EA has just – finally – shown off Fighter Squadron, the purely air-combat mode in Star Wars: Battlefront. Does it look good? I can only accurately answer that question with a series of gurgling noises. If you thought those opening moments of the on-foot E3 demo – all hails of blaster fire and TIE Fighters screaming overhead – were a hell of an authentic Star Wars rush, just wait until your X-Wing emerges through the clouds to see an entire, 20-ship attack squadron of TIEs hurling and swirling toward you, all lightning fast and silky smoothy. Goosebumps, people. Goosebumps.
In fact forget what I just said. Don’t wait at all. Click the video below and witness it now.
As for gameplay details, we know that it’s a ten-on-ten mode, with an additional ten ships added to each side via AI, to ensure both a genuinely epic conflict and constant targets to engage in (imagine Titanfall with wings). In terms of objectives, the match picked for the demo launches an Imperial transport on its way to escape via a couple of distant Star Destoyers. The Rebels are tasked with taking it down, while the Empire players are ordered to defending it along its flightpath. The Gamescom trailer also shows us our first glimpse of a new planet, namely rocky lava world Sullust. It looks, unsurprisingly, rather hot.
But there’s something even more exciting than all that. Much like in Battlefront’s on-foot modes, hero units can come into play for both sides. We get a brief look at Boba Fett’s Slave 1 ship right at the end of the demo, but the target it’s going after? Gold Leader. ie. the Millenium Falcon. Its pilot introduces himself by requesting that the good guys “Never tell me the odds”. You know who’s in the cockpit.
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