Star Wars: Battlefront Classic Collection was released this week and what should have been a nostalgia-fueled good time, instead turned out to be another case of nostalgia-fueled disappointment. The game's launch was marred by server issues, visual glitches, gameplay bugs and more.
Available for $34.99, Star Wars: Battlefront Classic Collection bundled the original two Star Wars: Battlefront games from 2004 and 2005. Included with this collection was all of the content inspired by the original and prequel trilogies, including bonus content that was previously console-exclusive.
The highlight for many was 64-player online support. Unfortunately, Aspyr seemingly didn't take into account just how many people were eager to play the game.
Shortly after launch, there were complaints of players being unable to connect to the online game mode. Reports soon surfaced that there were just three 64-player servers available at launch for more than 9,000 players who logged in on Steam alone.
Although Apsyre did add more servers within a few hours after launch, other aspects of the game were broken. Matchmaking was a disaster. There are complaints of poor hitboxes and aim accuracy. Spawning is broken, and bugs are rampant.
All of this has resulted in Star Wars: Battlefront Classic Collection getting overwhelmingly negative reviews, especially on Steam where just 19% of the reviews are positive.
Aspyr has finally issued a statement following the game's launch, acknowledging the critical errors with network infrastructure and promising to address many of the game's problems.
We’d like to thank the Battlefront community for their overwhelming support and feedback for the STAR WARS™ Battlefront Classic Collection release.
At launch, we experienced critical errors with our network infrastructure. The result was incredibly high ping, matchmaking errors, crashes, and servers not appearing in the browser.
Since launch, we’ve been working to address these issues and increase network stability, and we will continue our efforts until our network infrastructure is stabilized to prevent further outages.
Star Wars: Battlefront Classic Collection was released for $34.99 on March 14. While not the price tag that a new game carries these days, it's still pretty high for a remake -- especially one that doesn't work.
For those disappointed with Star Wars: Battlefront Classic Collection, there's always DICE's more recent version. The EA-owned developer released Star Wars: Battlefront II in 2015 and while it was also met with disappointment at its launch, DICE has since worked hard to address many of the areas of fan frustration. Through numerous free updates, they've added additional content and more, making the game much better now than it was at release.