You can heavily feel the Metroid Prime and Halo inspiration in this one, yet they still manage to add their own twists to early 2000's FPS stereotypes.
The best part of the game is the strategic management of your 4 man squad, that's about the only innovation present however. It does massively change the thought process a player has when entering a new battle arena, but unfortunately it isn't integrated as cleverly as it could have been.
Most of the game is thoughtless corridor clearing, but when you do get some interesting level design, the combat really shines through, which is what makes me really wish we got the cancelled sequel.
Not worth playing unless you like Star Wars or are interested in early 2000's games.

Side note: The bonus features explaining how the game was made was hella dope! Even if this isn't my favorite game, seeing developers talk is really inspiring and informative.

Possibly the most fun you can have playing a Star Wars game, it's a robust entry in the tactical shooters and has a lot of setpieces and cutscenes reminiscing the movies. It's no Rainbow Six Vegas, but Republic Commando has a lot of love poured into it.

Some sections are harder than others and it feels as polished as a mid 2000s game can feel, but after playing with mods and getting an HD texture pack the game shines in presentation: from deserts to tropical jungles, that one level in space and so on, Republic Commando takes you in the hottest and most extreme battlefields in the Clone Wars. If you're a fan of Star Wars, you definitely should play this game, just don't forget mods and that you couldn't save him.

The most overrated Star Wars game? This received strong reviews back in the day, is still held in high regard by the fanbase, and secondhand copies could go for pretty high up until it got rereleased on the Switch and PS4. I remember finding mine in a store years ago for roughly $21 and thinking that was a steal. Little did I know that when I would finally get around to playing it much later, I wouldn't end up having much fun.

Let me be clear, I absolutely LOVE what they were going for tonally. From the insurmountable odds, enemies that were fodder in the movies being turned into legitimate threats, and the occasional splatters of alien blood on your visor Republic Commando expertly captures the tone of a gritty war film. It does a better job of showing a darker, more desperate side of the franchise's conflicts from the perspective of an expendable grunt while still managing to stay true to that classic Star Wars feel than the likes of Rogue One or Andor have. At least until that ill-fitting credits song. If you thought Godsmack was out of place in Prince of Persia, let me tell you mid-2000s misplaced teen angst had nothing on this.

Unfortunately, the actual gameplay isn't as enjoyable. RC is a tactical first-person shooter that doesn't get the shooting, combat sequences, or arguably even the squad control mechanics right. I get you aren't supposed to be a gung-ho killing machine in these types of games, but I at least expected to be able to AIM properly. Targeting with the right joystick is bafflingly stiff, awkward, and clunky making it hard to hit exactly what you want to even with the overly large reticle taking up the center of the screen. To put it simply, Halo this ain't. That's a real problem when the campaign inexplicably wants to try its hand at being a regular FPS at points by stripping you of your AI-controlled allies and forcing you to go it alone. The poor gunplay and speed at which your enemies can kill you can make these stretches quite a drag.

Luckily, most of the time you're with your three AI teammates. It doesn't necessarily make things all that much better, but battles are less of a pain. Well, before they start artificially increasing the difficulty by continuously throwing more of the bullet-sponge special foes at you at once, that is. Your fellow members of Delta Squad are impressively competent on the battlefield. Honestly, the most you'll ever really have to do is point them to spots where they can lay down sniper or heavy weapons fire, focus all their attention on a specific threat, and occasionally tell them to heal up. For the most part though, they can handle themselves and whatever danger is headed their way so there's not always a reason to give them any direction at all. It kind of makes it hard to be excited about anything when you realize the action almost exclusively consists of walking forward until reaching the next area where you'll need to hunker down for a bit to fend of repetitive waves of hostiles, and that in most cases the smartest strategic leadership decision you can make is to just simply sit back and let your subordinates take care of everything. Especially in the stages where ammo pickups are scarce often leaving you with dry blasters. Also, I mean, come on... Ammo? In a SW title?

A shame, because the settings these firefights take place in are genuinely fantastic. From the massive canyons on Geonosis to the sprawling bowels of a Republic capital ship and the immense forest that is planet Kashyyyk, the level design has such a way with scope so that you're fully aware of exactly how VAST these locations actually are in a manner I've not personally experienced from another piece of Star Wars media despite the linear paths you travel through them. I caught myself wishing there was more going on with the writing to accompany the sights. RC is solely focused on delivering its central premise alone, so there's not much happening narratively. Delta are an amusing bunch, particularly Scorch who sounds and acts so similar with his constant sarcastic lines like Grif from Red vs. Blue I legitimately had to check to see if they were voiced by the same person (they're not, it's some dude named Raphael Sbarge), but they really aren't given a whole lot to do. There are some interesting lore tidbits such as the revelation that bullets were once a thing in the galaxy far, far away, and while I wasn't expecting something too significant from an EU story I did at least think there would be a semi-decent plot to keep me invested. Yet, after progressing through the three different scenarios you're treated to a hilariously abrupt conclusion that feels less as if intended to hammer home the theme of stepping into the role of a highly dispensable soldier, and more along the lines of they ran out of development time to include the final mission or two.

Republic Commando isn't a bad game. It simply never does anything it sets out to do all that well. Except maybe multiplayer, it's most praised aspect on release. Naturally however, the servers have long since been shut down so on the OG Xbox in 2024 that's far from a selling point. Even if you were up to go the split-screen route, man, I'd have to recommend you just choose Halo instead any day. As a hardcore fan of the property, I view this as an altogether skippable and forgettable experience. Of all the prequel era SW I've been annoyed by seeing get demoted to "Legends" status (because it's not like Disney is doing anything with this period of the franchise anyways), I'm not too sour about this one.

5/10

I had fun with Republic Commando but, to be honest, I wouldn't give two shits about this game if it didn't carry the Star Wars name.

And I dare say that you also wouldn't.

I like the fact that this game manages to capture what we've seen/read about the clone wars, putting you in the boots of Delta Squad's leader. Giving orders to your team, managing them in the field, aiding them when they need, blasting droids and even ocasionally seeing familiar faces was pretty fun. I also loved the portrayal of famous Star Wars areas, ESPECIALLY Kashyyk's Shadow Lands, which's always a great place to visit in a SW game. I somehow got lightly attached to my teammates. Maybe it was the convincing voice actors. Or maybe it was because they're clones and I LOVE that era of the saga. Probably the latter.

The shooting's quite competent. Not quite as tactical as I expected, but if you go in gun's blazing, you'll quickly die. This isn't Doom and it's better for it. Soundtrack's also pretty good, but that should go without saying, since most SW games nails the music and atmosphere. And while the challenge feels unfair, the sense of accomplishment you get after surviving a maneuver with your squad is great.

The problem with Republic Commando is that, besides being a SW fps, it's just very... Generic? The shooting might be good, but it lacks any surprises. Enemy variety is a joke and some objectives are utterly unbalanced. In the first mission you are a badass, but on the next, your character is made of GLASS! Anything kills you! Especially since you're alone for the majority of that level.

The environments are cool, but they're only cool because you know them from the SW's universe. Outside of that, they're bland, uninspiring and painfully repetitive. Checkpoints are atrocious, the AI doesn't always function as well as it should, the weapons feel weird to use and everything gets old fast. This game only has 3 missions, around 8 hours, but it manages to OUTSTAY ITS WELCOME! The controls are very clunky too. Even changing weapons or picking up ammo feels, somehow, unresponsive. I get that the game is old, but goddamnit, HALO Combat Evolved is from 2001 and did it masterfully. As for the story? It's nice. Typical Star Wars. I liked it. Until the final scene, which just murdered the climax. Credits just rolled. A big letdown, to be frank.

Whether I recommend Republic Commando or not can be boiled down to a question: Do you love Star Wars?

If you do, pick it up. It's filled with flaws, but you'll get some entertainment out of it. If you don't, just stay far away from it.

This game reminds me a lot of Star Trek: Elite Force in that they’re both pretty basic shooters that are elevated by the IP they’re associated with. The best word to describe Republic Commando is ‘adequate’. The shooting, level design, and story are all nothing special but serviceable. The game’s main flaws come from its random yet frequent difficulty spikes where it seems to believe filling a small corridor with constantly spawning bullet sponge enemies constitutes a reasonable challenge, and the repetitiveness of its mission design. Every objective Republic Commando has to offer is just: Go here, shoot enemies, blow thing up, over and over and over again, with very little to break up the monotony. The game also has a strange lack of personality. There’s no memorable scenery, no compelling characters, and if it weren’t for the use of Star Wars jargon the dialogue wouldn’t sound out of place in any random C-tier FPS.

I enjoyed my time with Republic Commando and would say it’s a good game, but it’s really nothing special. I’d only recommend it if you’ve played the Jedi Knight and Battlefront games and are just fiending for another good Star Wars shooter, otherwise just play those games instead.

A lot of the levels are little 5-10 minute sections of a wider mission that are broken up by loading screens (probably so the game could run on Xbox) and it could really have used some more enemy and weapon variety, but it's pretty fun. As far as Star Wars games go, it's also neat to see something focus almost entirely on the science fiction side of things instead of the space fantasy aspects of the franchise. Giving your squad orders and figuring out the best way to approach a fight was always enjoyable.

Fuck taking the bridge with the two super battle droid dispensers, though. That part sucked.

It's alright but aged. Crosshair feels oddly off, SBDs have a ridiculous amount of health (like 500 bullets to kill. I figured out that knifing them around in circles was way more effective if I had no sniper or anti armor ammo which was all the time. Knife is super op so I'd advise getting used to that.), geonosians and scavenger droids are very annoying, endless hordes of enemies appear even when you're done clearing the area and are trying to stock up, having to command your men to do literally anything that's common sense, team not shooting at enemies a lot of times. Another huge issue was having to tell my guys to heal themselves all the time, which never really mattered anyways because if anyone loses their health in this game, chances are you were always going to die regardless because most of my deaths are just me getting one shotted by tanky and high damage enemies. Besides that, the game is cool. I liked the commando's voice acting even though it didn't really make sense that one was Temura Morrison and the rest were someone else. The levels were super repetitive and unnecessarily long at times to meet the 6-8 hour mark, especially Kasshyk and parts of the Acclimator level. I see some people complaining about bad batch (I never saw it) and it not living up to this game, but tbh it wasn't that far off from my teamates doing literally nothing and not hitting enemies unless they were behind sniper cover. Beat the game on medium difficulty in 8 hours. It would get annoying particularly when I would only die due to what objective I'd prioritize out of the 50 on my plate. That ending really was hilarious where it was basically confirmed that we were a one man army prepping for the actual invasion force. That's literally what it was the whole game which really isn't lore accurate to was commandos really are. Still liked it though despite all this don't get me wrong. It has that novelty and uniqueness that only this game has. I prefer other eras in the expanded universe besides these little sotries in the clone wars, but I still enjoyed this a lot. You should still definitely play it if you like Star Wars, especially the Clone Wars, this is one of the only games that gives that authentic Clone Wars vibe (even if the commandos weren't all that accurate like I mentioned earlier.) Sev's death at the end felt random and shoehorned but it was epic, and that ending was awesome.

It's a real shame I never played this game earlier because, despite it being focused on clone troopers (which was one of the things I didn't like about the prequals) the team behind this game made them all varied and interesting with their own personalities and each one specialising in a certain field, however all commandos can do the jobs, just some are better than the others.

The story is actually quite interesting as you lead a group of elite troopers, Delta Squad and there are a lot of neat little things with the UI such as how when you get blood or machine oil splatted on your visor, it cleans itself. Same with rain too. Aside from your pistol and your ever-changing rifle (that has three modes, Assault, sniper and rocket) and various types of grenades you can also pick up a single alien weapon, which is a shame you can only pick up the one as there are a variety of weapons from the Genoshan's energy beam cannon, the Trandoshen's shotgun to even the Wookiee Bowcaster.

I also loved using the melee weapon which is a blade that comes out of your left gauntlet, generally killing most creatures in one or two strikes.

The story ends just before the end of episode three and before the order is given to fire on the Jedi. The game also contains cool unlockables to learn about the game and it's production, which is something generally missing from most games these days sadly.

Though as much as I like the game, there is one really annoying enemy. A real fuck-you kind of enemy. There are these flying droids that drain your shield and health and by the time you shoot them, them kamikaze straight at you, often insta-killing you so you know, fuck those things. I'd take on a spider-droid anyday.

And if you're not sold on it yet, the character you play as (Delta 38) is played by the actor who played Jango Fett.

I'd recommend picking this up when you have a chance.