Battlefront: Twilight Company Puts You on the Front Lines in a Galaxy Far, Far Away
Just as The Force Awakens is the most anticipated movie, like, ever, Star Wars Battlefront is the game of the holiday season. A complete overhaul of the decade-old series, Battlefront places Force-strong gamers in the role of either a soldier for the Rebel Alliance or an Imperial Stormtrooper (with better aim, hopefully). Set during the original film trilogy, it puts you in the trenches of the Galactic Civil War, and looks perfect for anyone who has ever dreamed of being chased by a rampaging AT-AT or of taking potshots at Ewoks on the forest moon of Endor. But the game isn’t the only way to get inside of this story…
Star Wars: Battlefront: Twilight Company
Hardcover $28.00
Star Wars: Battlefront: Twilight Company
Hardcover $28.00
There is another…
Star Wars has a decent track record with games, but an even better reputation for tie-ins, ever since 1996’s Shadows of the Empire, a multi-media game, book, and soundtrack event. Knights of the Old Republic, a game set 4,000 years prior to the movies, was both awesome and popular enough to have lead into several novels and dozens of comics. Same with Dark Forces, X-Wing, and The Force Unleashed. There have been a lot of Star Wars games, and Lucasfilm and friends have generally taken that shared universe pretty seriously.
Which brings us to Battlefront: Twilight Company, the companion to the much-anticipated game. The book follows the toughest soldiers of the Rebellion’s 61st mobile infantry throughout the galaxy in a series of skirmishes that begin sometime after A New Hope and take the team to Hoth and beyond.
Part of the Rebel Alliance, and a Traitor
It’s a unique perspective on the Star Wars universe: these are soldiers as you’d find in any hard military sci-fi novel. No hokey religions nor ancient weapons here (plenty of good blasters, though). In the dark days prior to Empire, the Alliance is forced to pull out of worlds on the outer rim of the galaxy, and Twilight Company is tasked with covering the retreat. It’s brutal, messy work, with world after world being retaken by the Empire as the 61st just tries to survive. There’s loyalty and camaraderie between the deeply cynical Namir, our main character, and his team of elite Rebel soldiers, but light moments are few and far between.
Writer Alexander Freed, a veteran of LucasArts’s story team, has gone to great lengths to create convincing characters that live on the fringes of the Star Wars universe we know and love. These are the tough women and men fighting on the ground and in the stars while Luke and Leia are off fulfilling their grand destinies. Hope takes the unlikely form of reluctant rebel Everi Chalis, an untrustworthy Imperial governor who fell out of favor with Darth Vader and defected rather than face a Sith Lord’s wrath. Her knowledge leads the team to Hoth just in time for that legendary battle from The Empire Strikes Back, and to a brush with Vader himself. With Chalis’ guidance, the 61st develops a complicated, audacious plan to strike a crippling blow against the bad guys. Moreso even than the soldiers, this heroic traitor is the book’s most compelling character; it’s never clear whether she’s working for anyone but herself.
Whether or not you’re a gamer or not, this is a great Star Wars book, and reading it will certainly add a lot to the experience of Battlefront (as might a fancy strategy guide). Its gritty and sometimes violent nature makes it stand out in the universe of the franchise, and it’s about time someone gave some thought to the grunts fighting the Alliance’s battles while Luke, Leia, Han get all the glory.
Star Wars Battlefront: Twilight Company is available November 3.
There is another…
Star Wars has a decent track record with games, but an even better reputation for tie-ins, ever since 1996’s Shadows of the Empire, a multi-media game, book, and soundtrack event. Knights of the Old Republic, a game set 4,000 years prior to the movies, was both awesome and popular enough to have lead into several novels and dozens of comics. Same with Dark Forces, X-Wing, and The Force Unleashed. There have been a lot of Star Wars games, and Lucasfilm and friends have generally taken that shared universe pretty seriously.
Which brings us to Battlefront: Twilight Company, the companion to the much-anticipated game. The book follows the toughest soldiers of the Rebellion’s 61st mobile infantry throughout the galaxy in a series of skirmishes that begin sometime after A New Hope and take the team to Hoth and beyond.
Part of the Rebel Alliance, and a Traitor
It’s a unique perspective on the Star Wars universe: these are soldiers as you’d find in any hard military sci-fi novel. No hokey religions nor ancient weapons here (plenty of good blasters, though). In the dark days prior to Empire, the Alliance is forced to pull out of worlds on the outer rim of the galaxy, and Twilight Company is tasked with covering the retreat. It’s brutal, messy work, with world after world being retaken by the Empire as the 61st just tries to survive. There’s loyalty and camaraderie between the deeply cynical Namir, our main character, and his team of elite Rebel soldiers, but light moments are few and far between.
Writer Alexander Freed, a veteran of LucasArts’s story team, has gone to great lengths to create convincing characters that live on the fringes of the Star Wars universe we know and love. These are the tough women and men fighting on the ground and in the stars while Luke and Leia are off fulfilling their grand destinies. Hope takes the unlikely form of reluctant rebel Everi Chalis, an untrustworthy Imperial governor who fell out of favor with Darth Vader and defected rather than face a Sith Lord’s wrath. Her knowledge leads the team to Hoth just in time for that legendary battle from The Empire Strikes Back, and to a brush with Vader himself. With Chalis’ guidance, the 61st develops a complicated, audacious plan to strike a crippling blow against the bad guys. Moreso even than the soldiers, this heroic traitor is the book’s most compelling character; it’s never clear whether she’s working for anyone but herself.
Whether or not you’re a gamer or not, this is a great Star Wars book, and reading it will certainly add a lot to the experience of Battlefront (as might a fancy strategy guide). Its gritty and sometimes violent nature makes it stand out in the universe of the franchise, and it’s about time someone gave some thought to the grunts fighting the Alliance’s battles while Luke, Leia, Han get all the glory.
Star Wars Battlefront: Twilight Company is available November 3.