The gameplay of Rogue Squadron III is almost entirely identical to the previous versions of the game with a few minor tweaks here and there, although there is the new addition to this version in that you fight through ground based missions, but more on these later.
Firstly, let’s talk about the flying bits. Like I said briefly before this is similar to the previous versions of the game, however the handling of ships has been ever so slightly improved and different ships actually feel like… different ships! The missions are pretty straight forward. You have to either shoot a certain number of small ships to progress or blow up the weak point of a larger ship whilst avoiding the smaller ships. This all sounds pretty non-revolutionary and to be honest, it isn’t. However it is still as much fun as when the original was released. Plus you now have the added advantage of a drop down targeting HUD. You see, picking your opponents out from the other fighters in the game can be tough at first, but over using this targeting feature will penalise you on performance and so subtract from your overall points total, therefore hindering progress through the game somewhat. It certainly makes things interesting and forces you not to become overly reliant on the new mode, a good learning curve to overcome.
Each ship has obligatory alternate firing modes, hold down the B button and you release Ion cannon blasts or heat seeking missiles depending on your particular craft. As you progress through the game you can earn new craft to play on different levels that may help improve your stats and therefore unlock some of the secret levels and vehicles in the game. Oh, and for fans of the original games, the snow speeders still have the ability to wrap tow cables around the AT-AT legs to trip them up!
Walking to work
The main new addition to Rogue III is the new foot based missions. These are viewed from a third person perspective with a fixed camera and are a nice idea that simply needs to be worked a bit more by the System 7 crew in any future releases. Basically they involve your character running and shooting as fast as they can, hoping not to die. There doesn’t seem to be much skill involved in these missions and look more like a sub-game between flight missions. Two missions that do stick out though are the Battle on Hoth level, where you play as Luke Skywalker after he crashed his snow speeder, negotiating you way through the AT-AT’s and AT-ST’s (not to mention snow troopers) and doing the classic winching your way up to the engine of the AT-AT and using Luke’s lightsaber to slice through and set a detonator.
I admit this does look really stunning sometimes, watching the imperial troops land is also a great moment. The other surprise level is where Wedge Antilles travels to Geonosis (Episode II) and encounters some ancient Battle Droids and then finds an abandoned Jedi Starfighter. It raised a bit of a smile I have to say. Apart from these nice touches they do seem a bit easy and short.
Nostalgia Wars
This game is packed full of levels based on scenes from the original Star Wars trilogy, it even has some lengthy cut scenes from the movies too to help it feel like a more complete package, even though in reality it isn’t. Strangely I found the Endor speeder bike level less exciting than the movie and the awkward platform levels that Luke has to go through just seem again like a reason to add some kind of quick sub-game in to make the game fit in with the Star Wars story.
To add to the nostalgia though there are two classic conversions of the Star Wars arcade machines to play as well as the funky disco version of the Star Wars theme tune, all unlockable once you have completed the game. Great for Star Wars fans!
“She’s got it where it counts kid”
The graphics in this version of Rogue Squadron are the best yet, there is more detail on the vehicles and higher frame rates throughout. The surfaces of the ships reflect light now and the whole thing feels more accomplished graphically than the previous versions. What it does suffer from is some ugly slowdown when there is too much going on but not so much as to be a huge distraction most of the time.
The sound effects are again taken directly from the Lucas Arts sound library and are instantly recognisable. The only let down in the sound department is the original music composed for the game. Why they didn’t just use the John Williams score like most other Star Wars games is beyond me, it’s there in some instances but most of the time its synthesiser produced mockeries of the Star Wars themes. Nice try but no cigar as they say.
Jump to light speed!
Now for the main major gripe with the game I have, it is way too short. The levels are pretty much identical each time you play them so you basically learn simple attack patterns of enemies which are of no real challenge. I managed to complete the whole thing in a few hours after mastering the controls which I don’t expect to find in what was supposed to be a ‘big release’. There is the added incentive of collecting the Gold medals in the game and unlocking secret ships, but these days I find these sort of incentives rather lacking.
Yes it will take you a while but watching a developer interview and flying around the same missions in a slightly different but “cool” ship isn’t the kind of extra I can be bothered trying. It may be just me but I’ve seen it all before and it’s never worth the added hours put into it. Extra levels would have been most welcome. There is an interesting two player split screen battle mode but this seems more of a short lived distraction than a real multiplayer challenge.
