Star Wars is one of those franchises that has impacted the general society for over three decades and has no plans of stopping its freight train anytime soon. The most recent attempt is a game from LucasArts titled The Force Unleashed, which takes place somewhere between Episode 3 and Episode 4 of the saga. When we first heard about this video game our excitement could barely be contained; what’s not to love about an entirely new Star Wars chapter with a compelling story line and brash new graphical engine. Considering the Clone Wars movie didn’t leave the best taste in fans mouth everyone was waiting with baited breath to see if the Force Unleashed game could remind people why the Star Wars brand is as powerful as it used to be.
A couple weeks ago a book of the same name was released in hardcover form and instantly shot to the top of the New York Times bestseller list. After much debate we decided to pick up the fictional novel and give it a read before our time with the final build of Star Wars: The Force Unleashed for the Xbox 360. By the time LucasArts latest attempt reached our office we were hooked on the storyline, even though both contain the same basic story arc we were ready to spend some more time with the Force Unleashed universe. For the purposes of this review we will only focus on the story of the video game and what it presents to fan but we need to at least recommend any fans of the Star Wars spectrum to check out the novel and give it a read.
The basic premise of The Force Unleashed is one that fans have been begging to experience since the first sighting of the all-powerful Darth Vadar. The game starts out giving gamers the chance to actually step into those black boots and at the same time shows the player the maximum potential of what the Force Unleashed has to offer. Once this “preview” level is completed it’s time to progress into the main plot, which involves you taking control of Darth Vadar’s “secret apprentice” and following him as he experiences more than a few storyline twists and turns. For the most part the story plays out through a number of non-interactive CG cut scenes and a bit of Star Wars style text.
It is obvious that some amount of effort went into writing and tweaking this story and it shows, because of this there were a number of times where we became frustrated with the gameplay in the Force Unleashed but continued to play because we wanted to know where the story was going. LucasArts did not take some old, washed-up, graphical engine and strap the Star Wars franchise to it. They decided to try something completely original with the Euphoria engine, using it to successfully bring the powers of the Force into a Star Wars video game for the first time ever. Throughout the game we got a chance to experience what it would be like to have use of such Force powers as Push, Grip, Choke, and Sith Lightning.
