billservo's Full Review: Shadow Of Destiny for Windows
I'll go ahead and blame this on my console upbringing, but I could never get into real-time strategy (RTS) games. I have a hard time waiting for that "perfect moment" to unleash fury on enemy bases then in the heat of the battle I never feel I have the level of control I want and end up neglecting my production responsibilities at my base.
But, I am a Star Wars fan. I don't construct my own lightsaber replicas or own a suit of Stormtrooper armor, but as a kid I did cry when Han Solo got frozen in carbonite. I didn't even cry when my dog died, but somehow Han Solo getting captured sent me over the edge.
So with the balance of these two extremes- my love of Star Wars and my apathetic RTS stance I decided to give Galactic Battlegrounds a fair, objective shot. After all, Galactic Battlegrounds is based off of the Age Of Empires Engine, which is considered the pinnacle of RTS gaming by many.
Like AOE2, Galactic Battlegrounds offers up a slew of civilizations to take on. Hot on the heels of the Episode One DVD release, Galactic Batlegrounds is, for the most part, set in the Episode One timeline. Available civilizations include the Trade Federation, Wookies, Rebel Alliance, the Empire, the Gungans, and the Naboo. Balance is achieved between the civilizations by giving them certain advantages over the other. Gungans are maritime masters and in their own aquatic maps are tough to deal with. The Trade Federation's robotic armies can forego the need for shelters and produce bots quickly. At the same time their soldiers are pretty weak and are cut down with little effort. On the other hand, Wookie soldiers are total beasts- fast moving and hard to kill. There are even more differences between the various civilizations, but I'll admit, these differences weren't immediately noticeable. However, during more advanced play they do matter.
What's especially cool about Galactic Battlegrounds is that the differences between civilizations are emphasized by the differences in maps that a galaxy full of worlds allows. The changes aren't just cosmetic, but factor in strategically. As mentioned, in a water heavy map, the Gungans have an advantage. Maps with low amounts of Nova Crystals (money) to be mined favor the Naboo, and maps low on food pose problems for the Empire and Wookies.
Once you overcome your resource obstacles even more differences between civilizations become apparent. The Empire's reliance on giant mechs mirrors the books and movies. AT-AT walkers are the most envied of their unique arsenal- ground troops are decimated by a well organized fleet of walkers. Up against the Rebels, though, they're vulnerable. No other civilization is capable of creating the snow speeders which are super efficient at taking walkers out. At the same time, the Gungans, with notably less technological advances can produce shield equipped beasts, like in Episode One which can shelter units within its range. All units are rendered perfectly on screen, even using some nice light effects to help players see translucent shields.
Like AOE2, not all technology is available right away. You have to progress through Tech Levels which is done by research and utilization of your current technologies. Gaining tech levels not only makes new units available, but also offers upgrades to existing units, like improved armor plating, advanced scanning capabilities, or more efficient pilots. One of my minor gripes with this system is that once you progress a tech level you can no longer build out-of-date units. For example, progressing to the point where TIE Interceptors are available makes TIE Fighters extinct. It makes more sense in the Star Wars universe to be able to produce the two together- there is even a tactical advantage to it. Maybe future expansions will fix this.
Not every unit is based on technology, though. Certain civilizations are capable of building Jedi or Sith Temples, which in turn can create Jedi or Sith. On-screen they are seemingly no different than other soldiers, but once the action starts they are near invincible. They can handily fend off huge amounts of soldiers and even use their Jedi powers to turn enemy units to your side. Civilizations that cannot support Jedi can create Bounty Hunters. While they can't use advanced Jedi Powers, they can give Jedi a good fight and are your best defense against them.
Another advantage to Jedi is their ability to pick up Jedi Holocrons scattered throughout the map. These are straight Relic translations from AOE2. Their placement in the Star Wars universe is suspect, and like in AOE2 obtaining all of them will win you a battle- it's a pretty cheap way to win. There's also the Monument (read Wonder) race where players compete to be the first to build a Monument. While I don't see the point of these game types, they are purely supplemental play modes and don't take away from the standard battle modes.
Within the usual battle mode, there's a few variations. The most typical flavor involves the destruction of all the enemy Command Centers. Another is Last Person Standing where the complete destruction of all players is required and then the Terminate The Commander game, where the objective is to take out an opponent's specific hero.
Galactic Battlegrounds cast of heroes is actually quite impressive. Qui-Gon Jinn, Obi-Wan, Nute Gunray, and even a specific droid commander from Episode One are all there. From the later movies are Luke, Leia, Han, Chewbacca (who was alive back in the Episode One era), and Darth Vader. There's even more than these, some recognizable, some you may need a Star Wars Encyclopedia for, and others who seem to be made up just for the game. The engine's graphics are even fine enough to be able to recognize some of the characters, even from your bird's eye view.
When using these characters, they have specific sound effects to let you know who you're dealing with. They're all good, but Qui-Gon's voice over is so close to Liam Neeson that it's almost hard to tell it from the actor himself- it's that good. Other units also have distinctive sounds, but they're not always intuitive. For the most part you just have to memorize what sound goes to what unit, especially when it comes to the mechanized ones. A few effects are just confusing, especially when you click on War Centers or Command Centers and it sounds like laser fire. This is minor, and won't even be noticed after even a little play time.
There are bigger annoyances with clicking on units comes than just sound effects, though. Units can be double-clicked, thus selecting all like units currently displayed. Sometimes this works, but sometimes it's quirky. In the heat of battle this can be costly, at other times it just costs you a mouse click. You can assign custom groupings of units to a specific number on the keyboard, though. Using this feature before battles is a more sure-fire way of getting the units you want. Tactically, there are even more advanced unit control options. Unit line formations can be selected, aggressive or defensive stances can be assigned, and units can even escort others to an objective. The level of control the game delivers is very comprehensive when it comes to fighting.
When you're not fighting, though, there's definitely some extras I would've included. In AOE, workers who've completed their task stand around waiting for more orders. There is some improvement in Galactic Battlegrounds over AOE here. For one, if a worker can continue his task nearby, like processing a different tree for carbon, he will do that. But if his task is exhausted with no options nearby he does nothing. Galactic Battlegrounds gives you the next best thing, though: a button which highlights an idle worker. Whenever a worker goes idle the Idle Worker button lights up. Pressing this re-centers the screen on him and selects him- no more hunting these guys down. But the next step would have been the ability to queue up tasks. The game allows you to queue up movement locations by setting waypoints, an awesome feature, but the ability to similarly queue up jobs would make management much more efficient.
The wartime management is all there, though. While you can't queue up workers, unit production can be queued up to help replace destroyed units during battle. You can even set Gather Points to any location on the map so new units march right back into battle. Like AOE2, hotkeys let the true professionals do everything from the keyboard. Some AOE players will feel uncomfortable with the fact that the mappings aren't one-to-one from AOE, but the amount of control otherwise should keep these complaints to a low rumble.
In the multiplay department, complaints are simply not allowed. In my first multiplayer game with three other players we lost the game due to an "out of synch" error. We all pretty much lost out minds and phones started ringing trying to figure out what happened. In our frantic rage none of us noticed the next screen telling us that an error ocurred, but our game had been saved!. We all quickly rejoined with the host and were back into the game where we left off. Since then I haven't had any multiplay problems, and even that one was most likely due to a bad ISP. RTS games need to be this robust from here on out- the resource gathering investment is just too great to be able to drop games and not pick them back up.
Multiplay was so engaging that I found myself hours into a game that I just wanted to give a quick try. I never thought it possible, but this FPS fanatic has actually been turned. The combination of the AOE engine with the instantly recognizable Star Wars universe has finally created an RTS that LucasArts can be proud of and AOE players can get into when they want to get out of their galaxy for a bit. Galactic Battlegrounds may not push the RTS genre in a new direction, but it delivers a solid RTS experience that should be missed by none.
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