Video Game Review: Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II

By Number 1 son:

In my last review, I mentioned that while I would definitely recommend Star Wars: The Force Unleashed to anyone. I also said that I would not do the same for its sequel. This game actually came out very recently, in late October. As one can imagine, I was very excited. My hopes and dreams were swiftly crushed.

Like its predecessor, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II was released on multiple platforms. I played it on the PC only, because I did not think it was worth it to spend another $40 on the Wii version, so I do not know of any differences between the two.

Now, let's start the review proper by summing up my opinion of this game. I HATE THIS GAME!!! It is so abominably bad, even if it were a stand alone game, but the fact that it is a follow up to a tremendously good game makes it even worse. I'm going to try and prevent this review from degenerating into a rant, but I make no promises.

To be clear, I have very few problems with the gameplay or visuals, it's primarily the story that makes this game bad. The gameplay is very much the same as in the first game, but there were a few changes, and I don't like most of them. For one thing, you start almost as powerful as you ended the first game, and only get more powerful from there. They have also added two new Force powers: Jedi mind trick and Force rage. Mind trick allows you to make enemies do things they would not normally do, usually taking the form of attacking other enemies, but this is not a terribly useful power. Force rage is also pretty useless. This builds up as you kill enemies, until a meter in the bottom of the screen fills up. When you activate the power you can basically kill anything in one hit, and by kill, I mean disintegrate. While it is very flashy and impressive, I spent most of my time saving it for bosses, but it is absolutely useless against every single boss in the game because you generally don't fight them by conventional methods.

There are only three bosses, and none of them are fought using conventional methods (well, you can fight one in this way, but it takes forever). Also, only one boss, Darth Vader (he's the final boss) has a lightsaber. Now lightsaber-wielding enemies are normal foes, and are easily killed if you simply use the lightsaber/lightning combo (which basically can be used to fight every single enemy in the game-except for bosses) a couple of times. Darth Vader is laughably easy to beat, but the fight took at least 45 minutes for a number of reasons. 1: unlike in the first game, you are absolutely incapable of attacking Vader with more than one attack at a time (no combos), even during the second round, when you are placed in a permanent state of Force rage (it really has no effect). 2: Vader has a huge health bar that you have to deplete twice. 3: the finishing move you use to end the fight literally takes 15 minutes, and doesn't even look that great.

The visuals are great, but this is outweighed by the fact that the game is slow and skips at some points, and even crashes at times (and this is not just my problem, other people on Amazon had the same complaint). There is another gameplay mechanic I liked where you freefall and use the Force to destroy any obstacles, but this is not used enough to salvage the game. One final aspect of gameplay is that you now use two lightsabers instead of one, and this is very enjoyable, but has little actual effect.

In all, the gameplay is satisfactory and while I was playing I described it as epic. Like I said, the main problem, besides the difficulty (or lack thereof), is the story. Now, in order to talk about the story at all, I'm going to have to mention things that happened in the first game, so there are spoilers from that game. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

Alright, after the Apprentice died at the end of the first game, it turns out that Vader cloned him, and that is the character who you control in this game. Vader plans to eliminate you as a failure because you are plagued by memories from the first game and incapable of fighting the Rebel Alliance the Apprentice began. The clone figures this out, however, and escapes, leaving to find General Kota, who has been captured by Imperial forces. Kota is one of the few redeeming factors in this game. Besides the Apprentice and Vader, he is the only character from the first game with a major role. Kota, as it turns out, is even better than he was in the first game, as he has managed to survive for seven straight days in a gladiatorial arena, despite being both blind and about 60 years old. After he escapes with the Apprentice, they go to help the Rebels strike at the cloning facilities on Kamino.

Like I said, Kota is one of the few redeeming factors, and the only good character. The Apprentice, unlike in the first game, has no real development, and spends most of the game just screaming as loud as he can. Juno does literally nothing, is captured by Boba Fett as bait for the Apprentice. PROXY also appears (despite seeming to die in the first game) but also does almost nothing. Boba Fett and Yoda also appear, but do almost nothing (although Yoda breaks with his character and actually tells the Apprentice to PAY ATTENTION to his foreboding vision of the future). I did not expect much from Yoda, but I expected Boba Fett to at least be a boss, but he only shows up a handful of times, resulting in only one funny moment where he asks for some stormtroopers, who "won't be coming back." Even Vader is unsatisfying, and does not really do much. In all, except for Kota the characters are bland and I really don't care about them.

However, the worst part of this game is the ending. Unlike in the first game, where the ending tied the story of the game to the story of the movies and tied up all the loose ends, this ending does none of those things. Nothing is resolved. For instance, while Vader says that you are a clone, Kota insists that it is impossible to clone Jedi. WOW!! This is pretty good drama, which one is right? Well, we never find out. This question is never resolved, we don't know if the Apprentice is actually a clone or a somehow alive original. Besides this, the ending is just confusing. At one point Vader kills Juno, but she somehow comes back from the dead. However, one thing (I won't say what it was) is so out of whack with continuity that it made me enraged. And the worst part? The very last scene is a set up for a sequel (good luck getting my money this time, LucasArts). When I saw this, it made me so mad that I actually began screaming at the computer because of the bad story with no real ending.

Now, I am willing to accept that I don't know everything, and so, having faith in LucasArts, I e-mailed my good friend, Continuity. He is the guy responsible for making sure that all stories make sense and fit into the larger story. As such, he has a very unhappy life, since it was bad enough when he had to deal with D.C. comics, but now he also has to cover video games. Anyway, I e-mailed Continuity, asking him what the deal was with this story. Here is his reply:

"DUDE!!! WHAT IS YOUR PROBLEM? DO YOU THINK IT'S EASY TO MAKE SURE EVERYTHING MAKES SENSE? IT'S NOT!!! ESPECIALLY WHEN THE WRITERS DEFENESTRATE YOU!! THOSE-"

I am afraid that this is all I can reproduce, since at this point his message degenerated into a sting of obscenities so foul that I washed my computer out with soap.

In all this game is bad. The characters are bland, and the story is a textbook in how not to write a story. The gameplay is great, but if the game is going to have any pretense of having a story, the story has to be good, otherwise it degenerates the value of the game. If LucasArts had released a game called Star Wars: Blow Stuff up with the Force, it would have been closer in value to the $40 I paid than this trash. If you do want to play this game, I recommend waiting until you can find some used copy for $10.

That's about how much this game is worth.