4 hours in.

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Kryplixx

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  • So far this is great! No bugs or performance issues.
  • The graphics are beautiful. So much little detail in the cockpits. This is 1st person only which I love. The background stages are incredible. Star Wars fanboy wet dream.
  • The sound design is top notch. The VO and characters in single player are also great. You talk to them after each mission if you want - VERY similar to Mass Effect.
  • The flying is tough. There is a lot going on, which is a wonderful thing. In MP the skilled pilots will rise to the top for sure. The X-Wing for example: You can transfer power to Shields, Engines or Primary Weapons. Transfer shield power to either front or back or balance power equally between all three on the fly. You can then overcharge any of the three for a big boost. Tons of different loadout's you can experiment with.
  • I think it does a fantastic job of walking the line between Sim and Arcade.
  • 40 Bucks, zero micro-transactions. Earn all your rewards and skins in game.

I realize I sound like an EA puppet, but I was really excited for a game like this and it so far does not disappoint in the slightest.

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Humanity

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The little gameplay of this I saw looked pretty involved. Dodging missiles was a whole maneuver of slowing down half speed and then hairpining or something - definitely feels more like a simulation than pressing the "dodge button" to execute a canned barrel roll animation.

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csl316

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#4  Edited By csl316

It looks neat, but I guess I'm more into arcade flight games. Would I get anything out of this, or is it more Gran Turismo than Burnout?

$40 at launch makes it more attractive, regardless.

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krulon87

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@csl316: No definitely not. I picked this up last night and have only played a few missions but it is not a full simulation. It allows you to adjust the power of your ship at different times depending on the situation you are in but still has an arcade feel to it. I am really enjoying it.

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Gundato

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Yeah. Tested talked about it on their podcast this week and it sounded awesome. Also amuses me that Norm seemed to rediscover that all of these games (Freespace, Mechwarrior, etc) are best played with a mouse and keyboard and we just use HOTASes because they are fun.

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nophilip

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I think it walks a line somewhat similar to a Forza game. There are a lot of options for basic/advanced controls, how granular you want your power distribution options to be, basic/advanced HUDs, etc. If you want this to be more of a sim, you can make it more like one. But if you want it to be more arcade-y, you can do that too.

That said, just like Forza is never going to be a Burnout game, Squadrons is never going to be a Rogue Squadron. It is inherently more complicated (and IMO a lot more fun). But it's also not Elite Dangerous. I think it rides the line really well on default, and you can tweak it up or down depending on your preferences.

Also, A-Wing for life.

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wollywoo

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I'm almost completely burnt out on Star Wars at this point, but this seems like the most obvious way to take advantage of that iconic feel. I loved the Rogue Squadron and X-Wing/Tie-Fighter games back in the day - surprising there are not more of these types of games. It seems like this should be the 19th entry of a series by now.

It looks there are no planet-based missions? If so that's disappointing, I liked that in Rogue Squadron back in the day and it would be great to see the detail that could be pushed on modern systems. How about a battle on Coruscant?

I'll skip this for now, but if I ever get into VR this is the first thing I'll check out.

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lKennedyl

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I was very excited for it but i'm wildly disappointed. I don't know why. I don't know what I thought I was going to get but what I am getting is my shit pushed in on half a Battlefront '05 mode. It's not fun to play for me. I'm not sure how much happier I'd be even if I was good at it. All the aesthetic customization is incredibly dull and none of the differences between ships and loadouts matter if I'm annihilated in seconds. Maybe in a couple years time it'll have "come a long way" but right now it's just so much nothing.

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deactivated-61665c8292280

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@csl316: @humanity: It can be a lot. There's even a "drift" maneuver they teach you. It's like boost, yaw, throttle cut, throttle up. A four-step process for what other games might condense into simpler terms. But I would categorize it in the "learning curve" column and not in the "this is way too complex for me to pick up and enjoy" column. Generally speaking it's a game more concerned with mastering the few abilities you have rather than managing a multitude.

@kryplixx said:
  • 40 Bucks, zero micro-transactions. Earn all your rewards and skins in game.

Hard to overstate this one. Seriously, a big deal. I think a lot of players are hesitant to jump on even at the low price point because the assumption is that the profit will be made up on the back end.

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development

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What are the chances they turn on microtransactions in 6 months

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Zelyre

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@gundato said:

Yeah. Tested talked about it on their podcast this week and it sounded awesome. Also amuses me that Norm seemed to rediscover that all of these games (Freespace, Mechwarrior, etc) are best played with a mouse and keyboard and we just use HOTASes because they are fun.

One interesting thing about the Tested video was that Norm said he felt the HOTAS controls felt mushy, but liked it because it was more immersive.

Looks like EA put in a really huge dead-zone for joysticks.

I'm pretty excited to play around in this in VR, but on launch day, my expectations are pretty tempered. I'll be playing this on easy, be a space tourist, and just to play around in a TIE/I or T-65B and treat it like it was a Galaxy's Edge or Disney Spring's VR experience.

But with a mushy dead zone, I know I'll get frustrated if I try to play for real.

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deactivated-61665c8292280

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@development: I would not be blown away if they start offering additional starfighters with secondary purchases. Though there aren't presently any microtransactions, there is certainly obvious room where they might go.

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Hunkadunkodon

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The thing that immediately struck me about the game was how it made me feel like I was playing a DOS era CD-ROM game in terms of the briefing room presentation stuff. Being in a single static room with clickable talking heads and the just... Very MIDI-esque background music was flipping all my old man switches.

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Hunkadunkodon

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I'm not sure how much happier I'd be even if I was good at it.

At the risk of sounding like an ass I honestly thought about that after playing it for a few hours last night. I personally have been enjoying it even if I'm on day two of playing it and I'm still trying to figure out how to not have dumb fingers with the controls... But I can see that this is a game that a lot of folks might find surprisingly hard. Flight movement in and of itself is hard enough to wrap your head around. Combining that with manual rerouting of power to shields, engines, and weapons while also doing correct maneuvers and maintaining situational awareness and constantly adjusting your throttle... I'm still honestly pretty bad about managing my throttle.

Honestly I think that this $40 game with no mikes (not yet anyway) is a smart sales move, which seems unusual for a company like EA who normally shouldn't give a damn. What could have been a "This is Star Wars, they'll give us $200 for it even if it's mediocre" release came out as a "Hey this game probably won't blow your mind and it's not here to consume every minute of your time and every penny of your paycheck but if this kind of game is interesting to you maybe check it out".

I would love to see this be a trend going forward. Time will tell for stuff like Genshin Impact but my initial thoughts on that were incredibly skeptical because of it feeling like a pretty damn good game for zero dollars AND the gacha seeming to be unattractive in the "You totally want to roll for characters, don't you?" sense that most of it's kin tend to encourage. Genshin comes off as looking like a game that they know nobody would play if they charged up front for it and if that results in some folks giving them money for the gacha stuff then it'll make more money than if nobody bought it at all.

Who knows? Maybe 2021 will be a crazy new world for gaming hearkening back to the days when perfectly serviceable retail releases could come to market at several price points between zero and full price. Maybe they can make that work. Would be nice. Would be damn nice.

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pastor_richards

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Some issues on my end. The arenas are small, smaller than I'm used to in these types of games. I've ran into the "death wall" a few times. Once when the capital ship was moving in Fleet mode, I did a bombing run across the top of it and after I flew over I ran right into the the wall and started taking damage. So hopefully that gets fixed.

The meta is A wing and Interceptors are OP. Which is a bummer cause it just turns into Eve Valkyrie again. Extremely shallow multiplayer experience, but the story is pretty neat. Visually it looks amazing on Ultra. You don't need a VR hmd to have a good experience in this game honestly. It was made for flat screen and you can tell VR was added later on. The scale in the cockpits are very good compared to a game that was VR first then ported to flat screen (eg. Eve Valkyrie, BattleZone). VR in the Imperial ships is almost pointless due to the shallow viewing angle from the front of the Tie classes.

Controls via controller are a bit weird at first, most folks are customizing them. I switched to "South Paw" which I never do, and it's been great. Power management is fine, nothing from the boosts makes it a serious part of the game, but it's a fun little thing to do.

I've heard multiple times from multiple people that there is NO POST GAME CONTENT, which if true is a big bummer. Especially since the MP is so shallow.

Overall it's a fine game, not the best in it class but not the worst. If you're a Star Wars fan and want the feeling of the old X-wing, Tie Fighter, Vs games, this might scratch that itch a bit, but it won't be the same. 40 bucks isn't bad, maybe 30 max is what it should be, but I don't make prices ;)

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Whitestripes09

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I have been waiting a long time for a spiritual successor to X-Wing and this is a love letter to that game series.

The way the ships fly, managing power and shields, hangers, briefings, and using the cockpit elements as a sort of hud for information is all so X Wing that I'm just in love.

It is just hardcore enough in my opinion without being over saturated with information. It feels accessible, but engaging to the point where I feel really involved with what I'm trying to do in the game, which is the exact opposite how I feel like when I'm flying in Battlefront.

That being said, I totally understand the price point and why this is a turn off for some people. Is this Microsoft Flight Simulator difficulty? No, but I'm still so involved that I feel like my hands are dancing all over the gamepad when it gets really hectic and memorizing what each button does to make sure I don't die. Some people just want to steer and shoot without the worry of pressing any other buttons, I get that.

My only "bleh" point are the cosmetics. They feels really uninspired and too video game-y. I don't want my ship to look like a gun from CoD, I just want a solid black paint job for my Tie Interceptor or a darker green for my X Wing. Not sure if this makes sense, but the ships in the hanger look incredibly detailed in texture, but they're missing color details? The shade of red in the Red Squadron almost doesn't even look right. Maybe it's a video setting that I need to adjust, but the colors just do not look right on these ships, which is a shame given how much effort they put into the model textures.

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Pasta_Pirate

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HOTAS deadzone is a huge issue and makes it almost impossible to aim. However, there are workarounds if you look for them it's just not ideal. I was nearly going to refund the game until getting that fixed. Now that the controls aren't actively undermining the experience I've enjoyed it quite a bit in the 90 minutes I've played. Excited to give it a try in VR later on tonight.

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Played the first couple missions tonight. I enjoyed it. Switching to the "southpaw" control really helped get a grip on the controls. Was starting to get some Colony Wars vibes to a certain extent, which is always good in my book.

Excited to give the PSVR mode a shot tomorrow. If it's anything close to what that Battlefront 1 PSVR mission was, I'll be super happy.

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hippie_genocide

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I hope people check back in with their experience with PSVR. If I play this at all, that would be what would get me on board.

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Hunkadunkodon

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@hippie_genocide: I keep meaning to check it out but I haven't set it up just yet. Hoping to poke at it this weekend but I've heard positive things about the VR in the game.

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Well, it's better Star Wars than we've been getting for the last few years.

The controls are continually throwing me off, though. I give them credit for trying to get it to work on a controller, but a lot of it feels kind of shitty. There's a huge dead spot in the flight controls and the throttle being on the stick feels really crappy to me, particularly when it's also on the same stick as roll. It looks like there are settings for just about everything, so I'll probably need to spend a ton of time figuring out what I want on and off.

It almost makes me wish I hadn't uninstalled Battlefront. I remember having a lot of the same issues there, and I eventually managed to get everything dialed in pretty well. I just can't remember for the life of me what those settings were.

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Zeepzorp

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#25  Edited By Zeepzorp

Game looks really nice. The 20 percent joystick deadzone issue makes it unplayable for joystick right now, unfortunately, without a somewhat tedious 3d party fix. The TTK seems absurdly high to me personally, 3 or 4 times higher than how it's always portrayed in Star Wars media. I'd much prefer them keeping it like a WW2 dogfighter in that regard, since it allows for more skill in deflection shooting and rewards defensive flying. It also just feels wrong to unload into a TIE fighter and not have it die.

Aside from that, people review bombing because it has an array of skin colors instead of just more white people is silly. I understand wanting more character customization, but the ones review bombing are not even arguing for that, just projecting their real-world politics into a fantasy universe where Earth history is irrelevant.

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holycrapitsadam

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Glad to hear it’s fun. I’m gonna wait till they roll it into gamepass

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lapsariangiraff

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I've been enjoying it as a new AAA VR game. Especially striking when you aren't just flying through empty space and have other ships, asteroids, or debris that lets you see just how quickly you're moving around.

The game part? It's fine. Neat they made a game like this in 2020 and $40 is perfect.