empire at war

As is the trend with print media's brief grasp on exclusives, some scans of PC Zone magazine appeared on Planet CnC over the weekend, displaying Petroglyph's upcoming RTS: Star Wars: Empire at War. They were soon taken down for obvious reasons, but as we all know the damage had already been done. 1UP has since posted a preview with screens, no doubt based on information already released in PC Zone and CGW's cover story.

Up until a few months ago, the project tackled by former members of Westwood's Command and Conquer team had been tightly under wraps. Understandable, given the medicore reception of Galactic Battlegrounds, essentially a Star Wars skin on an aging engine (pun intended). And let us not forget the complete flop known as Force Commander, LucasArts' last attempt at an original engine, and a sucking chest wound for Star Wars gamers everywhere.

According to a description at TheForce.Net, the events of Empire at War will be set a few years before A New Hope, and will purportedly cross over with some elements of the upcoming Episode III, a logical decision given the game's Fall release. It also sounds like the technology revealed in the battle in Episode II will also be available.

Empire at War also hopes to take Star Wars RTS into space, and although the gaming press loves to make comparisons to Homeworld in this regard, with a game divided between such disparate fronts I hardly think that they'll be able to capture the fluidity of Homeworld's interface and still make it adaptable for the ground based battles. Still, I like the thought of a brand new engine, and look forward to what the game has to offer in terms of gameplay. Those eager to cut their teeth on Star Wars capital ship battles can always try out New Rebellion for Homeworld, or wait for the upcoming Warlords - an absolutely amazing looking adaptation for Homeworld 2. Next to these ambitious mods, the space battles in Empire at War seem less than inspiring.