Literally any money they would've made on this would have been a guaranteed profit. They made back the development investment decades ago and then some, and all they had to do was make sure it runs on modern software and has mildly enhanced graphics which is a minor investment if you do it right. Instead they made the game slightly worse, messed up the multiplayer, increased the file size tenfold and asked $30+ for a digital copy of an ancient game with no major improvements or reworks. *At best* the game should've been worth $20 or $15, possibly even less if you want to get real critical. And at that price point they would've still been making big profits on something they had lying around in their media vault with a new coat of paint. But their greed was as big as their incompetence, and when you ask $30 for a really old game and release something that's probably not worth half that then you somehow end up disappointing already low expectations that should've been a win by default.
Being a Battlefront fan post OG BF2 is a neverending misery. 3 canceled close to completion supposedly. EA BF1 was mostly a mess, BF2 was the lootbox that broke the camels back for several countries. Now this, a failed remaster of the good games. My genuine condolences to the people who loved the first two games.
I genuinely believe this is some kind of inside job, there's no way you can be THIS incompetent. Only theory I have is that Disney wanted to botch the reputation of the classic games since they're "non canon" and were part of the legends timeline. The more attention people would give to those games, the more star wars legends would pique in interest and detract from the stuff that disney was already producing. and for fair reason, battlefront 2's story is well done and handles order 66 significantly better than dave filoni's TCW show which retconned all the clones into having inhibitor chips that turned the clones into mindless drones when order 66 was initiated. In legends and battlefront 2, or at least prior to the 2008 show, order 66 was simply a contingency protocol in case of a jedi rebellion, part of around 200 republic contingency order's. It was basically a case of "following orders".
What's sad is that isn't accessible to people with Playstations or Switches. That's what broke me ultimately. Even if they just ported those, I would be happy. Without the multiplayer fluff..
Watch them shut down and delist the old one in the next few months to try and drive sales up once the new one has already cemented itself as a failure and no one's buying it anyway
@@jacobpetersdesigns To be honest its rose tinted glasses. I still have my PS2 copies of BF1 and 2 and while I never played multiplayer aside from Splitscreen, I know modern multiplayer would ruin the experience. It's not worth $30. There's no point in going back to play BF1 when you've got BF2 so the "two games in one" is redundant. Aspyr chose these games cause they know people will pay for them but they'll never live up to the experience when PS2 was the current generation.
five minutes in, the video becomes a super relatable Millenial journal entry, and I love it. Between A Series of Unfortunate Events, playing in the creek and Battlefront 22, that was a fun jaunt down memory lane.
I had the exact same reaction. I turn 28 in a few months, and seeing Battlefront 2 and Lemony Snicket brought back so many memories. Seeing Frost talking about how great the Felucia and Jedi Temple levels were gave me flashbacks and made me want to play the game all over again.
For real I’m quite glad they didn’t handle it if this is their idea of treatment of a venerable property. It’s so frustrating, it should not be hard to do a good KOTOR remake! It’s still a good game, just make it prettier!
Nah Aspyr have done good stuff before. They did the recent Tomb Raider remasters, for instance. I get the feeling Battlefront was *very* rushed and underfunded in comparison :(
Kinda, but not really. Aspyr used to be a really good company for ports. To this day, the Linux port they made of KotOR 2 is more feature complete than the OG windows version. And then it was bought by Saber/Embracer in 2020... who still have the rights for the KotOR remake.
Nightdive’s remasters and the Halo: MCC are generally celebrated cus, not only they bring back games you can’t find elsewhere, but you can adjust how authentic the experience is
@@Andystuff800I didn't even own an Xbox One when MCC first released in 2014 and I still heard all about how big of a trash fire it was. I do give 343 credit for committing resources into fixing it when they released it on PC though.
@@Andystuff800 oh at release it was bad, but, not only they fixed the issues, they weren’t overcharging you for games that you can still get on pc for less. If you going to add $15 to them add some big updates like graphical overhaul and making galactic conquest online team multiplayer
PSA: The original two games are available, separately, as Xbox backward compatible ports on the Xbox One for half the price. Just don't have the online multiplayer but at least it's fully functional and cheaper.
Another PSA for PC Players; both the original games are available on Steam and are dirt-cheap, *and* have functional multiplayer and mod support. There's no reason for anyone to buy this defunct collection.
On PC it's even funnier: old games are still available, playable (including multiplayer!) and looks so much better then Remastered when you add just a few graphical mods! xD
I bought SW Battlefront 1 and 2 on PC back in the day. I can't belive they re-released #1 with the same map bug on one of the planets that causes the crash to desktop.
@@rundown132 -- That's the thing though. IIRC, it's some building or terrain feature being slightly out-of-bounds on that specific map. It's not a problem with the on-disk copy of the game -OR- the last official patch. It's a problem specific to a specific patch of the PC port.
As an aside, it's not _exactly_ a copy paste job, as they apparently pulled a James Somerton and stole the programming from a mod while saying that they didn't.
The latest botched release of a Star Wars game is just a reminder to go check out the dark forces redo that night dive did that was excellent. And also Star Wars galactic battleground, the utterly shameless age of empires rip off, but still. Great game
I used to love that game, Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds. Though it is worth mentioning, it is not a shameless Age of Empires rip off... it is literally an AoE reskin, made by the exact same developer (Ensemble Studios) using the exact same engine and the (almost) exact same code. It is basically what 2/3 of the Assassin's Creed games are: same game, different clothes and voice actors.
I'm genuinely confused why this got a PC release, besides money? A couple months ago I went back and played the steam version of Battlefront 2 and had a grand old time, still worked and it still worked great. So...whats the point? It's just so they can resell it, isn't it?
Yes. It's also to revive the multiplayer since theoretically the "updated" version will bring in new players. It's much like how PC players had to buy the remastered Dark Souls if they wanted to be part of a bigger community of pvp since the old pvp was suffering from lack of players.
I think a problem with online multiplayer is the desire for balance. Turning one player into a hero, and another into a super soldier (by way of power ups) just means the other team now actually has to work together. The culture of online multiplayer has shifted so dramatically. Nobody dives in and plays the game, getting immersed and playing with like minded people. Instead everyone is out to be the best lone wolf they can be. Or some run and gun super streamer. But that tactic doesn’t work as well without the power scale. This nothing to force team work, so why even play on a team? Just make everything FFA at this point.
You perfectly explained why I can't stand online multi-player games for nearly the last 10 years. Ever since it became a necessity for games to need internet to even be playable, it has ruined this once great, and beloved hobby of mine I. I can't call myself a gamer, and if it doesn't have a good amount of content I can play without other people, or it needs a constant online connection, I don't even give it a second thought.
@@domesticdragonwaffle The scary thing is that even online games that were or use-to-be team based have increasingly become self-centered. I recently picked up League of Legends again, and it honestly feels like they redesigned the game where people can genuinely do nearly anything they want. Buffs that people usually had to share are now replaced by buffs being given passively to the entire team by a single person's actions. The Meta is all over the place with harsh scaling and tactics focused around mobility, teleports, and who can avoid team fighting the most. Hell, it's even hard to tell what lane people are going in anymore. No one talks in chat, duo queueing over voice with a premade is pretty-much encouraged, and they have an annoyingly harsh limit on the amount of pings you can do.
@@domesticdragonwaffle Agreed, I used to play a TON of Halo 3 with a community almost entirely focused around the Warthog, which was practically teamwork personified in a video game. Hard not to rely on a teammate when all you can do is steer, and all they can do is shoot. Get a third to ride shotgun while humping the only Laser that spawns on Standoff, and you've effectively split your survival three ways. It was great... Then every iteration of Halo after that included more and more "balancing" mechanics. Mechanics which inevitably made multi-person vehicles a free double or triple-kill, and allowed people to spawn with those mechanics rather than needing to acquire them on the map. They effectively CoDified Halo. It was manageable in Reach when the extent of the loadout choices were whether you wanted the human pistol or the Covenant one, but it just got way too crazy after that. It has gotten to the point where the only time you see TRUE teamwork anymore is in pro level play, where all of the players are so good that it is incredibly rare that any one of them even could do it solo. Then, as they are forced to cooperate, cooperation resumes. In more normal skill level games though, where you'll often have a mix of brand new and almost semi-pro? Not so much.
I feel like this is part of the reason a game like Overwatch can't bear to have any actual, specialized Support classes/heroes. Every "support" role also needs to have some combat utility. Because the idea of a role where a player doesn't actually fight anyone, but instead patiently and diligently boosts their entire team through some other kind of labour, doesn't sit right with modern multiplayer culture. Everyone wants to play in the most glamorous roles. No-one wants to swallow their pride and do the gruntwork. This is exemplified in Overwatch's "Play Of The Game" system. It's a system that highlights massive, turning-point actions that players took in the game. But it's a system that cannot capture the reality of playing in a support role. Because a good support is one who is consistently effective, for the length of an entire game. Good supports don't have make-or-break plays. Their value is in the sustained... well, *support* that they provide their allies. To play as support is to play as a piece of infrastructure. It's a kind of effort whose value is easily overlooked, and it requires a certain humble mindset to enjoy.
5:45 Reminds me of a conversation I had back in the USAF around 1994. I was working in a shop with several people from other countries. One night we started talking about Star Wars and when we all first saw it back in the late 1970s, and a guy who was Palestinian (Israeli citizenship) said he'd never seen it. That's when another guy looked at him incredulously and said, "Really? I saw Star Wars and I was still living in Vietnam."
9:00 No it is not a placebo effect. I just replayed both original games on Xbox BC in the days up to launch of the classic collection and the AI teammates are 'bad' or at least worse in the new release. Some AI soldiers (friendly or enemy) will just stand still or run into walls until you get within a certain range of them to seemingly 'activate' them into doing something. It is odd.
Console player here - I own the original battlefront II on xbox. It still works on my xbox one when I pop the disc in, and they updated the game to include kit fisto and asajj ventress and added 2 maps from the original game. Pop in your old disc and have a grand time!
The real tragedy of these cash grab "remasters" is that the audience will happily shell out their cash to relive these classics and they just want them done well. Hell, look at the demon souls remaster, that was made with passion, was pretty much universally well received and made them a tonne of money. And not just remasters, if an all new Battlefront 3 was announced tomorrow you can bet that people would go ape with hype for it. People are happy to pay for good products from IPs they love, there is zero need to rip them off like this. This botched release really lays bare the cynicism of some studios and it's a crying shame.
Was SWBF2's online play really an afterthought, though? I always perceived it as being online first with some single-player tacked on. It's just that the online experience was built with a much different sensibility than your Calls of Duty, greatly prioritizing fun and opportunities for emergent play over precise balancing. Like hosting hero duel fight clubs in the arena-shaped Mos Eisley hangar in Assault mode. SWBF2 is genuinely among the very best experiences I ever had with an online game.
The point of console gamers starting to understand PC gamers frustrations thanks to move to digital only is something I did not realize before but that is absolutely true. Not that it is a good thing but maybe people could stop arguing about nonsense and realize nobody wins with this move, only corpos.
The problem is that most consumers don't care about that, they care about convenience and less responsibility on their own end. That's unfortunately majority of people these days, not just gamers, that's why the US has over 35 trillion in debt and it's only climbing. No one wants to be more responsible to fix it now, they just want their instant gratification.
@@domesticdragonwaffle Well I can´t argue with that, you are right that this problem is connected to much more pressing situation with the state of.. well, us people.
So, fun thing. I was working at Free Radical on a temporary junior position back in 2008 when Battlefront 3 was being worked on - because they were planning to do 4 as well, and that's the game I was working on. Ultimately it was decided I wasn't a good fit, so was let go, but it was amusing to see, in December that year, when the project fell apart and the leaks came out attributing this or that concept art to 3 and me, thinking "no, that was intended for 4." For those interested, the story mode for 4 was divided in a kind of interesting way. They would do five canon battles, where you played initially as the heroes, but then you could play it again as the villains and when you won *that* battle you would then get a 'what if' battle spinoff resulting from the changed outcome. This is where the images for, e.g. Sith Leia or the redeemed Vader associated with 3 came from.
I saw the movies as a kid but playing BattleFront 1 (and later, 2) at a friend's house is the thing that turned me from general-audience 'Star Wars enjoyer' into Star Wars fan at age 11. Both games have pros and cons that make them balance each other well, 2 didn't replace 1, it stood alongside it.
I feel the Switch makes the strongest argument for a purchase here, with the ability to play Battlefront anywhere. However, I only originally played Battlefront 2 on the PS2 and not online, so I'm perfectly happy to queue up a singleplayer Instant Action playlist and shoot clankers til the cows come home. Just because it works for me doesn't mean it works for other people. Gotta say, though, that Battlefront was surprisingly ahead of its time, gameplaywise. Snappy, responsive, and not much futzing needed to bring controls closer to modern shooters.
Dude, I feel you, as I believe this idiocy about needing online multi-player has ruined gaming as a whole. If online gaming was as mainstream then as it is today, these games never would've been so beloved.
I started gaming because of Battlefront (2004) I had no real interest or experience gaming up until I tried it at my buddy's house while in middle school. Fast forward to Christmas, and I ask for a PS2 and a copy of that game. The rest, as they say, was history.
While I'll never say no to a bit of Frost, I do miss the old Cold Take formula. Not reviews, but musings on topics in the games industry. I'd like a bit more of that
I play the originals, on my Series X, digitally owned. The situation described at 1:21 is already here. All the classic collection could offer me is increased resolution and active multiplayer servers.
My favorite thing in the world was pinning the CIS into force spawning a fleet and moving into one of my fleets. The space missions are my absolute jam. The dogfights are incredible, the ship boarding is amazing.
That's crazy, I've played Battlefront 2 and I never knew you got buffs for staying alive because I suck so much that I've never stayed alive long enough I guess. I actually never beat the Jedi Library mission and I just tried to go back and play the first mission and got wrecked.
I have such fond memories playing these games in co-op mode with my cousin. I was heartbroken when the reboot games didn't have split screen, because that meant I couldn't have that same experience with my little brother.
I was playing this single player on console and had no idea what everyone was talking about as it ran fine. Then I realized there were no cut scenes. Just heartbreaking this series can't take a break
Are you sure? I played the BF2 campaign on this last night and I had the cutscenes play with Tomura Morrison narrating for the 501st just like the original. The BF1 campaign has the clips from the movies just like the original as they didn't have the narrated cutscenes like BF2 did. Or did you think they would ADD more cutscenes which makes zero sense to even think.
@@domesticdragonwafflethey patched the ending cutscenes back in but when the classic collection first released it was missing the end cutscenes from the 501st journal
I do not know if multiplayer works, but Battlefront 2 is backwards compatible with the Xbox One and Series consoles, so instead of supporting a bad remake consider buying a used copy and giving it a go if you can There is a part of me that still wishes for a second part for Republic Commando (try it Frost!) Or a HD Remaster (preferably both), but there is almost zero hope that it would be better than the original release as this franchise also seems to be cursed
It's been so fun and relaxing in a 'bare-bones' and 'back-to-basics' kind of way. I knew and 'mastered' Battlefront before I ever even considered other multiplayer shooters.
People forget that the original Battlefronts (on XBox at least) had absolutely terrible connectivity problems when it came out, too. So as far as authenticity goes... well done.
So they finally fixed single player? That even launched busted missing cut scenes and had its far share of bugs. Also doesn't help is how much memory the game takes up. For PC you can just mod in the extra features to have it take up a third of the memory the 'new version' takes up.
literally all they had to do was take the 1st one, give it the graphics of the 2nd release, fix the multi-player and add some cross-play. IF they were feeling spicy, maybe take a crack at adding the last 3 movies to it but I would have paid full price for a remake of the original pair that worked beautifully and stuck with modern controls
You hear it all the time, but SWBF2 WAS my childhood. I played it on a friend's PS2. I played it on my PS3 (although that didn't really work so well). I played it on my potato laptop in grade school. I played it on my gaming laptop in college. I am considering playing it again on my gaming PC now that I am working. When I learned that SWBF3 was cancelled, I was so goddamn pissed. That and 1313. Then years later we got DICE's Battlefronts, and we all know how that turned out. Rough time to be a Star Wars fan.
This informed me enough to make a truly wonderful and completely worthwhile purchase on Steam. That being the PS2 Battlefront 2, which I hadn't realized I could still get anywhere.
@@arnox4554 but this video is about battlefront specifically. It's not about star wars videogames overall. So its a nonsense complaint. Sure Jedi academy has that awesome mod. It has no bearing for this video.
I remember having a conversation with a guy once, in college. I forget what we were talking about before this came up, but it came to light that he didn't know what Star Wars was, after I mentioned Han Solo and he asked who that was. I was so shocked by this turn of events that my mind totally blanked, and the conversation stopped abruptly. I think my shock freaked him out too, because he quickly walked away after that.
I really like your more Philosophical episodes like this where you go into a thought about some gaming topic. You did turn this one into a review eventually. But I'd love to see more of your thoughts on games as opposed to reviews and them having a different name. I love your voice in these videos, but reviews just feel... All over. Whereas in depth thoughts are out there but more rare.
I also was someone who just never was a Star Wars fan (even now I've only seen the first movie, pop culture osmosis kinda ruined the experience when I got to it) but after a friend brought this game over once I has hooked and got my own copy. I mainly played the multiplayer though.
3:04 This is so much better than the retcon of the CG Clone Wars cartoon, where it's just a mind-controlling biochip that removes free will and conscious decision making.
I remember having the worst time at school and battlefront 2 was one of the things that distracted me and brought me joy..it sucks that they messed up such an easy win
4:23 The first battlefront game does have *some* significantly different maps to the second game (many of which feel more like an actual "battle" than the more gamey maps in bf2) but otherwise I would agree the experience is the same. I still prefer BF1s maps and aesthetic, but completely understand why the systems and greater total content in bf2 is more popular in the public eye and is considered the more complete package.
Yoooo i bought the unfortunate series of events as they came out but that boxed set slaps. I probably played battlefront 2 for hundreds of hours, they were beautiful games but i dont think I'll go back. They were beautiful memories, but I wont be rewriting them with a second take.
I too did not have access to Star Wars aside from the random discarded toys(Hello Star Wars Risk) and books that managed to stay inside the library. There was no imposter syndrome, I was LEGIT the imposter. (Still like Star Wars tho)
I’ll be honest, I am a console player. My experience buying this game was me and three friends booting up a private server and playing for 4 hours together and having a great time. This was day one, no patches, just playing together like any other private lobby shooter. It’s not a perfect experience by any means, but it’s more than enough for what I expected from it.
Battlefront 2 (old) + community mod + hi-def texture pack and you get this same experience only better AND a community full of people who still play online. Plus it's cheaper and doesn't take up as much hard drive space.
I dont give a crap about multiplayer and i only ever played this thing on ps2, so i have nothing to complain about tbh They added the xbox dlc and updated the graphics, its all i need
The man still has a good voice and vibe; Just like a guy from 20s drinking a whiskey at the bar late at night while the band plays some slow pace tunes in the background.
On one hand I laughed at the idea of remastering Battlefront I and II from the PS2 days - *_they were not super good games_* and they were like, VERY BASIC Battlefield games. On the other hand *_I had to laugh even harder that they somehow fucked it up_*
Yeah, I'd prefer buying the original and being able to open up "DS4Windows/DS5Windows" program to convert my DualSense Controller into an Xbox/Xbox 360 controller. But when it was released on PC, it originally was released Physical on an actual CD-Rom, much like how Roller Coaster Tycoon 1-3 games were originally released on CD-Rom albeit it you have to enter into the serial number when opening the program for the first time on your user program/PC and such. After that, you would only need to activate it maybe sometimes or once in a while, or if the program was uninstalled/reinstalled to make it work once more. Same thing with Simtower, and the same thing with The Sims, World of Warcraft, and yes, Star Wars BattleFront I+II, and Sonic Heroes/Mega Collection to name a few.
I’m sticking it out for the patches on Series X, but I won’t be touching an Aspyr product with a 39.5 ft pole after this debacle. On or offline, some things should be functional. Sounds, cinematics, scopes, aim sensitivity. The basics. Discovering Aspyr’s history of “take the money and run” after the fact is just the salt and lemon on the wound that franchise loyalists like me never asked for.
@@igorthelight I mean still a lot of abandoned PC games that dont run properly anymore without patches. That said, i just assumed the whole time that battlefront was a console game lol
@@DctrBread True about old games and "community patches" which are technically just mods xD Or playing old console game using emulators (look how good PS2 games look in emulators!).
Cold take feels like it’s shifted into just being reviews, I don’t mind them but I feel like the identity of cold take was that of informative videos on the industry. The reviews are great just wish they were their own thing imo
I feel they fumbled this intentionally to make the old fans look dumb. The people in charge of Star Wars have been so bitter and vengeful, hell the whole gaming industry has, that not only can EA spit on Pandemic’s grave but the current lucasarts people spitting in the face of old Star Wars fans. Because if EA actually let Aspyr care about doing Star Wars right they would have let them put the Lost Content mod or work on some equivalent for Kotor 2… but they didn’t and won’t.
It really does feel like the classic story of being given gold and turning it, through sheer incompetence, into lead.
They somehow squeeze the diamond back into a piece of coal, it’s incredible in a way.
I've favored the term 'spinning gold into straw' because golly it fits.
Lead is useful. This is radioactive waste.
Literally any money they would've made on this would have been a guaranteed profit. They made back the development investment decades ago and then some, and all they had to do was make sure it runs on modern software and has mildly enhanced graphics which is a minor investment if you do it right.
Instead they made the game slightly worse, messed up the multiplayer, increased the file size tenfold and asked $30+ for a digital copy of an ancient game with no major improvements or reworks. *At best* the game should've been worth $20 or $15, possibly even less if you want to get real critical. And at that price point they would've still been making big profits on something they had lying around in their media vault with a new coat of paint. But their greed was as big as their incompetence, and when you ask $30 for a really old game and release something that's probably not worth half that then you somehow end up disappointing already low expectations that should've been a win by default.
@@jcace13 simple. Diamonds burn
Battlefront, to think such a beloved name would be given to its creators’ killer. Rest In Peace, Pandemic.
They also created Destroy All Humans which Black Forest Games has remade a couple times so far.
@@AlmightyPolarBearThey made a lot of good games. That's why EA took them from us.
So this is how a liberty dies?
With thunderous footsteps and dwindling resources.
Indeed. These are sad times
Being a Battlefront fan post OG BF2 is a neverending misery. 3 canceled close to completion supposedly. EA BF1 was mostly a mess, BF2 was the lootbox that broke the camels back for several countries. Now this, a failed remaster of the good games.
My genuine condolences to the people who loved the first two games.
Thank you. The funeral is in perpetuity at this point.
"BF2 was the lootbox that broke the camels back for several countries" - it's fixed now but damage to it's reputation is already done.
@@igorthelightand eafront 2 still sucked to get into behind the upgrade metas
@@igorthelight No disrespect to you but "its fixed now" its not an excuse and should be rejected by gamers. A game should be ready to go upon release.
I genuinely believe this is some kind of inside job, there's no way you can be THIS incompetent.
Only theory I have is that Disney wanted to botch the reputation of the classic games since they're "non canon" and were part of the legends timeline. The more attention people would give to those games, the more star wars legends would pique in interest and detract from the stuff that disney was already producing. and for fair reason, battlefront 2's story is well done and handles order 66 significantly better than dave filoni's TCW show which retconned all the clones into having inhibitor chips that turned the clones into mindless drones when order 66 was initiated.
In legends and battlefront 2, or at least prior to the 2008 show, order 66 was simply a contingency protocol in case of a jedi rebellion, part of around 200 republic contingency order's. It was basically a case of "following orders".
This series has been cursed ever since the battlefront 3 was cancelled
Exactly, that game looked so promising but this series really fell off
There was gonna be a sequel?
@@ceasar9865 SW:BF III was practically finished, when it got cancelled and shelved.
Why everyone forgets the other two battlefront games? Elite squadron and Renegade Squadron.
I continue to weep for 1313 too
The original PC release is still available for dirt cheap with tonnes of mod support, including multiplayer support
What's sad is that isn't accessible to people with Playstations or Switches. That's what broke me ultimately. Even if they just ported those, I would be happy. Without the multiplayer fluff..
@@jacobpetersdesigns Yeah I don't regret moving from consoles
Watch them shut down and delist the old one in the next few months to try and drive sales up once the new one has already cemented itself as a failure and no one's buying it anyway
@@ABronyNamedBurnie Buy it soon then
@@jacobpetersdesigns To be honest its rose tinted glasses. I still have my PS2 copies of BF1 and 2 and while I never played multiplayer aside from Splitscreen, I know modern multiplayer would ruin the experience. It's not worth $30. There's no point in going back to play BF1 when you've got BF2 so the "two games in one" is redundant. Aspyr chose these games cause they know people will pay for them but they'll never live up to the experience when PS2 was the current generation.
Not to mention the fact that they made a 5Gb bundle into 70Gb of bloatware.
@@hossdelgado626 Really terribly managed AI upscaling of textures. A lot of bloat in modern games is just texture size increasing.
Until 10:12 I didn't even notice that you were swapping between the old and new versions of the game. Truly, a stunning graphical upgrade
I blinked and missed it 🤣
Oh, thanks for pointing that out. Stunning indeed.
I went the whole video without noticing 😅
five minutes in, the video becomes a super relatable Millenial journal entry, and I love it. Between A Series of Unfortunate Events, playing in the creek and Battlefront 22, that was a fun jaunt down memory lane.
I had the exact same reaction. I turn 28 in a few months, and seeing Battlefront 2 and Lemony Snicket brought back so many memories. Seeing Frost talking about how great the Felucia and Jedi Temple levels were gave me flashbacks and made me want to play the game all over again.
Now we have an idea of what KOTOR could have been if Aspyr kept the rights to the remake..
For real I’m quite glad they didn’t handle it if this is their idea of treatment of a venerable property. It’s so frustrating, it should not be hard to do a good KOTOR remake! It’s still a good game, just make it prettier!
Dantooine frame drops.... *imagine the horror*
Nah Aspyr have done good stuff before. They did the recent Tomb Raider remasters, for instance. I get the feeling Battlefront was *very* rushed and underfunded in comparison :(
They could have just redone the faces and upscaled a few textures and I would have bought it.
Kinda, but not really. Aspyr used to be a really good company for ports. To this day, the Linux port they made of KotOR 2 is more feature complete than the OG windows version. And then it was bought by Saber/Embracer in 2020... who still have the rights for the KotOR remake.
Nightdive’s remasters and the Halo: MCC are generally celebrated cus, not only they bring back games you can’t find elsewhere, but you can adjust how authentic the experience is
That's funny, I remember how hated MCC was when it released.
@@Andystuff800I didn't even own an Xbox One when MCC first released in 2014 and I still heard all about how big of a trash fire it was. I do give 343 credit for committing resources into fixing it when they released it on PC though.
@@Andystuff800 oh at release it was bad, but, not only they fixed the issues, they weren’t overcharging you for games that you can still get on pc for less. If you going to add $15 to them add some big updates like graphical overhaul and making galactic conquest online team multiplayer
PSA: The original two games are available, separately, as Xbox backward compatible ports on the Xbox One for half the price. Just don't have the online multiplayer but at least it's fully functional and cheaper.
OG Xbox discs work too
And it has 4 player split screen, long live the days of everyone playing on the same couch
Another PSA for PC Players; both the original games are available on Steam and are dirt-cheap, *and* have functional multiplayer and mod support. There's no reason for anyone to buy this defunct collection.
On PC it's even funnier: old games are still available, playable (including multiplayer!) and looks so much better then Remastered when you add just a few graphical mods! xD
Seriously, I played both of these games on Xbox One back in 2020 and they ran great. Were given away for free through Games with Gold too.
Help us Obe DonQuixote, you’re the gaming industry’s only hope.
I bought SW Battlefront 1 and 2 on PC back in the day. I can't belive they re-released #1 with the same map bug on one of the planets that causes the crash to desktop.
ctrl+c ctrl+v
@@rundown132 -- That's the thing though. IIRC, it's some building or terrain feature being slightly out-of-bounds on that specific map. It's not a problem with the on-disk copy of the game -OR- the last official patch. It's a problem specific to a specific patch of the PC port.
As an aside, it's not _exactly_ a copy paste job, as they apparently pulled a James Somerton and stole the programming from a mod while saying that they didn't.
The latest botched release of a Star Wars game is just a reminder to go check out the dark forces redo that night dive did that was excellent. And also Star Wars galactic battleground, the utterly shameless age of empires rip off, but still. Great game
Shameless or not, Galactic Battleground is fun and that's what matters.
I used to love that game, Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds.
Though it is worth mentioning, it is not a shameless Age of Empires rip off... it is literally an AoE reskin, made by the exact same developer (Ensemble Studios) using the exact same engine and the (almost) exact same code. It is basically what 2/3 of the Assassin's Creed games are: same game, different clothes and voice actors.
Absolutely :)
Frost's reviews are such a wonderful balance for Yahtzee's. So happy these are part of the Second Wind smorgasbord.
I'm genuinely confused why this got a PC release, besides money? A couple months ago I went back and played the steam version of Battlefront 2 and had a grand old time, still worked and it still worked great. So...whats the point? It's just so they can resell it, isn't it?
Yes. It's also to revive the multiplayer since theoretically the "updated" version will bring in new players. It's much like how PC players had to buy the remastered Dark Souls if they wanted to be part of a bigger community of pvp since the old pvp was suffering from lack of players.
because a PC port is cheap and it will be bought enough to be profitable because star wars has a lot of fans that are idiots
Let's hope the original release doesn't get fully delisted like Rockstar did
In one of the many videos about the battlefront collection, one comment said it best: "They somehow took a complete game and made it incomplete."
"If you're asking me, here's what I want Santa"😆You're just as funny as Yahtzee Frost but in a different way💖
I think a problem with online multiplayer is the desire for balance. Turning one player into a hero, and another into a super soldier (by way of power ups) just means the other team now actually has to work together.
The culture of online multiplayer has shifted so dramatically. Nobody dives in and plays the game, getting immersed and playing with like minded people.
Instead everyone is out to be the best lone wolf they can be. Or some run and gun super streamer. But that tactic doesn’t work as well without the power scale.
This nothing to force team work, so why even play on a team? Just make everything FFA at this point.
You perfectly explained why I can't stand online multi-player games for nearly the last 10 years. Ever since it became a necessity for games to need internet to even be playable, it has ruined this once great, and beloved hobby of mine I. I can't call myself a gamer, and if it doesn't have a good amount of content I can play without other people, or it needs a constant online connection, I don't even give it a second thought.
@@domesticdragonwaffle The scary thing is that even online games that were or use-to-be team based have increasingly become self-centered.
I recently picked up League of Legends again, and it honestly feels like they redesigned the game where people can genuinely do nearly anything they want. Buffs that people usually had to share are now replaced by buffs being given passively to the entire team by a single person's actions. The Meta is all over the place with harsh scaling and tactics focused around mobility, teleports, and who can avoid team fighting the most. Hell, it's even hard to tell what lane people are going in anymore. No one talks in chat, duo queueing over voice with a premade is pretty-much encouraged, and they have an annoyingly harsh limit on the amount of pings you can do.
Guys!
You need to find some indie game with a small but very dedicated playerbase! That may still have teamwork ;-)
@@domesticdragonwaffle Agreed, I used to play a TON of Halo 3 with a community almost entirely focused around the Warthog, which was practically teamwork personified in a video game. Hard not to rely on a teammate when all you can do is steer, and all they can do is shoot. Get a third to ride shotgun while humping the only Laser that spawns on Standoff, and you've effectively split your survival three ways. It was great...
Then every iteration of Halo after that included more and more "balancing" mechanics. Mechanics which inevitably made multi-person vehicles a free double or triple-kill, and allowed people to spawn with those mechanics rather than needing to acquire them on the map. They effectively CoDified Halo. It was manageable in Reach when the extent of the loadout choices were whether you wanted the human pistol or the Covenant one, but it just got way too crazy after that.
It has gotten to the point where the only time you see TRUE teamwork anymore is in pro level play, where all of the players are so good that it is incredibly rare that any one of them even could do it solo. Then, as they are forced to cooperate, cooperation resumes. In more normal skill level games though, where you'll often have a mix of brand new and almost semi-pro? Not so much.
I feel like this is part of the reason a game like Overwatch can't bear to have any actual, specialized Support classes/heroes. Every "support" role also needs to have some combat utility. Because the idea of a role where a player doesn't actually fight anyone, but instead patiently and diligently boosts their entire team through some other kind of labour, doesn't sit right with modern multiplayer culture. Everyone wants to play in the most glamorous roles. No-one wants to swallow their pride and do the gruntwork.
This is exemplified in Overwatch's "Play Of The Game" system. It's a system that highlights massive, turning-point actions that players took in the game. But it's a system that cannot capture the reality of playing in a support role. Because a good support is one who is consistently effective, for the length of an entire game. Good supports don't have make-or-break plays. Their value is in the sustained... well, *support* that they provide their allies. To play as support is to play as a piece of infrastructure. It's a kind of effort whose value is easily overlooked, and it requires a certain humble mindset to enjoy.
There are no shortage of cold takes on this series, this might be one of the coldest ones yet.
5:45 Reminds me of a conversation I had back in the USAF around 1994. I was working in a shop with several people from other countries. One night we started talking about Star Wars and when we all first saw it back in the late 1970s, and a guy who was Palestinian (Israeli citizenship) said he'd never seen it. That's when another guy looked at him incredulously and said, "Really? I saw Star Wars and I was still living in Vietnam."
9:00 No it is not a placebo effect. I just replayed both original games on Xbox BC in the days up to launch of the classic collection and the AI teammates are 'bad' or at least worse in the new release. Some AI soldiers (friendly or enemy) will just stand still or run into walls until you get within a certain range of them to seemingly 'activate' them into doing something.
It is odd.
7:54 That already exists, Frost. It's called the Umbara arc in Star Wars: The Clone Wars.
Console player here - I own the original battlefront II on xbox. It still works on my xbox one when I pop the disc in, and they updated the game to include kit fisto and asajj ventress and added 2 maps from the original game. Pop in your old disc and have a grand time!
2:19 How cool would it be if the battlefield actually filled up with the dead?
The real tragedy of these cash grab "remasters" is that the audience will happily shell out their cash to relive these classics and they just want them done well. Hell, look at the demon souls remaster, that was made with passion, was pretty much universally well received and made them a tonne of money.
And not just remasters, if an all new Battlefront 3 was announced tomorrow you can bet that people would go ape with hype for it. People are happy to pay for good products from IPs they love, there is zero need to rip them off like this. This botched release really lays bare the cynicism of some studios and it's a crying shame.
Was SWBF2's online play really an afterthought, though? I always perceived it as being online first with some single-player tacked on. It's just that the online experience was built with a much different sensibility than your Calls of Duty, greatly prioritizing fun and opportunities for emergent play over precise balancing. Like hosting hero duel fight clubs in the arena-shaped Mos Eisley hangar in Assault mode. SWBF2 is genuinely among the very best experiences I ever had with an online game.
The point of console gamers starting to understand PC gamers frustrations thanks to move to digital only is something I did not realize before but that is absolutely true. Not that it is a good thing but maybe people could stop arguing about nonsense and realize nobody wins with this move, only corpos.
The problem is that most consumers don't care about that, they care about convenience and less responsibility on their own end. That's unfortunately majority of people these days, not just gamers, that's why the US has over 35 trillion in debt and it's only climbing. No one wants to be more responsible to fix it now, they just want their instant gratification.
@@domesticdragonwaffle Well I can´t argue with that, you are right that this problem is connected to much more pressing situation with the state of.. well, us people.
"it was no clumsy kisser this was a
snowballing Power Trip" was an impressive surprise of a sentence.
So, fun thing. I was working at Free Radical on a temporary junior position back in 2008 when Battlefront 3 was being worked on - because they were planning to do 4 as well, and that's the game I was working on.
Ultimately it was decided I wasn't a good fit, so was let go, but it was amusing to see, in December that year, when the project fell apart and the leaks came out attributing this or that concept art to 3 and me, thinking "no, that was intended for 4."
For those interested, the story mode for 4 was divided in a kind of interesting way. They would do five canon battles, where you played initially as the heroes, but then you could play it again as the villains and when you won *that* battle you would then get a 'what if' battle spinoff resulting from the changed outcome. This is where the images for, e.g. Sith Leia or the redeemed Vader associated with 3 came from.
I saw the movies as a kid but playing BattleFront 1 (and later, 2) at a friend's house is the thing that turned me from general-audience 'Star Wars enjoyer' into Star Wars fan at age 11. Both games have pros and cons that make them balance each other well, 2 didn't replace 1, it stood alongside it.
I feel the Switch makes the strongest argument for a purchase here, with the ability to play Battlefront anywhere. However, I only originally played Battlefront 2 on the PS2 and not online, so I'm perfectly happy to queue up a singleplayer Instant Action playlist and shoot clankers til the cows come home. Just because it works for me doesn't mean it works for other people.
Gotta say, though, that Battlefront was surprisingly ahead of its time, gameplaywise. Snappy, responsive, and not much futzing needed to bring controls closer to modern shooters.
Dude, I feel you, as I believe this idiocy about needing online multi-player has ruined gaming as a whole. If online gaming was as mainstream then as it is today, these games never would've been so beloved.
I started gaming because of Battlefront (2004)
I had no real interest or experience gaming up until I tried it at my buddy's house while in middle school.
Fast forward to Christmas, and I ask for a PS2 and a copy of that game. The rest, as they say, was history.
While I'll never say no to a bit of Frost, I do miss the old Cold Take formula. Not reviews, but musings on topics in the games industry. I'd like a bit more of that
Damn, I wanted 32 on 32 space fights that felt like the first 5 minutes of episode 3
I play the originals, on my Series X, digitally owned. The situation described at 1:21 is already here. All the classic collection could offer me is increased resolution and active multiplayer servers.
My favorite thing in the world was pinning the CIS into force spawning a fleet and moving into one of my fleets.
The space missions are my absolute jam. The dogfights are incredible, the ship boarding is amazing.
That's crazy, I've played Battlefront 2 and I never knew you got buffs for staying alive because I suck so much that I've never stayed alive long enough I guess. I actually never beat the Jedi Library mission and I just tried to go back and play the first mission and got wrecked.
Ugh! Frost! The Lemony Snicket bit and this encapsulated my childhood perfectly.
I have such fond memories playing these games in co-op mode with my cousin. I was heartbroken when the reboot games didn't have split screen, because that meant I couldn't have that same experience with my little brother.
Don’t know if it was intentional mentioning kissing and snowballing in the same breath, but made my brain go on the blink for a sec…
I was playing this single player on console and had no idea what everyone was talking about as it ran fine. Then I realized there were no cut scenes. Just heartbreaking this series can't take a break
The lack of end cutscenes is just ridiculous!
Are you sure? I played the BF2 campaign on this last night and I had the cutscenes play with Tomura Morrison narrating for the 501st just like the original. The BF1 campaign has the clips from the movies just like the original as they didn't have the narrated cutscenes like BF2 did. Or did you think they would ADD more cutscenes which makes zero sense to even think.
@@domesticdragonwafflethey patched the ending cutscenes back in but when the classic collection first released it was missing the end cutscenes from the 501st journal
I do not know if multiplayer works, but Battlefront 2 is backwards compatible with the Xbox One and Series consoles, so instead of supporting a bad remake consider buying a used copy and giving it a go if you can
There is a part of me that still wishes for a second part for Republic Commando (try it Frost!) Or a HD Remaster (preferably both), but there is almost zero hope that it would be better than the original release as this franchise also seems to be cursed
The typing stopping to remember how many t's are there in "battle", is neat
It's been so fun and relaxing in a 'bare-bones' and 'back-to-basics' kind of way. I knew and 'mastered' Battlefront before I ever even considered other multiplayer shooters.
The total incompetence of these releasea baffles me
The "I can't believe they made movie about my favourite game" anecdote was exacly what happened to me with Goldeneye.
Galactic Conquest coop was amazing!
That Virginia line I felt that
I LOVED SuperTruck Racing!! It's what got me into racing simulators in high school.
The publishers Were So Preoccupied With Whether Or Not They Could, They Didn’t Stop To Think If They Should….to quote a famous line
People forget that the original Battlefronts (on XBox at least) had absolutely terrible connectivity problems when it came out, too. So as far as authenticity goes... well done.
So they finally fixed single player?
That even launched busted missing cut scenes and had its far share of bugs.
Also doesn't help is how much memory the game takes up.
For PC you can just mod in the extra features to have it take up a third of the memory the 'new version' takes up.
Singleplayer is fixed.
I would suggest using word "storage" instead of memory - on PC "memory" is very often used as a replacement for RAM ;-)
I love your analysis of the 501st journals. I never gave them much thought before.
literally all they had to do was take the 1st one, give it the graphics of the 2nd release, fix the multi-player and add some cross-play. IF they were feeling spicy, maybe take a crack at adding the last 3 movies to it but I would have paid full price for a remake of the original pair that worked beautifully and stuck with modern controls
So real for the Snicket shout-out.
You hear it all the time, but SWBF2 WAS my childhood. I played it on a friend's PS2. I played it on my PS3 (although that didn't really work so well). I played it on my potato laptop in grade school. I played it on my gaming laptop in college. I am considering playing it again on my gaming PC now that I am working.
When I learned that SWBF3 was cancelled, I was so goddamn pissed. That and 1313. Then years later we got DICE's Battlefronts, and we all know how that turned out.
Rough time to be a Star Wars fan.
This informed me enough to make a truly wonderful and completely worthwhile purchase on Steam. That being the PS2 Battlefront 2, which I hadn't realized I could still get anywhere.
Frost's writing continues to inspire. Good stuff.
These games properly introduced me to the Star Wars universe. It genuinely breaks my heart to see these games done so dirty.
It always depresses me when no one talks about the Jedi academy mod movie battles when talking about star wars battlefront.
True as fuck
Why? This is battlefront, not Jedi academy.
Do you get depressed from a lot of reviews because they don't talk about a mod for a different game?
@@arnox4554 but this video is about battlefront specifically. It's not about star wars videogames overall. So its a nonsense complaint. Sure Jedi academy has that awesome mod. It has no bearing for this video.
I poured hours into Galactic Conquest as a kid
2:56
Oh, now THAT'S a clever name!
The best way to play battlefront is to replay the version I’ve had on my laptop for 15 years. Oof 😂
"summer blockbuster action" I felt both young and old at the same time hearing that Frost
Came for the review, stayed for the philosophical musings.
Not surprised you liked the Lemony Snicket novels growing up, but still very happy to see them get some love. ;)
I remember having a conversation with a guy once, in college. I forget what we were talking about before this came up, but it came to light that he didn't know what Star Wars was, after I mentioned Han Solo and he asked who that was. I was so shocked by this turn of events that my mind totally blanked, and the conversation stopped abruptly. I think my shock freaked him out too, because he quickly walked away after that.
Clear eyes on something you adore is tough. It does feel like, "why'd you make the game in this form?" is a good question to ask.
I really like your more Philosophical episodes like this where you go into a thought about some gaming topic.
You did turn this one into a review eventually. But I'd love to see more of your thoughts on games as opposed to reviews and them having a different name. I love your voice in these videos, but reviews just feel... All over. Whereas in depth thoughts are out there but more rare.
I also was someone who just never was a Star Wars fan (even now I've only seen the first movie, pop culture osmosis kinda ruined the experience when I got to it) but after a friend brought this game over once I has hooked and got my own copy. I mainly played the multiplayer though.
3:04 This is so much better than the retcon of the CG Clone Wars cartoon, where it's just a mind-controlling biochip that removes free will and conscious decision making.
I bought the old versions when they were marked way down. Totally fine with them.
Still better than every cod that has come out in the last 10 years. Thats not saying much cause that bar is on the ground.
I remember having the worst time at school and battlefront 2 was one of the things that distracted me and brought me joy..it sucks that they messed up such an easy win
4:23 The first battlefront game does have *some* significantly different maps to the second game (many of which feel more like an actual "battle" than the more gamey maps in bf2) but otherwise I would agree the experience is the same. I still prefer BF1s maps and aesthetic, but completely understand why the systems and greater total content in bf2 is more popular in the public eye and is considered the more complete package.
I saw Hunt: Showdown in that library, Frost... where's the video? Where's my cowboy swamp game video?!
Are we all just going to ignore how much of an absolute banger of a name "Obe DonQuixote" is?
I wasn't expecting a Dixie caverns reference!
Yoooo i bought the unfortunate series of events as they came out but that boxed set slaps. I probably played battlefront 2 for hundreds of hours, they were beautiful games but i dont think I'll go back. They were beautiful memories, but I wont be rewriting them with a second take.
I too did not have access to Star Wars aside from the random discarded toys(Hello Star Wars Risk) and books that managed to stay inside the library. There was no imposter syndrome, I was LEGIT the imposter.
(Still like Star Wars tho)
I’ll be honest, I am a console player. My experience buying this game was me and three friends booting up a private server and playing for 4 hours together and having a great time. This was day one, no patches, just playing together like any other private lobby shooter. It’s not a perfect experience by any means, but it’s more than enough for what I expected from it.
Marty does a wonderful ad read and the current ad has a great soundtrack but I can't wait for some more wacky Jack ad spots
Obe DonQuixote, eh? Nice. 👏
Battlefront 2 (old) + community mod + hi-def texture pack and you get this same experience only better AND a community full of people who still play online. Plus it's cheaper and doesn't take up as much hard drive space.
It was on this day I learned frost lived 30 minutes away from me in Dixie caverns. Don't blame him for leaving the wasteland lol
I dont give a crap about multiplayer and i only ever played this thing on ps2, so i have nothing to complain about tbh
They added the xbox dlc and updated the graphics, its all i need
The man still has a good voice and vibe; Just like a guy from 20s drinking a whiskey at the bar late at night while the band plays some slow pace tunes in the background.
Yes, that is the theme of this show.
@@1IGG And it's a good theme.
On one hand I laughed at the idea of remastering Battlefront I and II from the PS2 days - *_they were not super good games_* and they were like, VERY BASIC Battlefield games.
On the other hand *_I had to laugh even harder that they somehow fucked it up_*
i mean the only reason i bought the game in the first place was to have LOCAL CO OP fun with the chums, so the multiplayer issues dont affect me
Man, space battles are so weird once you figure out the equation to win
Those were chilling words....
Man, Star Wars Battlefront 2. Need to boot up my PS2 and do a few rounds of Mos Eisley Assault, for old time's sake.
Yeah, I'd prefer buying the original and being able to open up "DS4Windows/DS5Windows" program to convert my DualSense Controller into an Xbox/Xbox 360 controller.
But when it was released on PC, it originally was released Physical on an actual CD-Rom, much like how Roller Coaster Tycoon 1-3 games were originally released on CD-Rom albeit it you have to enter into the serial number when opening the program for the first time on your user program/PC and such. After that, you would only need to activate it maybe sometimes or once in a while, or if the program was uninstalled/reinstalled to make it work once more. Same thing with Simtower, and the same thing with The Sims, World of Warcraft, and yes, Star Wars BattleFront I+II, and Sonic Heroes/Mega Collection to name a few.
I’m sticking it out for the patches on Series X, but I won’t be touching an Aspyr product with a 39.5 ft pole after this debacle.
On or offline, some things should be functional. Sounds, cinematics, scopes, aim sensitivity. The basics.
Discovering Aspyr’s history of “take the money and run” after the fact is just the salt and lemon on the wound that franchise loyalists like me never asked for.
From a layman's perspective, I actually thought that this game must not be available or fully functional on PC or else this wouldn't have come out
Even Diablo 1and original DOOM are still playable on modern PCs ;-)
Both games are from 1994-1996
@@igorthelight I mean still a lot of abandoned PC games that dont run properly anymore without patches. That said, i just assumed the whole time that battlefront was a console game lol
@@DctrBread True about old games and "community patches" which are technically just mods xD
Or playing old console game using emulators (look how good PS2 games look in emulators!).
So,
PC: there's no point.
Console: wait for a sale
Extra Note: don't play it for the online multiplayer
Cold take feels like it’s shifted into just being reviews, I don’t mind them but I feel like the identity of cold take was that of informative videos on the industry. The reviews are great just wish they were their own thing imo
I feel they fumbled this intentionally to make the old fans look dumb. The people in charge of Star Wars have been so bitter and vengeful, hell the whole gaming industry has, that not only can EA spit on Pandemic’s grave but the current lucasarts people spitting in the face of old Star Wars fans.
Because if EA actually let Aspyr care about doing Star Wars right they would have let them put the Lost Content mod or work on some equivalent for Kotor 2… but they didn’t and won’t.