Lego Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy

by: The Ryan 1 year, 11 months, 6 days, 48 minutes ago

Release Date:

9/12/06

Price:

$50

Company:

Lucas Arts

Series:

Lego Star Wars

 

There’s been many Star Wars games that have crossed out path. Some good like Star Wars Battlefront, and some not so good like Star Wars: Obi-Wan. I gotta say that Lego Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy is the best Star Wars game I’ve played to date. I never jumped on the bandwagon with the first Lego Star Wars game because it seemed a little too gimmicky and hokey. But The Original Trilogy seemed mighty interesting to play through so when it was released I decided to give it a go and I encourage all of you to give it a chance as well.

The first thing you’ll notice is that there is no voice acting in the game what so ever. In any other game this could be a problem, but Lucas Arts played it off very well. In the cutscenes the characters make small sounds but no actual words, becuase by now everyone knows what they’re saying anyway. The games cutscenes also touch on all the aspects necessary to pass the story along, while adding a comical twist. In one scene from Episode IV, as you fly away in the Millennium Falcon you see one Storm Trooper giving another Storm Trooper a noogie and not paying attention to the escaping ship. In some of the early levels you will also come across Storm Troopers in bathing suits. Oh they still have their helmets on, just not much else. It’s the storytelling like this that keeps the game fun and intersting to play through becuase you’ll never know what you’ll see next.

The levels are set up to give players a lot of replay value. Some places in the levels cannot be entered unless you are a Bounty Hunter, someone who uses dark force powers or a Storm Trooper (just to name a couple). When you play through a level in story mode, you unlock that level in free play mode. Free play mode is where you can choose from any unlocked character to play through that same level. So if you just play through the story once and don’t go back through the level with other characters, there’s A LOT of things that you’ll miss.

In typical gaming fashion, there are items that you’ll need to collect along your journey. In Lego Star Wars, it’s lego pieces. You remember those little Lego pieces that only had one prong that weren’t good for anything, well they’re currency here! As you pick up those little pieces after you defeat an enemy or thrash the environment you can use those pieces for more unlockables. In between levels you can enter the Mos Eisley Cantina which serves as your HUB. From here you can enter any level that you have previously played through and head to the bar to spend your Lego’s. The unlockables range from gameplay hints and characters, to some interesting extras. One of the extra’s include Chewbacca carrying C3PO on his back, which isn’t a needed character but a fun addition. Now I know that spending Lego’s on hints isn’t everybody’s first impulse, but without buying everything the bar has to offer you’ll never hit 100% completion. Don’t worry though, there are a TON of unlockables and hidden items in levels to keep you playing for a while.

The graphics are very worthy of the XBox 360 system. Of course there’s nothing that’s very graphically demanding on a cartoony game like this one, but it looks pretty sharp. There are very infrequent times of frame rate slow down. But nothing to really affect your gameplay experience.

If you’re looking to play the game just for the story then you’ll finish it in just a few hours, easily worth a rental. But if you want to take your time and unlock everything this game has to offer, it’s worth a purchase on any platform.