Star Wars: The Force Unleashed Review

Okay, so let's get the main things out of the way.

Visuals

The Force Unleashed's graphics are pretty sub-par on the Wii. During the gameplay, the graphics are decent. There are few graphical glitches, decent lighting and shadow effects, and a rather nice attention to detail. However, the cutscene for whatever reason are God-awful. I'm not sure how they managed to do that, but all the effects I mentioned are pretty much null when it comes to the cutscenes. Star Destroyers look like plastic models against black backgrounds and the models move rather clumsily.

Gameplay

Controls: Feel the Force flow through you...

So here is where the game really shines. First, the Apprentice. Lightsaber swings cannot be waggled. Well, they could, but you'll die trying to do that. Move the Wii mote side to side for slashes, and trust forward for a stab. By holding A and swinging it you throw your lightsaber and by holding A and holding the Wiimote sideways you block. The A button can also be used to dash by moving forward and pressing A at the same time. The B button is used to jump

With the nunchuck, the control stick is to move, Z button to force grip, and C button to use force lighting. You can also force push by thrusting forward with the nunchuck. Force powers can be unlocked through progression into the game and leveled up with points earned through each level.

Combos are relatively easy to pull off. Usually one or two motions following or prior to a button. For example, if you use force lightning followed by thrusting the nunchuck, you create a storm of lighting that deals a good amount of damage, but if you force push then lighting, a ball of lighting will follow who ever you just pushed with less lag time than the first combo.

Be sure to play through the tutorial to learn all the moves, the first level doesn't exactly tell you everything you can do (like block :P)

Enemies: There are alternatives to fighting

I want to bring up something about the enemies because The Force Unleashed did something interesting which I'm not sure was intentional or not. The AI is fine. Pretty basic "search and destroy" kind of thinking and they rarely search for cover, but they also don't charge in at you from their nice little spot. Anyways, there are a few enemies in the game who are nearly impossible to kill. I'll use EVO troopers for example. They are short range fighters who have electrical staffs and usually come in squads of 3. They are tough. How tough? I can use my entire force meter of maxed out lightning, and not kill even one. There are other enemies like that too, and usually I threw them off nearby cliffs (doesn't work so well against the flying troopers though...) Anyways, more often than not you are given a choice. Run or fight? Usually, the next area is visible and it's safe. Run there and bypass all your enemies, but there are tons of hidden goodies in the game and sometimes, swarms of weak enemies and strong enemies will come at you and if you run, you can leave with most of your life intact, if you fight and win, you can look around for any hidden extras. Thankfully, if you die, you respawn at where you last auto-saved, with enemies still dead and puzzles solved, but often when it looked like I would die again, I just ran for to the next area and focused on the mission.

Boss battles are more or less, a bit repetitive but fun. Every boss battle (Jedi, Sith, or other) involves a bit of strategy. If you mindlessly waggle around or abuse the force, the opponent will rampage right through it or block it. You need to strategically use your environment to keep your distance, and time your attacks right because both the boss and you can either saber lock or force lock. When this happens, either the wii mote (for saber locks) or nunchuck (force locks) will appear on the screen along with a transparent version that is titled to a certain angle. You must match that angle, then when the red arrow appear, shake until it turns green. Do it fast enough, and you win the lock with a semi-cool cinematic. Lose, and the same happens except with you on the receiving end. When bosses are weak, the wiimote or nunchuck appear again but with four arrows pointing in different directions. This means shake what ever they tell you to begin the final cutscene of the battle. During the cutscene, you must shake what to they want you to shake, when they want you to. It's random so watch carefully. Completing it will end the boss battle, although it's not needed to win the boss battle.

Multiplayer: Always two there are...

The fighter feels a bit tacked on, despite being the selling point for the Wii version, but thanks to the already nicely done lightsaber dueling engine, it plays out fine. You get a ton of characters to play as ranging from episode 1 to the expanded universe (although, more than a row is dedicated to the apprentice's different costumes.) The characters have different stats but they aren't that noticeable. After taking some damage and dealing some damage, one player becomes "unleashed" which maxes out their force power and gives them unlimited force. Prior to learning how to block, this was pretty broken since force lighting can just trap the opponent and kill them instantly, but with blocking, it's actually rather useless. So "Unleashed" (which is not random, there is a gage seen on your character's portrait) is more of a nuisance than a threat. However, a clever person will find a way to take advantage of it, but this isn't the best fighting game ever so there is not much to strategy here. (By the way, no wi-fi, but the rating thing asked about muliplayer so I figured I should still rate it).


Gripes: I have a bad feeling about this...

Aside from graphics, there is not alot to gripe about this game. Of the few things there are, one of them is not being able to use the nunchuck to control where the force takes someone. When force gripping, they go a certain height and then they are controlled by the analogue stick as your character remains stationary. This could be due to force choking being activated by turning the nunchuck upside down, but if I were to re-program the controls, I would have the analogue stick control the force action, while moving the nunchuck controls where they go. Also, no voice acting in the multi-player, even characters that are already in the game don't talk. I would love to hear Anakin bad mouth Darth Vader and say something bad about his mother, or here some friendly banter between Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon, but there is nothing...which kinda bums me out because the episode 3 game, which sucked and didn't have as good as multiplayer as this, kept you playing because all the characters would have something witty and funny to say and you would want to hear it.

Also, lightsabers are more of shiny sticks in this game. You can't cut through anything with them, as a result, bad guys with metal-looking weapons can block your lightsaber and AT-ST's can be sliced through but not fall apart. I want to sever something dang it!

Lastly is the repetitiveness of bosses. While they are fun (the last two in particular), big things are taken out the same and small things are taken out the same.



Comparing to 360/PS3 version

Size matters not:

Once again, aside from graphics there are a few things I found the Wii version did better than it's nice looking counter part. For one, I found no use for charging up a force push in the 360 version other than breaking down walls and barriers that the Wii version only lets you do that when it needs to.

Also, the 360 version is a bit cluttered and you would often target the wrong things when using force grip. The Wii version is more compact but that results in smaller levels which was kind of a bummer.

The Wii does fine without the Euphoria engine or the Molecular-thingy engine. Sure, blowing up doors and grabbing defenseless stormtroopers watching them panic and grab onto as many things as possible is fun, but not required to enjoy this game.

I'm not entirely sure, but there are several levels that take you to the Jedi Temple on Coursaunt and I think those are the bonus levels. They are fun and so are the boss battles at the end of them are also fun, but they were awkwardly placed into the story, often lines like "Something is pulling me there" or "Go there now" lead into them.


Extra's and Goodies:

There are tons of ways to customize your lightsaber in this game. You cna give it different colors, different attributes, and different hilts. There is also 200 concept art to unlocked but here's the catch, you have to find all of it! Well, some things are given to you, like Costumes and some attribute crystals for your lightsaber, but other than that you have to find it.



Well, overall, this game was a blast. The story was only 7 hours long but the multiplayer will have me playing it for much longer (Perfect for local tournaments).

May the Force be with you!