Product description
-------------------
Fly against the evil Empire! As Luke Skywalker,
co-founder of the Rebel Alliance's elite Rogue Squadron, you must
combat the evil Galactic Empire! Engage in intense, fast-paced
planetary air-to-ground and air-to-air missions - dogfights,
search and destroy, reconnaissance, bombing runs, rescue
assignments and more! Pilot X-wings, Y-wings, A-wings, V-wings
and Snowspeeders with powerful weapons in over 15 missions
battling TIE fighters, TIE bombers, Imperial shuttles, AT-AT
walkers, AT-STs and other challenging foes.
.com
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It is a time soon after the destruction of the first
Death Star. Luke Skywalker has formed a squadron of hot-
pilots to engage the still-formidable Imperial forces. You, as
Luke, must lead this rogue squadron in a series of
galaxy-spanning raids and rescues. To complete all your missions,
you'll need good flying skills, fast reflexes, a keen eye, and a
quick trigger finger.
You get to fly all your favorite ships: The X-wing, Y-wing,
snowspeeder--even the Millennium Falcon. There are also some
"secret" ships, such as the sleek Naboo Starfighter (
/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00000J2F0/%24%7B0%7D )from Star Wars: Episode
I, The Phantom Menace ( /exec/obidos/ASIN/0439087066/%24%7B0%7D
), a TIE interceptor, and, um, a '78 Buick.
The flight simulation in this game is first-rate. You'll find
yourself leaning to the side as you pull a high-G turn in pursuit
of Imperial TIE fighters. And the outstanding graphics and sounds
are realistic enough to transport you to the Star Wars universe.
Every detail is in place, right down to the individual
Stormtroopers you can see running around (and trying to shoot
you). One of the more impressive sequences lets you bring down
Imperial Walkers by using the tow cables on your snowspeeder.
Nice touch.
This is a single-player game, but you start each mission with a
few wingmen from your squadron, and the well-done spoken dialogue
between pilots and commanders really makes you feel like part of
a team. The only significant shortcoming is the lack of a
cooperative multiplayer option. With its excellent gameplay,
varied environments, and interesting missions, Star Wars: Rogue
Squadron is sure to become a long-time favorite. --Eric
Fredrickson
Pros:
* Faithful to lots of Star Wars details
* Satisfying flight action, explosions, sound effects
* Interesting missions and plot
* See--and fight over--the Spice mines of Kessel and other famous
Star Wars planets
Cons:* For some reason, you can only fly clockwise when bringing
down a Walker
* No "easy" setting for those without The Force
* Voices of Luke, Wedge, and Han don't sound like the real thing
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Review
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Remember the first level of Shadows of the Empire?
Remember thinking "Gee, if only the rest of the game were like
this, this game would actually be good"? LucasArts heard you and
developed an entire game based around the concept. Of course,
spending an entire game in the snowspeeder, fighting AT-ATs, is
something better left to that old Atari 2600 game, so some more
modes of transport have been tossed in to spruce things up.
You play as Luke Skywalker (finally, no Dash Rendars or Kyle
Katarns in ) who leads the Rogue Squadron against the
Empire. The game has a very movie-like quality to it, mostly
thanks to a lot of voice work and in-game cinemas. The game plays
like an action-packed Wing Commander game sans all of the crazy
controls. Auto-leveling keeps you from cing and allows you to
get a firm grasp on the control quickly and easily. Once you've
gotten the hang of flying the craft, you can disable it. Each of
the ships has varying armor and weapon strengths. In addition,
the ships maneuver differently, making one type more suited for
some missions than others. The missions are composed of rescue
missions, defense, escorting ships, and striking targets. Some
missions require pinpoint accuracy when shooting, while some
require that you simply lay waste to everything that you
encounter. This mix of levels really keeps the pace of the game
fresh and exciting. In each level you can earn one of three
medals. Your performance throughout the level decides which, if
any, of the three medals you'll receive. If you collect all three
medals on every level in the game you will be handsomely
rewarded.
The visuals get a great boost from Nintendo's new RAM upgrade
accessory. When using the RAM pack, the game plays in a much
higher resolution. The textures of the landscapes, the ships, the
lighting effects - everything looks so much better. Without the
upgrade, the game looks OK but not nearly as nice. Whether you're
playing with the upgrade or not, the game does unfortunately
suffer from one major visual flaw: The pop-up is horrendous.
Every object in the game is drawn in at an incredibly short
distance from your view. This at first seems like a really bad
thing, but after spending any a of time with the game you
nearly forget all about it since most of the time you are
generally focused on what's right in front of you and your radar.
Rogue Squadron has a ton of speech for an N64 game. Each mission
has a briefing to listen to before you go into battle. Then
during the action there are voice commands indicating what you
have to do next. Plus there's a lot of chatter from the rest of
your squadron. All of the voices sound fairly decent and really
draw you into the game. Once there, the incredible sound effects,
like the scream of TIE fighters zooming past you with their s
blazing, really sound terrific. The game also makes good use of
stereo effects. The only thing in the audio department that Rogue
Squadron lacks is quality music. Sure, its Star Wars stuff, but
the actual quality of it doesn't sound very good.
Overall, Rogue Squadron is a good mission-based shooter. Fans of
the film will be pleased with the good usage of the Star Wars
universe. Being able to fly by Jabba's palace, over Sarlacc, or
to see Han Solo's homeworld is really a treat. Any fan of the
first level of Shadows of the Empire really should check out
Rogue Squadron. --Ryan Mac Donald
--Copyright ©1999 GameSpot Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction
in whole or in part in any form or medium without express written
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