Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds Saga - Galactic Battlegrounds and Clone Wars (PC CD)

There's nothing essentially new here for the hardened RTS gamer. Resources need to be mined, units built and technologies researched in the race to crush the opposition. What gives this the edge is the Star Wars setting and the quality of the graphics, which are visually appealing and stay accurate to the wealth of Star Wars information that already exists.

There are six basic "races": human Rebels, the Empire, Gungans, Wookiees, the Trade Federation and the Naboo, each with their own specific weapons and tools--there's nothing quite like sending a squadron of AT-ATs into battle and watching them smash the Alliance to bits.

In addition to the standard hardware afforded each side, Force alliances come into play and it's possible to side with either the Jedi or the Sith depending on your preference. It's also possible to conjure up Jedi Knights and Sith Dark Lords.

Clone Campaigns is the first add-on disk. This content mainly comes in the form of two new campaigns: the Old Republic and the Confederacy of Independent Systems. You can choose to either take control of the shiny new Jedi controlled Army of the Republic, forefathers of those pesky Imperial Stormtroopers, or the combined armies of the Confederacy complete with the insect-like Genosians and Techno Droids.

The action in Clone Campaigns commences on Geonosis, with the aftermath of the big battle scene at the end of the movie. Each campaign features seven missions to complete and over 200 new troop, vehicle and ship units and takes you through the beginning of the infamous clone wars. New features are also added to the original game with new units, orders and effects all selectable in the older campaigns. All the new and old armies are selectable in the multi-player and Skirmish modes, ensuring you'll need to re-evaluate those tactics for warfare against the new combatants. Overall this is a great add-on which adds to and enhances an already fantastic game. --Laurent S Hall

The game itself is basically Star Wars with the Age of Empires 2 setup, whereby you go through different technology levels depending upon how many resources you have and whether you have constructed the prerequisite facilities. These then allow you to build even more complex buildings and more powerful units, and so on. Then it's just a matter of preventing your opponent from killing you while you get ready to build a massive force and stomp him into the floor. Nothing too technical, really. It's an easy game to get into, the AI is occasonally fairly inspired if you stick the difficulty settings upa bit, and the pre-made campaigns will keep you going for a while (though normally you'll be more irritated by the limitations imposed by the level design than you will about your enemies). All in all, a good little runner if you want a decent RTS.

But this is also the game's biggest turn-off: it's nothing new. The graphics are OK, but that's about it. And it's Star Wars, so the kit is unusually well-realised, and it looks and sounds good. But to be honest (and probably a bit controversial) I have to say that the "old faithful" game Starcraft is still a better game than this, even though it's a good five or six years old now. This game has the usual Command and Conquer style build-huge-army-and-go-stomp-enemy tactic; it's not particularly challenging or balanced like a truly good RTS should be. Every faction has its own generic unit types that could be the same as the others', eg droid with blaster, rebel with blaster, gungan with blue ball thingey, etc so all you really feel you are getting is another clone of the same old trooper - just with a different top-coat. It's just too... generic. And it's this underlying blandness that makes playing the game feel like a bit of a flat experience.

So, if you are looking for an inoffensive Christmas or birthday pressie for someone who loves PC games, this will do nicely. But if you want something with a bit more challenge and character, I would recommend (1) Starcraft - available at a really bargain price, with its expansion included; or (2) Age of Empires 2: The Age of Kings (also with its expansion). Both are good examples of what a good RTS should really be, because in this genre it's gameplay and concept that counts, not graphics.

For this game, however, I am awarding Four Stars, because while it's nothing new, it's well-presented, easy to play, and with its expansion pack it offers a lot more content for what you pay.


Best strategy game I've ever played   September 24, 2003
Simon Raistrick (London)
13 out of 15 found this review helpful

The game is fairly easy to pick up and get started, and the campaigns suck you into the starwars universe and get you learning how everything fits together. They get more challenging, and you work on to ever more complex scenarios from episodes 1 and 2. At any time, you can go into a standard game, and these are highly configurable, allowing you to change the map size, resource levels, population limits, etc etc. You can change the difficulty too.

Watching the films after playing this gives you a whole new insight, for example using starfighters to bring down at-at walkers, or using bounty hunters to kill jedi. It all ties in really nicely, even someone who's not really a fan of the films, I found the attention to detail impressive.

It has taken me 6 months to win on the hardest level, and it really needs some cunning military strategies, such as faking attacks in one place in order to break through at a weak spot somewhere else, and abandoning cities and relocating when a superior army attacks. This is an absorbing and rewarding game, and there really is nothing like the sight of 20 jedi knights fighting a fleet of 30 at-at walkers, while starfighters and anti-air defences fight it out overhead. Age of Kings and Age of Empires are the basis of this, and they were good. However, this is brilliant.


Fantastic   August 3, 2003
Mr Paul Gaynor
6 out of 12 found this review helpful

What a strategy game, it has everything needed. it could even rival the greats like Red Alert & Dune. Excellent graphics with lots of missions. The story is basically the same as the film but the missions are more towards the smaller battles except for the battle of hoth & Endor. Wheather your a star wars fan or not this game is a must