Overheat

A weapon's overheat is a gameplay mechanic in DICE's Star Wars Battlefront and DICE's Star Wars Battlefront II that limits the number of shots a weapon can fire in a short time period. Practically, it serves as a type of "magazine."

Overview
In both Battlefront and Battlefront II, as a weapon fires, it builds up heat. Heat build-up can be observed on a bar shown on the player's screen often under the reticle. Heat will automatically cooldown after a certain amount of time if the player does not fire their weapon. The player can also manually vent their weapon, beginning the the expulsion of heat from the weapon at the cost of not being able to fire for a few seconds. Venting is always faster than waiting for the heat to passively cooldown, especially on Heavy weapons.

Overheating occurs when the player completely fills the heat bar, at which point the player's weapon will be briefly unable to fire due to an Overheat Penalty.

In Battlefront II, once a weapon overheats and the overheat penalty has been applied, the weapon will begin to automatically cooldown, but two areas on the overheat bar will appear colored blue and yellow. Additionally, a vertical bar appears on the far-right side of the heat bar and begins to move quickly to the left. If the player presses the action key while the vertical bar is in the blue area of the heat bar, the weapon's heat will instantly reset.

If pressed while in the smaller, yellow zone, the weapon's heat will instantly reset AND not build up any heat for a short period of time if the player decides to start firing the weapon. However, if the player presses the action key in any other area of the heat bar other than the blue or yellow parts, the player "fails" the mini-game and the weapon overheats a second time, and the player is forced to wait until the heat is expelled at a normal rate ("normal" in that it is still quicker than the rate at which the weapon passively cooldown).