- Search: More on Star Wars Battlefront: Renegade Squadron

The Force is strong with this multiplayer hit.

Star Wars Battlefront: Renegade Squadron retains the blasting action from 2005's Battlefront, but includes a few subtle additions to make it an improved, though not quite perfect, sequel.

For those who don't have too many friends (or want to get a good amount of practice), Renegade Squadron packs a single-player campaign mode. In it, you fill the role of Col Serra, a commander who recaps his days of adventure and glory on Han Solo's squad to a curious listener. Over the course of each mission, select your starting point, equip yourself with the necessary items at stations and head into battle against the Empire. (As a bonus, you can customize Col if you don't like his drab appearance.)

Battlefront's credit spending system definitely stands out. Rather than pick and choose whatever tools you like, you have to budget a certain amount of available coinage. Weapons are cool to have, such as the rocket launcher and the chaingun. However, you'll also need to conserve funds for other necessities, such as a fusion cutter to repair gun turrets or a jet pack to reach higher plateaus.

The real treat, however, is the return of Galactic Conquest. In this mode, you hop around an interactive game board, mapped throughout a quadrant of the galaxy. Buy soldiers, weapons and items and move around sectors, starting battles to maintain control of a certain space. If you're not up for this Risk-like experience, however, other modes are available, such as two variants of capture the flag and a full-blown assault space battle where everyone jumps into ships and chases after each other like dogs in a junkyard.

All of this would be worthless without a reliable control scheme. Luckily for us, Renegade Squadron plays wonderfully. The ground combat is very similar to Battlefront II. Auto-lock onto enemies and switching targets is easy, except in the higher difficulty levels -- then it requires a bit of manual work on your part. Strafing and throwing grenades is a cinch. Even space combat missions have never felt so engaging, as your vehicles maneuver very easily. There's even an auto-follow option that's easy to turn on, in case you have trouble keeping a bead on Boba Fett or some other wily TIE Fighter pilot.

Not everything is perfect, however. For instance, when using auto-lock or auto-follow, deactivating it takes a second or two, meaning that you miss out on targets that may pulverize you with lasers. Also, the presentation isn't as top notch as it should be. The graphics look good but there's a lack of polish. Furthermore, the cut scenes look fuzzy, resembling first generation PSP stuff, and while the music is all John Williams and the sound effects "stay on target", it still skips every now and then.

However, most of these problems go away in the wake of Renegade Squadron's most impressive feature -- the multiplayer modes. Where Battlefront II only supports four players at once, the follow-up supports eight in AdHoc and sixteen via Infrastructure. Most of the maps cover familiar territory from the previous game, but the new ones are a welcome treat. Various classes and modes are also available so if you get sick of the good guy route, you always have the option of turning to the Dark Side. The action runs very smoothly, although it all depends on the strength of your Wi-Fi network.

If Star Wars Battlefront: Renegade Squadron had slightly better graphics, less music skips and a more reasonable lock-on system, there'd be nothing to stop it from getting a 9. As it is, it's still a quality Star Wars product with enough single and multiplayer options to make you as giddy as a Jawa at the cantina.

- 9/10