Star Wars Battlefront II skips season pass, consoles get offline co-op

Star Wars Battlefront II finally has a campaign, an element sorely lacking from the original. But the multiplayer is still at the core of the experience. The first of the new Battlefront games was fun but just about every review and fan gripe I heard about it could be summed up as saying it “lacked depth.” Our own Joey Davidson’s review included. So the team has some work to do with this game, and they’ve revealed some of what we can expect in terms of not only content but modes and expansions, too.

Yoda vs Kylo Ren, who wins?

First off, we’ll be able to step into the roles of characters like Darth Maul, Yoda, Kylo Ren, Rey, and Luke Skywalker, as well as “many more familiar faces” from the original, prequel, and new trilogies. Multiplayer maps include Theed, Takodana, Starkiller Base, Yavin, Mos Eisley, Endor, Hoth, and other locations, promising a bit more variety than the last outing, as well. Vehicles are back as well, including both standard ships like the TIE family and the Rebels’ alphabet fleet as well as “hero” ships like the Millennium Falcon.

Multiplayer matches can include up to 40 players, and will feature a class-based system complete with leveling for the Stormtroopers and Rebel soldiers.

If you’re playing on console instead of PC, Microsoft has revealed via the Xbox Wire blog that the console versions of the game will get a two-player offline cooperative mode that will allow you to earn customization rewards and bring those rewards over to online multiplayer. Microsoft’s initial posting said that this mode was exclusive to the Xbox version, but the wording has since been edited to clarify that both console releases are included.

Where we’re going, we don’t passes

Perhaps even more annoying than a lack of campaign with the first Battlefront was the presence of a season pass that asked players to spend $50 – almost as much on the pass alone as they did on the game itself – just to get access to more multiplayer maps.

Battlefront II creative director Bernard Diemer confirmed to Mashable that the team learned from the experience.

“We don’t want to segment our community,” he said. “For this type of game, season passes are not the best thing.”

EA offered up a statement in addition to Diemer’s comments:

While we’re not ready to confirm any live service plans just yet, what we can say is this we heard the feedback from our Battlefront community loud and clear. We know they want more depth, more progression, and more content. So we’re focused on delivering that in every dimension of Star Wars Battlefront II. We’ll have more to share about our plans soon.

When talking about the longevity of multiplayer games, market segmentation is one of the biggest stumbling blocks. For a game like Call of Duty: Black Ops II, where everyone is playing it and hype for it is at a fever pitch, you can get away with map packs. Turn that volume down even a little, though, and people are going to start losing interest in spending extra money.

If Battlefront II does get post-release paid DLC, it sounds like it could be campaign-related, or something cosmetic. Both would be a much better path.

Star Wars Battlefront II hits PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One on November 17.

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