't. The whole experience just feels unfinished, unpolished and has very little to desire.
Game Over Online Magazine
Score: 72%/100%
Snippet: Subsequently, beating the computer on the land or in space is easy, super easy. The single player campaign, which runs a storyline between the end of the third movie and the destruction of the death star at the end of the fourth from either the rebel or imperial viewpoints, presents no challenge at all if you’re just patient, build your forces, and attack en masse in space and with a ground force incompatible with his defenses on the ground.
Gamespy
Score: 4.5/5 Stars
Snippet: The good news and the bad news is that Star Wars: Empire at War is not a conventional real-time strategy game. On one hand, this is a great way to stand out. It does a wonderful job of bending, breaking, and often reinventing the normal RTS rules to create as Star Wars a feel as you could possibly hope for, short of sitting in a theatre and being fourteen years old.
GameZone
Score: 8.5/10 Stars
Snippet: First of all you have to realize that when you create a building (such as a barracks), units do not automatically come out of that building like every other RTS on the planet. Instead players can only call upon those forces at predefined reinforcement points. I really liked this idea because you can create units from any planet that you own, and then call them down at these points.
Next Level Gaming
Score: 7/10 (Average)
Snippet: As the Rebels, you do not invade neutral planets, you are not trying to repress the people you are trying to free them; instead, you can gain a bonus to your resources by stealing them from the Empires coffers directly. Send in a special unit, like Han Solo and they will start to siphon off cash for your use. As the Empire the opposite is true, you do not have the ability to steal credits from the Rebels, instead you must make it yourself, but you have no qualms about suppressing neutral parties. Think not that you will be defenseless if the Rebels start to steal your hard earned credits, you can always send a bounty hunter after them. The same system works for technology; the Empire can build research buildings and discover new advances, where the Rebels can only steal the knowledge from the Empire.
Gameguru Mania
Score: 78%/100%
Snippet: The only part I really enjoyed about the land battles was playing the Imperials and controlling Darth Vader. He kicks some serious butt in the game. Both land and space battles can be played in real-time, but if you desire you can use the Auto-resolve option. The space battles are very 2D, but will appear 3D - if you switch to the cinematic camera which is pretty cool.
Lan Game Reviews
Snippet: The graphics are also another subject to discuss. Flat out, they don’t feel like moded sprites. They feel like they were made for the game and that the game was made for them. The other nice thing about the graphics is that they use them for all the holographic transmissions and cut scenes. This keeps you focused on the game and doesn’t put forth any stupid CG cut scenes that just shows off what they can do in the way of CG. Also, the sound is amazing as well. I just can’t get enough of that ‘bpew bpew bpewbpewbpewbpew’ sound.
Computer And Video Games
Score: 85/100
Snippet: Clearly, Petroglyph has taken a long hard look at Total War's campaign map, and while Empire At War's is considerably smaller, it's still every bit as vexing and compelling. But here's the catch. Unlike Rome's turn-based strategic map, this one is real-time, meaning you never have to wait to issue your orders. And it works superbly, with planets (each has its own benefits and bonuses) constantly changing hands as you and your foe launch daring raids into each other's territories.
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Total comments: 25 | Last comment: 11-25-2009 at 11:27
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