Storytelling really is quite hard. So much has to go together in order to weave a cohesive and transformative narrative that it can quite a daunting task for some to undertake. You need a protagonist with space to grow, a compelling plot and, ideally, some pathos by the end. Constructing and combing those three elements together requires some degree of creativity and ingenuity that not everyone posses. When the process is badly done, it can make the entire story, and the time you spent with it, feel entirely pointless and wasted. These are the absolute basics of narrative-driven storytelling.
What I am trying to convey, is the fact that storytelling requires passion and care to be devoted by the author, which is why it is surprising that one can find so many low effort products in today's storytelling mediums. I'm not talking about times where an author has tried to make something special and it just hasn't panned out, I'm referring to the times where no one wanted to waste an aberrant thought or original idea on the offering. (Just look at the 'have fallen' series.) With this in mind, have you played any storymodes in DICE games?
The legendary guardians of the Battlefield franchise, DICE have proved their skill when it comes to framing and executing successful multiplayer ventures time and time again. (Some of them are even fun.) They are expert map makers, sound designers, net code workers, gameplay balancers and atmosphere generators; what they most certainly are not, are great storytellers. I don't say that to rag on their creativity, just to explain that their creative talents lie in other, sometimes more practical, fields. Yet they keep finding themselves getting roped into telling narrative stories alongside their games. Because for some unknown reason, no multiplayer game can exist without a singleplayer. (This was obviously in the day's before Fortnite and Black Ops 4.)
As a result, we have several examples of storymodes in Battlefield games that just aren't that compelling or fun. Battlefield 3 followed a very unclear save-the-world-from-political-meltdown plot that revolved around the securing of nukes. I won't belittle the team who worked on it by comparing it with the likes of Metal Gear, but I will say that the game seemed unsure as to what demographic it wanted to cater to. At the beginning of the game you find yourself in a realistic combat scenario in a middle eastern city with the emphasis being on gritty and grounded realism. By the end you are having a one-on-one fist fight with a terrorist in the middle of Times Square over a trigger to a nuclear bomb whilst the entire population of New York watches and does nothing. It is as though there were two writers, one who wanted to portray something unique and graphic and another who wanted it be another Call of Duty campaign; fun and explosive but far from authentic.
For that reason, I was fairly dubious when DICE announced that they would be telling an original campaign alongside Star Wars: Battlefront 2. The previous Battlefront game just featured a lifeless 'sceanerio' list that was mostly just a glorified hoard-mode, so nobody expected any great things out of this game either. However, I suppose all the backlash about 'lack of content' kicked DICE command into gear, "People want content? How about a campaign, that's content, right?" Kudos to DICE for attempting to go outside of thier comfort zone, I guess.
At least DICE handled the announcement well enough. They introduced their new protagonist by bringing her likeness and voice actress on stage, Janina Gavankar. (She was the one at Meghan Markle's wedding, if you had trouble placing her.) Ms Gavankar did a wonderful job selling her excitement for the game and role. Watch anyone with that degree of enthusiasm and you just can't help but find it contagious. I may have even bought the pitch if the marketing team hadn't come back on and told us that this was going to be a game where we followed an Imperial. "Really." I thought, "A Star Wars game in which you are going to attempt to objectively portray the otherside of the conflict. Written and envisioned by DICE, no less. We'll see how long that lasts."
From this point onwards, I intend to conduct a full deep dive in the storymode of Star Wars Battlefront 2. I'm going to look at the storyline, characters, what worked and didn't work and conclude whether or not the story was a success or failure. That is to say, expect huge spoilers for the Iden Versio's story. If you intend on giving the storymode a try and want to approach it completely blind, like I did, then it might be in you best interest to put this blog on hold until you're done. Now that the disclaimer is out of the way, lets get started.
The story starts in the ideal place that any 'fill-the-gap' Star Wars story should, at the moment of the Death Star II's destruction, the closing setpeice of Return of the Jedi. This is the key moment in the war between the Empire and the Rebels, as it is the point at which the last Imperial hail-mary goes askew and the balance of power shifts to the heroes. What an interesting idea it was to place players in the position of the Empire in the years when they are the underdog, this concept clearly did not come from inhouse.
It is here that we are introduced to the rest of the team that makes up the mythical Inferno Squad: Hask and Del. There are literally the only two other members of the Empire's entire special forces division. Oh sure, you have the crew of their ship: The Corvus, and Iden's personal droid, but neither of them are important enough to actually be granted the honour of a name. Seriously, Iden calls her droid 'Droid' for 12 out of the 15 missions the game offers. And here I thought it was standard procedure to forcibly endear the audience to some 'lovable' droid. Apparently this droid just wasn't adorable enough to make the cut.
Things look pretty dire for the Empire as you retreat from Endor. Their Emperor is dead, their space station is scuppered and the Super Star Destroyer went up in flames during the fighting. Luckily for them, ol' Sheev Palpatine had built some contingencies in place in the event of his death. Number one, deploying a set of red-cloaked droids sporting his likeness and exercising his will. What an interesting plot device, the Emperor is still leading the Empire beyond his own demise, like their very own E.D.I.T.H. I wonder when the dreams of a dead man will start to clash with the realities of what it takes to survive, and which motivation leads to the Empire's demise. Wait, he only shows up to introduce 'Operation: Cinder' and then is never seen again? Typical.
Before we get to move on and discover what this operation entails, we have to follow Del to some forgettable world in search of some McGuffin that is never mentioned again. Here we play as Matt Mercer- I mean Luke Skywalker, as he ruthlessly cuts down an entire battalion of Stormtroopers whilst saying things like "I didn't want this." and "They didn't give me a choice." Del Meeko ends up bumping into Luke Skywalker who inexplicably saves him from an insectile death because "(Del) asked." From that point on Del, about whom we know nothing, does a complete 180 on his whole 'jedi are evil' philosophy and helps out his sworn enemy, even allowing him to abscond with some obscure device after it is all said and done. I believe this mission was meant to amount to 'character development' but seeing as how the central focus had no intial character I suppose this is more 'character establishment.' Del is a flimsy special-forces officer who's entire world philosophy is so weak-legged that is blows over the second someone questions it. At least his commander is made of sterner stuff, right?
This next part of the story really drives me nuts, so in the words of Prince: 'forgive me if I go astray.' As it turns out, 'Operation: Cinder' refers to a plan to utilize an array of satellites to shoot heat beams into a planet and... burn the atmosphere? It's unclear. The point is, it essentially boils everyone alive and destroys the buildings. Sounds like a powerful weapon, right? I mean, it's no planet-killer but it's sure to ruin someone's day. So what planet would the Emperor first like it used on? The current rebel base of operations, maybe? Perhaps a traitor system somewhere? Or maybe he wants to destroy the galaxy's infrastructure by burning Coruscant, ensuring the rebels can never have their republic, even in the even of his death! Nope, they're going for Vardos. Imperial loyalists: Vardos. Admiral Versio and Iden Veriso's home: Vardos.
As you can imagine, Iden gets a bit uppity about this but her father shouts her down. "The Empire is our home!" He says. Never once explaining the logic of wiping out one of your most loyal populations whilst you are in retreat. Not even the medieval kings were that pointlessly cruel. But "That's the Empire" The story's writers are trying to say. "That's what they do. They don't need any reasonable logic to decide upon actions, they just kill. They crazy like that!" I don't mean to imply that Star Wars' Empire used to be some complex, morally ambiguous entity; I just thought that when DICE decided to make them the focus of a narrative some effort would be made to paint them in a less pantomime-esque light. (But hey, what do I know? I just post blogs on the Internet.)
What follows is a cinematic walk-and-watch mission, wherein you get to observe Operation: Cinder burn Iden's home to a crisp. Whilst enjoying the view, Hask spouts some nonsense about how this will 'spread fear across the galaxy'. That would be a point, I guess, if it wasn't for the fact the Empire was actively preventing ships from leaving the planet. (Who exactly is going to spread the fear if everyone is dead?) I digress. Iden then travels to the academy inwhich she was trained, and attempts to extract her former mentor. Once there, she notices that her mentor is flanked with a whole host of civilians and offers them safe passage on the Corvus. Hask freaks out about this. "This isn't the mission" he screams pointing his gun at the people. At this point I was struck but how good of a job the actors did at portraying these cardboard cutout's that DICE called characters. As Iden and Hask face off, with Del hiding behind his commander, I really did start to believe that this was a close familial unit who had trained together and were truly at odds. The story had put literally no effort into earning this moment, but the performances almost sold it. As Iden and Hask reached the stage of pointing blasters at each other, I knew that these people were family; they put on the brave face but deep down neither had it in them to open fire on- and then Iden shot Hask in the leg and hoofed it like an actual coward. Drama resolved; you're a fugitive now!
At that moment the audience it meant to believe that our protagonist had undergone a huge personal transformation in turning her back on her family, her creed and her career. Everything came into question once she found herself faced with an act so heinous that she could not ignore it, an act of unprecedented cruelty that revealed to her that the Empire does not protect the galaxy but rather harms it. However, the scene just opens up a whole bunch of questions; such as, Did she just not notice when the Empire blew up Alderaan murdering billions of civilians? Inferno Squad was created after the destruction of the first Death Star, but she is certainly old enough to have heard about that in her lifetime, or seen it on the news. Then there was the fact that the Empire was in the act of building another one. That was happening during her active service. That makes her complicit in conspiracy to commit genocide. But when a single city on a single planet gets destroyed, it's throw-in-the-towel time for her, let's become a rebel! Okay, you could argue that her personal connection to Vardos makes it a more important to her, but isn't that even more sickening? She's happy to murder as many civilians as she can get her grubby mitts on, but the second they are civilians from her homeworld she turns all contentious objector? What I'm trying to say is, Iden Versio's biggest character development moment was sloppily handled and it consequently hurts the integrity of the entire story.
The next time you see her, Iden is a rip-roaring rebel alongside her faithful tool, Del. Inferno ditched their cool armour in exchange for ugly rebel garbs and the Corvus' crew has switched sides after a brief mutiny so irrelevant that it is only addressed once in a throwaway line. You then follow Iden through the years as they chase down the Imperial fleet across the galaxy, become buddy-buddy with Princess Leia and stop Operation: Cin- oh wait I forgot. After Vardos the very next mission has you preventing a Cinder strike over Naboo, you destroy three or four satellites but apparently that was enough for the Empire to never try it again. (So much for the Emperor's legacy. Screw that wrinkly old dude. If he was so cool he wouldn't have died, now would he?)
The story wraps up by allowing players to relive the battle over Jakku (The same battle that was realized in multiplayer in the last game.) Disney's canon confirms that this was the Empire's final defeat and so it is fitting for it all to end here. Iden gets to have a brief dogfight with Hask and then she boards her father's Star Destroyer in order to... kill him? Rescue him? Her motivations literally change mid-sentence. In the end, Iden finds Admiral Versio and it is revealed that temperamental allegiances is a familial trait as her father flips sides and begs her to leave him to his fate, "You must survive!" Iden apparently couldn't remember what she was going to do to her father, so she obliges and undergoes a tense escape sequence as the Star Destroyer is bought down in the fighting. (Which she wouldn't of had to do if she hadn't have travelled there in the first place.) After the smoke clears, Del pulls her out of her escape pod to tell her that it's all over, the Empire lost, they won. Iden is understandably in utter disbelief and, in the heat of the moment, she and Del kiss. No, I didn't neglect to tell you about their budding chemistry and/or sexual tension. This comes right-the-heck out of nowhere as garnishing atop the unearned cake.
And so that was Star Wars: Battlefront 2's campaign. It wasn't good by any stretch of imagination, but it was about what you would expect from a modern day DICE story. Of course, then there are the addendum missions that were added a few months later, but I don't need to cover them now. At least the core offering was tonally cons- wait a second. I've only covered the first 11 missions and the game launched with 12. But that doesn't make any sense, the story reached it's natural conclusion, anything else would be unwelcome and excessive! Where else could we go?
The final mission takes place 'decades later' (Thanks for that descriptive text. Real informative.) on that god awful plant where Del met Luke. We see the Corvus get boarded by First Order soldiers with Kylo Ren as their vanguard. The young Sith-in-training then proceeds to force interrogate an older Del to learn the location of "the old man." "Oh," I thought."This is a strange way of tying the narrative into the beginning of the Force Awakens. But I'll see where it goes." What follows is a pretty cool mission where you play as Kylo Ren inside of Del's mind. You go through his journey of finding faith in 'The Force', fathering a daughter with Iden and becoming a glorified errand boy for Luke's New Order. (Gripping stuff.) After it is all said and done, Kylo sods off to star in J.J. Abrams' movie and Del is left with an old friend. Hask turns up, somehow still alive and dressed in First Order officer regalia. Now that he's older he also looks conspicuously like Paul Blackthorne. Heck, he looks a lot like him. Maybe Blackthorne should have sued. Wait, he was played by Blackthorne all this time! (That's make twice now that Paul Blackthorne has played a pseudo-Nazi. That's a worrying type-cast.) Hask Blackthorne proceeds to trade harsh words with Del before executing him aboard the deck of the Corvus. He then leaves the body for Iden to find, gloats about some 'Operation: Resurrection' and the game rolls to credits."Well, that sounds like an unexpectedly abrasive ending." You may be thinking. I'll admit, I didn't exactly like Del but I still didn't like seeing him gunned down a couple of seconds before the credits. What is this, 'Resevoir Dogs'? The whole scene completely takes the steam out of the main story in order to tease for the free DLC down the line. This would have been a perfectly fine opener for the next branch of the story, but instead it just got lumped onto the end of the first set of missions as though no one cared. If you need any idea of how clueless DICE's narrative department is at pacing, look no further. Darn, I guess now I have to cover 'Operation: Resurrection' too.
Resurrection starts with old Iden and her daughter Zay discovering the abandoned Corvus and then heading out on a journey to find Del, all because Hask decided to bury the bodies for some unknowable reason. The search takes place concurrently to the events of Episode VII and so suffers from a little bit of the 'bystander's envy' that the original game's managed to avoid by being between movies. Also this time around, Iden went to the trouble to name her droid companion; Dio ("You're approaching me?") giving those exciting 'defend the droid' missions an extra layer of depth.
Iden and Zay eventually find themselves following a people-smuggling operation to the wreck of Iden's old academy on Vardos at the same time that a huge red light blares in the sky. ("See! That's Starkiller base firing, isn't it cool the stories are connected?!") They find their way onboard of a First Order Star Destroyer and discover information revealing the truth behind Operation: Resurrection. Apparently, this is the name given to the process through which the First Order kidnaps children and brainwashes them into soldiers. And that alone raises so many questions.
Firstly, No one in the Resistance or Republic knew about this giant militaristic entity running the galaxy's biggest human trafficking operation for what must have been decades? (Judging by Finn's age in The Force Awakens.) Maybe it's a good thing that the new Republic got wiped out, they seemed unforgivably oblivious. Then there is the fact that these soldiers were apparently raised for war since they were children, and yet Finn breaks conditioning the second he sees blood for the first time. I know that I'm comparing the narrative failings of the movie's story with the game's story, but that is what happens when you try to combine storylines here. One of the dangers of sharing a canon is running the risk of ruining both stories. But I'm getting off track again.
Iden figures that it is imperative that they deliver this information to the Resistance. (Alongside some plans for a new dreadnought or something.) Unfortunately, the Star Destroyer is in the middle of hyperspace which means no signal, I guess. Instead of choosing to wait it out, like a sane person, Iden gets the idea to rip the ship out of space by blowing up the hyperspace core mid-transit. (Apparently Iden attended the same tactics class as Holdo.) They manage to fight through the ship and get everything in place without a hitch until the time comes to put the explosive on the core. Zay lets her mother do the honours and, in the fashion of every useless sidekick ever, gets jumped from behind by ninja Hask.
Here comes the stereotypical stand-off scene which ends with Zay, who has never been in a battle in her life, overpowering the former special forces officer and chucking him off the side of the reactor to his fiery death. They blow up the core, inexplicably survive, and the audience finds out that the whole thing was pointless because the ship had reached it's destination anyway. (Apparently the ship was on it's way to back-up Starkiller base from its assult by the Resistance. "See! it's connected!") But, oh no, Iden managed to get struck by one of Hask's wayward blaster bolts and suddenly realizes that she's dying. Zay suddenly summons up all the emotion she was devoid of when she learnt that her father was dead and begs Iden not to kick the bucket. Iden says some vaguely inspiring stuff and drifts away whilst Starkiller base blows up in the background. ("Connected!")
That all happened within the space of three missions, because that was all 'Operation: Ressurection' was. A bookend to Iden's story that was somehow even more cliché and dull than the main game. Nothing of value was really achieved and Iden died. Story over. Also, The Force Awakens happened in the background whilst you were floundering about. This kind of storytelling really does irk me, piggybacking off of other events to make your narrative seem worthy. I'm not saying that there can't be great side stories told in the Star Wars universe, just that this is most certainly not the way to do it.
With Star Wars: Battlefront 2, DICE took a gamble of telling an original story with the safety net of it existing within someone else's canon. I will say that this did allow them to tell a more consistent story than any of the Battlefields did, but not necessarily a better one. Iden wasn't much of a character and certainly couldn't have carried the story on her own, but the curiosity of being an old Star Wars fan meant that I still engaged, simply to learn about the Empire's actions after Return of the Jedi. Perhaps a little Stockholm syndrome came into play because I even started to like Iden by the end. Operation: Resurrection, on the other hand, ruined all that in an attempt to make it all seem more relevant by tying in the new movies. It was short, more cruel than was warranted and left me feeling a lot more dissatisfied then if they just left us on Jakku in the graveyard of giants.
DICE failed to impress me with Star Wars: Battlefront 2's campaign, and it makes me worried about what will end up happening with Jedi Fallen Order. I originally believed that Disney's quality assurance would clean up DICE's act and stop them releasing anything narratively mediocre but clearly that isn't the case. Respawn have pulled off great single player stories before but this will be the first time they work on an IP that they don't own. Will this harm the final product? Guess we won't know until the game comes out. I just hope they don't butcher Cal Kestis like DICE butchered Iden Versio.
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