Star Wars Rogue Squadron II: Rogue Leader

Every console has at least one breathtaking game that showcases the true power of the system. PlayStation 2 has several, but the leader of the pack is definitely Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty. Xbox has Dead or Alive 3 and Halo. Most people expected Luigi's Mansion, Wave Race: Blue Storm or some other first-party game to offer the best graphics on GameCube, because Nintendo has always been known for taking full advantage of their hardware at launch. Times have certainly changed though. This time around, LucasArts is the one taking center stage with Star Wars: Rogue Leader.

It goes without saying that the first thing you'll notice about Rogue Leader is the game’s amazing graphics. Every building, every ship, every vibrant explosion and every immensely detailed target on the Death Star will blow you away. I know that I've said that before, but it has been true every time. It's like seeing the Pod Race scene in Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace for the very first time. I was blown away when the first Pod crashed. I mean really blown away. Nothing like that had ever been done in a movie before. When the second Pod crashed, I was just as impressed. Same with the third crash and any others that followed. Video games are like the Pod Race scene right now. Metal Gear Solid 2 is one of the best-looking games ever made, but that didn't make Star Wars: Rogue Leader look any less impressive.

Before you start a game, head to the spacecraft select screen and take a gander at your pilot. No, on second thought, get a magnifying glass and carefully examine the specimen. You won't believe how much detail has been crammed into the pilot, someone you rarely ever see in the game! The character models are almost as impressive as those featured in the Resident Evil remake.

Run around in circles for a minute, allowing your eyes to fully explore the gorgeous surroundings. The detail of the X-Wing is, not surprisingly, unprecedented. I guarantee that you have never played a flight/combat game as realistic as this before. Best of all, this is only the beginning! Actually, it's not even the beginning because you haven't even left the select screen yet. Enter the battlefield (or should I say "enter the movie"?) and prepare to be blown away again. In fact, I recommend that you prepare to be blown away every time you start a new mission. Otherwise, you might faint and miss out on playing this great game.

The controls are excellent. All of the movements feel just right -- you never feel like something is out of place or that it doesn't belong. When you hop into an X-Wing, you're really hopping into an X-Wing! I loved Star Wars Starfighter, but this is so much better. Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within's slogan may not have been truthful for the movie, but it works great for this game. There aren't a whole lot of reasons to own a GameCube right now, but if you ran out and bought the console just to play Rogue Leader, you wouldn't have made a mistake. It doesn't seem likely, but I hope that Rogue Leader is ported to the Xbox so that a broader audience can experience the game, as I feel that the majority of the GameCube owners will not be able to fully appreciate it. Why do I feel that way, you ask? Because Luigi's Mansion is currently outselling Rogue Leader at most retailers, even though it's not as good as LucasArts' masterpiece. I know that the Nintendo name weighs in heavily on the buying decision of a lot of gamers, especially GameCube owners. Perhaps Rogue Leader would have gotten the respect it deserves on another console...

The real test for how good a game is, is how fun it is to just cruise around/aimlessly wander the world you're in. Mario 64 is the masterpiece of aimless wandering, followed by Crazy Taxi, Metal Gear Solid 2 and Munch's Oddysee. It was also fun to aimlessly wander in Final Fantasy VII and a short portion of Resident Evil and Sonic Adventure. Star Wars: Rogue Leader has been added to the former list for its unprecedented amount of depth. You could try and find a deeper flight/combat game, but you'd fail. Rogue Leader's worlds seem like they go on into infinity. Just when you think you've reached the end, another ship appears. The Death Star seems to go on forever. It can be beaten in a fairly short amount of time, but if you choose to ignore your mission goals and explore the world instead, you'll see that the Death Star never ends.

Unfortunately, the game does end, and it will end a lot sooner than most gamers want it to. Rogue Leader is a great game, but it probably won't last you through Christmas. That's a big problem, considering how short I hear Pikmin and Luigi's Mansion are. Great games are usually pretty short, but if you bought a GameCube for either of those games, you might be somewhat disappointed. On the bright side, Rogue Leader packs a ton of extras, and earning a Gold Medal on each mission is not an easy task. The replay value is extremely high and is probably the one thing that will keep Star Wars fans from constantly dreaming about Episode II. Or it could make things worse, as the exciting battles in Rogue Leader will remind you of how exciting the space battles in Episode II will be. Whether it makes the wait harder or not, playing Rogue Leader is a blast. It's everything a Star Wars game should be -- exciting, entertaining and breathtaking.

Gameplay: 9.2
Next to Pikmin, Rogue Leader is the best game on the GameCube. It's one of the best games of the year on any console. I may like Pikmin more, but since Munch's Oddysee -- the game that more or less "inspired" Pikmin -- is on the Xbox, Rogue Leader is the number-one reason to go out and buy a GameCube this Christmas. If you can only afford one new console, then Star Wars fans are going to have a very tough decision to make: GameCube has Rogue Leader, but Xbox has Obi-Wan!

Graphics: 9.5 
If Rogue Leader's visuals don't blow you away, then you must be the most jaded gamer alive. Rogue Leader is modern art. Ten years from now, we'll look back on Metal Gear Solid 2, Silent Hill 2 and Rogue Leader and remember that this was the year when video games stopped looking like video games. There's so much detail in Rogue Leader that I repeatedly crashed into enemy ships because I was too busy looking at all of the gorgeous eye candy to watch where I was going.

Sound: 9.5
Rogue Leader's sound will blow you away! I mean it, if you crank your speakers too loud, you might find yourself thrown through the window. What? You mean to tell me that you don't have a Dolby Digital surround sound system? No problem, because Rogue Leader sounds great with any speakers, even the shoddy ones built into your television.

Difficulty: 7.5
Rogue Leader may be short, however, it's anything but easy. It's going to take you a while to earn a Gold Medal on every level, guaranteed.

Concept: 9 
Factor 5 wanted Rogue Leader to top the original Rogue Squadron game in every way possible and they succeeded with flying colors. Colors of immensely detailed ships, laser blasts and explosions, that is.

Overall: 9.2
LucasArts strikes again with another great Star Wars game. Rogue Leader plays so good that you may begin to wonder if there is anything George Lucas can't do. He directs the best movies, he got John Williams to compose the best music and he created LucasArts to develop the best games. If you own a GameCube and haven't bought Star Wars: Rogue Leader yet, then what you waiting for? Drop what you're doing and go buy it immediately.