In the land-based skirmishes, this takes the form of building up your base and troops and balancing between protecting your currently owned and occupied areas and expanding out into new areas and attacking your enemies' holdings, trying to overtake and gain control of them as well. The point of either is to build your resources and gain control over the area. The main gameplay in Star Wars: Empire At War takes two forms: land and space-based missions. All of the above were represented by good looking, recognizable models and/or artwork 3D models being used when on the ground, and face shots being used in the Space battles. Special characters that can be used as reinforcements for their various special abilities include: Mon Motha, Kyle Katarn, Captain Raymus Antilles, R2-D2 & C-3P0, Commander Ackbar, Han Solo & Chewbacca, Obi-Wan Kenobi and Red Squadron (including the young Luke Skywalker) for the Rebels and Emperor Palpatine, Mara Jade, Captain Piett, Colonel Veers, Grand Moff Tarkin, Boba Fett and Darth Vader for the Empire. There are a wide variety of units that are faithfully reproduced in Star Wars: Empire At War, including T-65 X-Wings, Y-Wings, A-Wings, Corellian Corvettes, Correllian Gunships, Marauder Missile Cruisers, Rebel Cruisers, Alliance Assault Frigates, Mon Calamari Cruisers, Probe Droids, TIE Fighters, TIE Bombers, TIE Scouts, Tartan Patrol Cruisers, Broadside-Class Cruiser KDB-1s, Acclamators, Victory-Class Star Destroyers, Interdictor Cruisers, Imperial Star Destroyers, and even Death Stars. This mode removes your UI and lets you watch the action play out in front of you - up close and personal - for that cinematic experience. Speaking of 'film-like', if you find yourself in a position where you've set things in motion and you're waiting to see how things play out (such as while waiting for your credits to build up enough to purchase something you need), try out the 'Cinematic Mode'. If you can, you'll also want to increase the detail to get the full LucasArts film-like experience.

The higher resolution really helps the overall look of the game a lot. If your computer is on the lower side and you can't choose all of the options, I suggest going with the higher resolution before turning on other features. While there are several different settings that can be tweaked to adjust the quality of the graphics based on the power of your computer system, I found that the graphics looked nice even at the lower settings.

Star Wars: Empire At War does a nice job of bringing the Star Wars universe to life.

(see Game Mechanics section for explanation.) NOTE: This review is for the offline component of Empire At War only.

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