E3 2015: Star Wars Battlefront Gameplay Trailer Analysis - Is This The Best Battle of Hoth Ever?

You may think you’ve played the Battle of Hoth before (and before and before), but you ain’t played it like this. Check out what details we found in our screencaps of the new Star Wars Battlefront trailer.

First, if you haven’t seen the trailer, check it out here.

Still with us? Let’s get starts. We start in Echo Base (clearly a spawn point) as a Rebel soldier. Notice the UI, with the map on the left, score in the middle, and equipment on the right mapped to the face buttons of the controller.

We work out way out of the base through a hanger opening with tons of cover, fighting off snowtroopers along the way.

Check out this shot. Though it’s been mentioned they won’t have iron sights, this seems like some form of it. Perhaps it’s just a scope mode?

Our soldier gets out of the hanger to see Imperial Star Destroyers and Nebulon B frigates in low orbit, which will come into play later. Since they’re not in space, will we be able to attack and board them? We’ll have to wait and see.

The Rebel Soldier whips out a pair of electrobinoculars seen in The Empire Strikes Back and scopes out an AT-AT in a shot straight from the film:

Over on the Imperial side, we have snowtroopers traveling beside AT-ATs as they move for a Rebel transmitter. Notice the different blaster rifle.

The snowtroopers advance, and we get to see some terrifying grenades that seem to be controlled incendiary rounds.

The Imperials take the transmitter… but over at the Rebel side they decide to mount a counter offensive.

However, an AT-ST makes that pretty tough as it blindsides the soldiers. AT-ST seems to be the tank in this game, an armored ground unit specifically created to take down infantry.

Here, we can see the much lauded jetpacks we saw in the announcement trailer. Is it class specific?

The AT-ST armor is, much like it’s larger cousins, too strong for blasters…

… which is why we need to bring out the rocket launcher to take it out.

The Rebels are able to take back their transmitter, then turn to see an advancing AT-AT… which will probably spell a lot of doom for them.

Back on the Imperial side, we have control of the AT-AT walker (which is an on rails experience), but there are three weapon groups at your disposal. First is overhead blasters for precision shots:

The under head hanging turbolasers (jowl lasers, if you will), for a big punch on equipment.

Last, but certainly not least, you can call down orbital strikes down on targets, which seems pretty devastating as a rain of what looks less like turbolasers and more like blasters.

Back on the Rebel side, the snow speeders make a counter offensive, making a pass at the advancing walker.

Check out the cockpit mode in a comparison shot to The Empire Strikes Back:

It seems you have to wear down the armor on the AT-ATs, but once you do you can activate your tow cable…

… and bring it down.

But unfortunately for the Rebels, the Imperials are counter attacking with air support. Here come the TIE Fighters on a strafing run, showing off the air to ground combat.

The camera seems to snap to a pursuit mode when chasing an enemy fighter.

Also note the Ion Cannon exploding. It seems we’ll get some semblance of destructible environments.

But if that isn’t your thing, you can enter into cockpit mode.

There also seems to be plenty of geological formations in place to shake off enemy fighters. Here we have a quick shot of a canyon dogfight.

Back at the main battle, the Rebels prepare to make another attack on an AT-AT, but an orbital strike gets called in. It seems you can put down a mobile shield to protect you, probably a class specific ability.