Like Renegade Squadron, Elite Squadron features character customization but is limited by the hardware of the DS and PSP. That said, it is the first (and so far only) entry in the Star Wars Battlefront franchise to feature simultaneous ground and space battles (which are the game's core feature). However, even these are subject to obvious limitations: the transition between ground and space requires a short cutscene.
Elite Squadron features the following tropes:
- Artificial Brilliance: Concentrate your fire on the AI and they'll resort to combat rolls, breaking your lock. Sadly this only applies to ground troops; they don't seem too concerned about this being a problem in space battles.
- Awesome, but Impractical:
- Jedi and Sith are still this trope, the same as they were in Renegade Squadron.
- A bit more so is the ability to pilot a starfighter as a hero. Sure, they have a much better rate of fire than the standard starfighter, and their missiles cause more damage. But the guns overheat far too quickly, and take too long to cool off afterward.
- Backstab Backfire: At the end of the game, X2 defeats X1 on Mustafar. X1 declares that X2 should kill him and thus turn to the dark side. However, X2 decides not to, stating in the DS version that he'd rather imprison him. This isn't the answer X1 is looking for, however, so he levitates his discarded lightsaber, ignites it, and then attempts to kill X2. Unfortunately for him, X2 sees it coming and backflips over the blade, resulting in X1 accidentally impaling himself and then sending himself flying over the edge into a flowing lava river.
- Big Bad Slippage: X1 starts off as X2's brother and comrade during the Clone Wars, becomes a personal nemesis to X2 but ultimately a bit player in the grand scheme during the Galactic Civil War, and finally a genuine Big Bad in his own right in the aftermath of the Battle of Endor.
- Boarding Party: Like Battlefront II and Renegade Squadron, you can land your spacecraft inside the hangar of an enemy capital ship. However, there are some major differences this time around. First, before you can land in an enemy hangar, you have to destroy their shields. Second, once inside, you don't sabotage the internal systems, but rather have the opportunity to completely destroy the ship — you must make your way through the ships corridors until you come to the main reactor. You know what to do.
- Boring, but Practical: Destroying enemy starfighters. Sure, it's not as glamorous as capturing command posts or destroying the enemy capital ship. But it's easy to do, the enemy rarely focuses their fire on you, and it nets you a lot of pointsnote . Oh, and they'll continue to spawn even after the capital ship is destroyed.
- Cain and Abel: X1 and X2 respectively. Both are clones of a Jedi, but go on vastly different paths, with X1 falling to the Dark Side, and X2 being trained by Luke post-Endor. This all culminates in a final battle on Mustafar.
- Clones Are People, Too: Subverted. The main character of the story campaign, X2, is a clone of a Jedi. However, the game fails to give him any real characterization.
Leaked footage reveals that he would have gotten quite a bit more, had the game been officially realized as Battlefront 3. - Color-Coded for Your Convenience: The game features the same red-and-blue setup as previous games, so you can tell the difference between allies and enemies (and who holds the command posts). X1 and X2 are colored this way as well.
- Didn't Think This Through: In one of the later missions, the Jedi Falon Grey manages to defeat X1, but hands X1 back his weapon in a misguided effort to return him to the light side, which backfires as X1 manages to turn the tables on Grey and kill him.
- Evil Makes You Ugly: X1, like many Sith. As a clone trooper and even as an Imperial, he's a decently attractive man. After he goes full Sith Lord in the endgame, he shaves himself bald and tattoos his head, his skin has become pale and wrinkled, and he has Red Eyes, Take Warning.
- Evil Twin: X1 to X2.
- Later-Installment Weirdness: Unlike the previous Battlefront games, the campaign does not have a system that allows you to respawn after your character dies as long as your squad hasn't died too many times. Instead, death is a mission failure and you have start from that last checkpoint.
- Luke, I Am Your Father: More accurately, genetic donor. It turns out Falon Grey is the genetic template on which X1 and X2 were based. He puts two and two together when he realizes that X2 has Force potential and looks similar to him, as opposed to the Jango Fett clones, and, for the brief time after that he's still alive, refers to both X1 and X2 as his sons.
- My God, What Have I Done?: Implied. X2 partakes in the order to kill Master Ferroda after the battle on Cato Neimoidia. However, after he does so, he turns his back on the Empire and joins the Rebellion.
- Red Oni, Blue Oni: A literal example, with X1's armor having red coloring and X2's having blue.
- Sibling Team: X1 and X2 are clone twins who fight together in the Clone Wars. Of course, it all goes to pot once the Empire takes the stage.
