A surprise multi-platform hit, LucasArts must be kicking themselves for making the first Lego Star Wars game in trilogy form instead of releasing one game for each film. With the financial hit may be severe, the games haven't lost any of their witty, funny style. The source material alone is enough to elevate this sequel above its predecessor. Following the three films in the series which were released first, but are in sequel form here, after the prequels were given the Lego treatment in the initial release (if you're a Star Wars devotee, that made sense), George Lucas's space opera has rarely been parodied better. As the title states, this blatant promotional tie in follows the films entirely in Lego form. Everything from the cinematics to the characters has been rendered in connecting block form. Shy of taking hours out of your life to build these pieces, this will be the best way to see classic machines made from simple plastic forms.Game play is presented in a third person view, generally with interchangeable squad members following behind. In the story mode, the key players are chosen to fit the advancing plot. Once beaten, Free Play unlocks, and you're then able to pick any character to complete any stage. In about the same time it will take you to watch these same films on DVD, you'll be done with the first run through of the game. Lego Star Wars is built on replay value, and it manages to both hamper and help the overall experience. With a meager length, the extra characters (now customizable), levels, challenges, hidden objects, and hundreds of destructible environments, it's natural to explore stages multiple times. Certain areas can only be accessed by specific characters not available during the first run.This causes some confusion for those not interested in seeing everything the game has to offer. Sections leading to extras fall right in the line of the level design with few characteristics indicating that it's a dead end until the replay. You can easily become sidetracked for an extended period until the solution becomes obvious elsewhere. The obscuring camera doesn't help.Lego Star Wars II makes a few other frustrating errors as well. Enemies regenerate far too often, making it unnecessarily difficult to solve simple puzzles. Your squad mates are useless in defending, taking and giving excessive amounts of damage with no results for either side of the intergalactic struggle. The camera comes into play again when trying to make some tricky jumps, obscuring pitfalls and ledges.This is especially apparent in multi-player. Nicely set up to allow another player to jump into action at any given moment, though, sadly this isn't playable over Xbox Live. Sadly, the camera takes away a lot of the playability, though the simplistic and fast paced flight stages do a nearly perfect job of keeping things together. Even without the Lego presentation, LucasArts has still crafted a finely tuned engine for action fans. Playing through the more familiar trilogy only adds to that. For both kids and adults, this is definitely a worthy follow up.Lego Star Wars II is rated E10+ (Everyone 10 and older) by the ESRB for Cartoon Violence, Crude Humor. This game can also be found on: GBA, GameCube, Nintendo DS, PC, PS2, PSP, and Xbox.
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Article comments
1 - Beth Robinson
My husband and I have been playing this game, at least a little, pretty much every evening since it came out, although for the Playstation 2, and we've been having a blast. According to the counter, we've completed 70% of it and I'm still amused and entertained.
I do agree, overall, with your assessment of the detractions. At least the camera is better than last time. And one of us does usually need to drop out for those tricky jumps. However life becomes so much better after you track down the invincibility red lego block and save up the studs to buy it with.
2 - alexuk
i just want to get the stupid gold bricks!!!
also i would like to find the red brick that unlocks x2 studs.
3 - alexuk
beth any tips where to get the red blocks for the good extras??
4 - darth vader
hi erm where can i find the x2 multiplier red brick do you know?
5 - Watson
Yeah like everyone else is saying. Is there REALLY a 2x block, and if there is where is it located and on which level. Thank you =)
6 - Watson
And oh yeah, even though this is off topic Does anyone accually use this site?
7 - free xbox 360
I was surprised how good this game was- I expected much worse.