Review: 75001 Republic Troopers vs. Sith Troopers
When I reviewed the Sith Fury and the Republic Striker-Fighter, the basic worry I had was that Star Wars: The Old Republic (SWTOR) had a big jolt of freshness to add to the somewhat used up Star Wars palette. Don’t get me wrong, I love seeing updates of sets (at least when they’re done right, and not just an excuse to hide a cannon somewhere), but sometimes, it’s nice to see something unique. Sure, sometimes that’s a risk (like the TIE Crawler), and sometimes, it’s just awesome (like the Fury was).
Sadly, SWTOR was pretty much the duck that any of us who played it knew it was going to be. It could have been an amazing single-player (or even co-op) game, or it could have been a slick MMO, but they tried to make it both. It’s gone Free-2-Play, and managed to alienate just about everyone (okay, I don’t know that, but when I logged in, I was quite certain I’d have to pay a fee to try and log back out).
The ideas are all still there, though. The ships for the characters are all great, as are the general character ideas. And that led us to one of the Battle Packs released at the beginning of the year, Republic Troopers vs. Sith Troopers, tapped into some of that. For the first time in the history of ever, I think the throw-in speeder for a battle pack actually existed in the source material, so we’re in uncharted territory here. Then again, the Sith Troopers were also NPC-only characters, usually that you were just mowing down for fun (be it Jedi or Sith, lots of equal opportunity murder in the Sith Empire).
Obviously, the SWTOR based sets aren’t for everyone, but seem to be decent sellers (even though most people buying probably never played the game, given it’s terrible subscription numbers). At $13, this is one of the cheapest sets, but the real question out there is that $13 better spent on this battle pack, on getting more Clone Troopers (the other pack this year), or on Elite Troopers and Commando droids (last years pack). Sadly, if you waited on Endor Troopers, it’s sold out and discontinued, so you’re out of luck.
