Haha, you're kidding... right?

Game Info.

Genre Action (fighting platformer)

Publisher/Developer Eidos/Giant Interactive Entertainment & Traveller's Tales

Release 4/2/05

I'm a big giant Star Wars fan. There, I said it. I've been watching the classic movies so long I can't physically remember the first time I did. I've also collected a fair amount of Star Wars shit in my time, but strangely, this habit never included Lego Star Wars toys. A merger of the two franchises isn't what attracted me to this game. It was simply the promise of Star Wars co-op platforming fun. That should be something game developers think about before they introduce gimmicks to their games - it's always, ALWAYS the gameplay that matters most.
As defending of my purchase as this may seem, I will actually admit that this game doesn't look or play entirely like a gimmick. It stands on its own square-shaped feet fairly well. How long that lasts is a major issue, however, and one of a handful that you'll see in my review just about bog this game down into the pit of yesterdays...

Gameplay
You start out as Qui-Gon Jinn making his escape from the Trade Fed traitors in the opening sequence of Episode 1. The levels naturally progress from there and you play as whoever would play out the scenes in the movies. As with any license-based software, Lego Star Wars embellishes liberally on the core action presented in the films. I've grown up and learned to mind that less. As you'll read later, if anything, this game could've used all the embellishment in the world and still been somewhat short. But then would it have gotten repetitive and stale? I wonder.
Each movie gets its own non-platforming level that spices up the mix. Episode 1's podrace is probably the weakest of these, since we've already gotten a fantastic series of podracing-oriented games (at least I liked them). Episode 2's Clone War scene is reminiscent of top-down shooters like Raiden and 1941, and seriously rocks. I was very impressed by its quality. Finally, and probably the nicest of the three, Episode 3's opening sequence is covered in a killer Star Fox-like space battle. Even with its bells and whisltes, however, it suffers from being a tad oversimplified. Such is really the nature of this game as a whole.
Probably the aspect I admire most of the gameplay lies in the option to have a friend join in for 2-player co-op fun. If you liked the classic Final Fight, Battletoads, and Ninja Turtles games (specifically the SNES version of Turtles in Time), you and your friends are guaranteed to have a good time with this game. It's as simple as that.
Once you've beaten a level, you can go back and replay it without the story cutscenes using any characters you'd like. In the middle of a level, you can switch between different characters with the 7 important abilities (astromech droid [like R2], protocol droid [like 3PO], grappling hook, high jump, ability to fit in small spaces, Jedi power, and Sith power) on the fly. This of course makes collecting the "Jedi" amount of studs and the hidden ship parts much easier. Free Play is also great fun cause you can play any level in any of the movies as pretty much any character from the entire trilogy. Play the movies your way! Jango Fett killed Anakin Skywalker on Mustafar. Chewbacca saved Naboo from the battle droids. But the Jedi and Sith are clearly the most fun to mess around with. Tag-teaming Grievous and Maul against Count Dooku is as ridiculously enjoyable as it sounds. Fanboys beware - you will like this game a little too much.
7/10

Control
The control scheme is ridiculously simple, but of course, that works just fine in a game like this. "X" jumps, "square" attacks, "circle" commands a character's special ability, and "triangle" (God, I hate the PlayStation buttons) lets you switch to a nearby allied character. Lightsaber-wielding characters each have their own little set of moves, but none of 'em consist of doing anything more than timing how you press "square" and/or jump in sequence, and these sequences are the same for every character.
7/10

Graphics
The graphics are actually pretty nice for the PS2. Baby skin smooth character models, rich and diverse backgrounds, and impressive lighting and reflection effects add to the believability of a world built out of Legos. When characters die and spaceships explode, the Lego pieces that would make up that model in the real Star Wars line of Lego toys fly apart beautifully. Too bad this game isn't for GameCube. A neat style like this and an audience mature enough to accept it as being more than "lame and kiddy" would go together like horses and people who ride horses. Or sandwiches and plates. No wait, I've got more...
8/10

Sound
Among most things with the "Star Wars" label, I'm a big fan of John Williams' scores for the series (as well as for Back to the Future, Jurassic Park, and Hook [dear Christ, I'm a nerd!]). It's been put to use quite well in this game. The music is used to tell most of the drama as the soundtrack features no dialogue at all (somewhat unusual for a film-based game these days). Being such a fan of the films, I know when the songs are used in the right place and when they're not, so this extra care is appreciated.
8/10

Replay Value
Why is it that games are seeming shorter and shorter these days? Maybe it's cause I'm using childhood memories of not being able to beat games at ALL as a benchmark. Now, it's not like I flat-out hate shorter games. As I said in my review of Donkey Kong Jungle Beat last month, short games usually offer me MORE replay value, as I tend to replay them from start to finish much more often (sometimes as much as once a year with really great games). But it's definitely worth mentioning that because you can't really "die" in this game (and thus you never have to replay any large portion of a level), you can easily beat it your first time through in as little as 4 hours, and subsequent plays through could take as little as 2. I like this, really. It feels like one of those arcade classics. You know what I mean. Final Fight, Turtles in Time, Battletoads - guilty pleasure games if I ever saw any. But to many if not most, this is an entirely negative attribute - why pay $40 for something you can beat in one day? I'm not gonna' try to be your moral compass here. Decide for yourself whether or not you appreciate a game feeling more like a "side trek" than an epic.
Lego Star Wars tries to do the unlockable "thing" that I love so much by providing dozens of secret characters for you to purchase using Lego "studs" you collect throughout the levels (like coins in Mario). The problem is not only are these characters pretty darn easy to save up for, but most of 'em turn out to be carbon copies of eachother. In a rich universe like that in Star Wars, why are there no less than 6 "clone trooper" characters with different color schemes and maybe 4 different "battle droids" as well? Like I said before, however, the Jedi and Sith are extremely fun to mess around with in Free Play, and this mode will undoubtedly keep you coming back for more.
8/10

Overall
While I like this game a lot, and I have to say it's been good overall, it simply fails to achieve greatness. In whatever way, it feels like it should've been much longer. Maybe each movie could've tried to have 10 levels instead of 5 or 6. There's certainly room for that - why there's no gungan submarine level, Zam Wessel Coruscant chase level, or Yoda vs. Darth Sidious fight really confuses me. Another solution could've been extending the game into the realm of the original trilogy as well. Who wouldn't love playing the Death Star trench scene in Legos? Besides, twice the amount of characters to unlock could've majorly helped extend the replay value. But I digress - I promised myself I wouldn't talk about what games "could've" or "should've" had in reviews too much. This stuff, however, I feel has to be said, as I really dig the whole concept behind this game, I'm a fan of the prequel movies as much as a sane human being can be, and Lego Star Wars just BARELY misses the mark when attempting to become something more than a stupid gimmick.

FINAL SCORE: 7/10
=Good=
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