April 28th , 2011
By Requiem

Genre: First Person Shooter
Systems: Xbox and PC
Developer: Lucasarts
Publisher: Lucasarts
Release Date: November 8th 2011

When you think about Star Wars videogames, the term "dark" rarely comes to mind. In fact, most people automatically think of dogfights or lightsaber wielding action. Come this fall, LucasArts had decided to bring the Galaxy Far, Far Away into a whole new realm.

Republic Commando is a first person, squad based shooter. It places the gamer in the boots of a Clone Trooper fighting in the Galactic Clone Wars. For those of you who aren't Star Wars savvy, this simply means that it takes place between the time of Attack of the Clone and next years Episode Three. In the same vain as Rainbow Six, you are able to go into missions with your team and command them to do your bidding. However, this time around, you can actually create a formation and have your team follow through so that a proper ambush or assault and go through as planned.

Since LucasArts is attempting to make this a little more gritty and realistic, your Trooper can only carry two guns at a time, ala Halo. This means you'll need to think carefully when picking a weapon since you'll have your primary and only one other. If you reach down and pick up a Wookiee bowcaster, you will drop your current weapon in place of it.

Gameplay wise, the most important aspect so far seems to be learning your enemy. There are several different types of opponents, and each race has its individual classes of warriors. For example, the Separatists army will consist of battle droid, but there are three different types (all of which have been in the movies). The weak normal battle droid is easy to take out and also easy to evade. The Super Battle Droid however, is much more intense and eager to see you dead. Lastly we have the Droideka… the rolling weapons of doom that have their own shield projectors. While slow in battle form, they pack a considerable punch.

Set for November 8th, 2011, we still have a while to wait before we're able to bust out our blasters and hit hyperspace. Visual wise, RC is very Halo-ish in that it has vast, threatening landscapes and a wide variety of atmospheric conditions. In the next few months we'll see if LucasArts can really pull off this intriguing title… until then crack out the old Dark Forces games and try remember what it's like to use guns again. We can't all be Jedi…