Star Wars: The Force Flawed (Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (PSP))

Member Name: Review_God

Product:	Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (PSP)
Date:	22/09/08 (187 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Amusing gameplay, good story, good graphics.

Disadvantages: Gets repetitive, no online, little replayability, short.

Star Wars: The Force Unleashed is Lucasarts' most recent big project, and the basic concept is that the force (the telekinesis of the Star Wars universe) is 'unleashed'. The game is meant to allow the player to use the force in a way never seen in the Star Wars films. I'll come on to this in detail in a bit.

One of the selling points Lucasarts used was two 'revolutionary' technologies. One of these made enemies grab onto things when being thrown about and act in a realistic way, and the other made materials act they should (wood splinters etc.). As good as these sound, they are only included in the Playstation 2 and Xbox 360 versions of the game. So I was unsure on buying the PSP version as it lacked some of the things that were said to be unique about the game. Luckily, the PSP is very good without them. The graphics of course are nowhere near as good as on the PS3, but they are good looking as PSP games go.

You play as Darth Vader(second in command bad guy)'s secret apprentice. Darth Vader will send you off on missions - usually to kill Jedi (the good guys). As you are a secret apprentice nobody must know about you, but rather than be stealthy the idea is that you just kill everybody - friend and foe alike. To do so you can use your lightsaber, your force powers, or both. With your force powers you can do things like push enemies away from you, lift them in the air, throw your lightsaber at them, crush their windpipe, attack them with bolts of lightning, or throw things at them. There are also several combinations of these.

The story mode is not very long - only about ten hours - but it is very enjoyable. Every mission involves just killing everything, which can get repetitive very quickly, but the story is good and you can be very creative with the ways you kill baddies.

Having finished the story mode, there are three other modes you can do. 'Force Duel' mode is a series of fights between you and another force user. As you progress through this mode you will unlock new characters to play as. It's nice mode, but it can get tedious and repetitive.

The second mode, called 'Order 66', is a survival mode. You fight waves of enemies and try to last as long as possible. You can unlock things, but as before this mode can get dull quickly.

The third mode is exclusive to the PSP, and is a 'historic mission' mode. It allows you to 'recreate' scene of the Star Wars films such as the Dune Sea fight scene and the Battle of Geonosis. These are amusing, but there are not many of them and they aren't all that faithful to the films. Then again, something is better than nothing.

Star Wars: The Force Unleashed for the PSP has a great story and gameplay that is mostly fun, but it can get repetitive very quickly and the story mode is rather short. There is also no online mode at all - single player only I'm afraid.

Summary: Fun, but flawed.