| Platform | OVERALL |
|---|---|
| PlayStation 3 | 7.70 |
| Overall | 7.70 |
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Star Wars The Force Unleashed is one of those games that is fun enough to enjoy a few times but ultimately leaves you with nothing, its good but its mostly generic good. With this game Lucasarts wanted to make a game that explores force powers on a whole new level, well that's what they said and in a certain point of view they did that.  What they also did was make an action game that is very much like say God of War with a Jedi in place of Kratos. Besides some technical issues which I will get into later my biggest issue with this game, and it may be my inner SW nerd talking, is that I didn't feel like I was a Jedi, i felt like I was a generic action game character with a SW skin on. TFU does a great many things right; it's not a bad game at all. This game has some of the best level design in any SW action game, I think even better than the Jedi Knight series.  The stages are gorgeous to look at, they are massive in size and most importantly they all have unique set pieces that mix up the action.  For instance, on a Star Destroyer you will enter a Tie-fighter manufacturing center where you can control these mechanical welding machines, which shoot out lasers and melt enemies with it. The combat overall is good, your Jedi has a sizeable move list that he develops as you play, that constant gratification of upgrading your powers keeps things from going stale. The powers you develop allow you to do a whole array of interesting moves, killing standard enemies is so much fun you almost don't want to fight anyone else. But that's the issue; you do fight harder enemies, enemies that for some unknown reason (for some) are magically immune to certain powers of moves. All of a sudden you are fighting a group of enemies and you can force throw some of them but on others it has no effect at all. Some enemies block all your lightsaber attacks, and its not like you see an animation blocking it, no they have this magic bubble that protects them even if they are hurt or have their back turned. It gets really ugly when you have the boss fights, Jedi on Jedi action should be when the combat is at its best but its really when its at its worse. Many of these bosses are only susceptible to one type of move, they practically block all your other moves but they can do whatever they want to you. These bosses boil down to just spamming a certain move over and over. Its sad cause some of these fights are massive in scale and pretty epic, a few are really good but some are just frustrating. This is where my thoughts betray me, normally I like it when games give me enemies where I have to adjust how I fight, but not in this game, I want to feel like a powerful Jedi and you loose that feeling when some blue alien is deflecting your lightsaber blows with a stick. It feels so videogamey, the lightsaber is not a lightsaber, its more like a club in this game that you use to perform the basic combos any action game has. Force lightning could be substituted with any magic spell in any other game. The one unique thing it does have going for it is the manipulation with the force and that is impressive when it works well, sadly sometimes its just a piece of junk. The game has auto-targeting that chooses what you can pick up based on where you are looking, for some reason when there are many objects it decides to gives you the object you want least. Ok it's not that bad, you can kind of readjust quickly, the bigger issue is that you are a sitting duck when you grab something, completely defenseless. Anytime you have a room full of enemies, you better grab and throw, screw aiming cause they will hit you hard which will cause you to drop the object anyway. Its a good idea, those force powers mixed with all the crazy physics and other engines they got working produce some spectacular moments where the force just destroys everything, you will be wowed. But for every one moment like that there are an equal amount of moments where you will be yelling at your screen out of frustration cause its not quite doing what you want it to do. There are a whole list of little things that bugged me throughout the game, some are odd glitches where enemies get stuck. Completely dependent on the player the camera is and it sucks in close spots. Difficulty modes basically only change the amount of damage you take, not the skill level of the enemies. On the flip side it does a lot right, that same difficulty I mention is at least very well tuned on the normal difficulty setting offering just the right amount of challenge. There are plenty of secrets to be found on the levels, some can only be accessed by using the force in interesting ways to get there. The game has a solid game length clocking in at about 10 hours of solid play with a good variety of locations and events. It makes excellent use of the SW soundtrack, probably the best mix of movies tunes with a new score I have heard in any SW game. The story in TFU is really good with great twists and turns.  There are some major plot points that affect the entire original trilogy. I do have an issue with how they handled this new character; he basically comes out of nowhere, has this big lasting impact on SW but never gets mentioned again. I can go on and on about it but that's not for here.  The voice acting is top notch, the guy that plays the apprentice (he is in the movie The Mist) does fantastic job. Jimmy Smits is in it as well reprising his role as Bail Organa. I had just wished it wasn't told using the standard game format of play then cutscene, then play then cutscene, they could have gone a little but deeper into this story. Gamers can do so much worse than TFU. You might be saying I've got a bad feeling about this; please don't get the impression that its bad or even average, no its good, it just holds itself back in certain areas. It seems to me like the game developers had delusions of grandeur to make this GoW like game but instead they end up with this thing that is half SW half generic action game. The first level in the game allows you to play as Darth Vader and he is incredibly overpowered. His lightsaber kills everyone in one hit, you feel unstoppable. That's what I should have felt most of the game, but then you ask "where is the challenge in that?" that is where the devs need to be creative, have more Jedi on Jedi battles that feel like Jedi fights and not random action game bosses. The Jedi Knight games handled being a Jedi much better. Still this is a solid fun action game, which will surprise you at times and is entertaining from beginning to end as long as you don't expect greatness. |
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Posted by Dvader Sun, 21 Sep 2008 17:39:15
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*crickets*
I'd give the Wii version a 6.5, but I'm too lazy to write a review.
I'm left with a feeling after this review that it's something best rented or bought at a lower price.