Game Review: Lego Star Wars III: The Clone Wars

Genre

Action

Platform

Xbox 360, Nintendo DS & 3DS, Wii, PS3, PSP, PC

Story

If you followed the Star Wars prequel films, you might have heard about the Clone Wars.  Well, the Clone Wars mostly took place between Episodes II and III, a war between the Jedi and their clone Stormtroopers, vs. the evil collective of evil and their robot army.

Now, imagine a war with heroes, villains, and everything else [including parts of the landscape] made out of Lego.

Gameplay/Mechanics

One of the fun things about the Lego games is that they feel very much like old school video games, more advanced than Pong, but not too much more than the first Super Mario Brothers.

The next fun thing?  The scores [literally dozens] of characters and abilities you have to play with.

Play as a Jedi? You can throw your lightsaber, enemies, building blocks, and defend against incoming blaster fire.

Play as a soldier?  Depending on the types, that can include anything from using grappling hooks and automatics blasters, to just radioing in for backup.

Music/Graphics

The graphics are easy – they look like living Lego pieces. It’s simple and straightforward, and it works.  Don’t expect to be blown away by artistic designs, but don’t be surprised if they look like toys you may have bought at the store.

The music works, if only because it’s a variant of John Williams’ iconic themes.  It’s obviously a ripoff, but it’s good.

Morals/Appropriateness

This is one of the few times that the ESRB and I agree—this is for everyone, age ten and up.

Do you let your children see Star Wars? Do you mind a level of violence that’s up there with toys crashing into each other?  Then you should have no problem letting your children near these games.  In fact, you might want to play them, too (you can play, too, if you have the controller). There are no lines of dialogue, and outside of the scrolling introductions, there are no words in the game.

Community/Multiplayer

None that I can find.

Addiction Danger

Now this is a problem, and part of my biggest problem with the game.  You can’t save in the middle of a mission/battle.  The saves are automatic, and you have to keep playing until the mission is over, or you risk losing all of your progress.

Also, the scores of characters you can play through make this troublesome.  Why?  Because mission levels are designed for players to replay the level with different characters.  A different character on “free play” can unlock secret areas, collectable items, more characters, etc.  This creates a great value for the money, but can cause a lot of endless replay.

Get used to hearing, “But I’ve almost finished the level.”

Problems/Ending Comments

It’s fun.  The only problem you might have with the game is the save issue I mentioned before.

ESRB Rating: Everyone 10+
ESRB Link

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Copyright 2013 John Konecsni