How to botch up a legacy completely

What’s the first thing you thought about when you heard the Wii was going to be motion controlled? Were you excited by the prospect of minigames compendiums? Were your knickers wringing at the salivating prospect of 'Cooking Mama?'

No, the first thing you thought was lightsabres. Admit it.

Yes, everybody was agog at the thought of waving around a controller, pretending they were Luke Skywalker or Darth Vader. Just imagine…you’d be making the ‘vuuuuuuuum’ noise, waving around a little motion sensitive controller, and you would be twelve years old all over again. Granted, you’d look like an absolute fool, but that wouldn’t matter when your actions could be translated perfectly on screen, making you feel like a powerful galactic manny with crap hair.

It’d be nigh on impossible to fail. So how has ‘The Force Unleashed’ managed to do just that?

The first thing that hits you about SWTFU (which is one letter away from being the best acronym ever) is how diabolical it all looks. I know the Wii is less powerful and all that, but that’s no excuse to make a game that looks like a PS2 launch title. This is the same console that can run the gorgeous ‘Super Mario Galaxy,’ lest we forget. These shoddy, half-arsed efforts really aren’t going to cut it. The game is basically a bland, blurry uninspired interpretation of George Lucas’s original vision, that’s like Picasso’s ‘Sunflowers’ repainted by Adolf Hitler [Edit - Van Gogh painted the Sunflowers - James].

The next thing that strikes you is the gameplay. The graphics would be forgivable if the game played well, but guess what? It really doesn’t. It’s a third person slasher in the ‘Devil May Cry’ vein, with the fun removed and some poorly implemented waggle action thrown in instead. You’ll be waving your wiimote like a gimp on Christmas Eve, and your man on-screen will be fighting a wall, through no fault of your own. Besides, once your force powers are strong enough there’s no need to waggle, as you’ll spend all your time grabbing stormtroopers and flinging them everywhere. It’s fun for about five minutes, and then you just want to crawl into a corner and cry.

And while we’re on the subject, let’s discuss the main character. Part of Star Wars’ charm was that the cast looked like they enjoyed the Bay City Rollers. The main character of TFU however (named Starkiller), looks like a generic modern day bullnecked sci-fi git.

And the plot! God the plot.

One would have thought it impossible to micturate ever further over the legacy of the classic original trilogy, but thank heavens for Lucasarts, they’ve done it. Loathe as I am to use the term, they’ve managed to retcon an absolute ballache of a plot, sandwiched between the prequels and the originals. In it, we see that Darth Vader had a secret apprentice, the secret apprentice ran around killing remnant Jedi’s, realised he was naughty and then all was well with the world. That’s it.

Aside from an extremely tenuous link, it has absolutely nothing to do with the films. Never mind jumping the shark, this straps rockets to its feet, and flies straight over it. You know that the point has been well and truly missed when the final boss fight is a lightsabre duel with the Emperor himself. It’s little more than ill-thought fan service. The Emperor doesn’t fight! He flings lightning at people and giggles like an evil schoolgirl.

The biggest crime committed here though is laziness regarding the little white Wii. Take a look at the Xbox 360 or PS3 versions. They look fantastic, don’t they? Not only that, but the level design is better, the combat seems to be more focussed and it’s more of a challenge. And look what we, the Wii people get; a shonky port that looks like an entirely different, rubbish game. Fair enough, they’ve implemented a 2 player battle mode that the other consoles don’t have, but it’s as essentially broken and useless as the single player. If you and a friend choose to play this over Smash Brothers, you've got problems.

It’s bloody infuriating. The Wii holds so much promise, and when the console’s abilities are implemented properly it’s peerless. A good example is Resident Evil 4. It controls so beautifully that to consider any other control method would be madness. Then there’s No More Heroes. Ostensibly, it’s the same sort of thing as TFU (slashy slashy kill kill), but it doesn’t rely solely on useless waggling, and has charm and originality in abundance.

TFU has none of these things. It’s really a giant devious slap in the face of the consumer, sold on the prospect of wiimote controlled lightsabre action. It’s a shallow, ugly lazy game that can be completed in about five hours, with little to no replay value. If you love Star Wars and only own a Wii, then I’d advise you go for the ‘Lego Star Wars’ effort instead. It’s a million times more engaging than this festival of mediocrity.

Force unleashed? More like arse unmitigated.

Just don't. Seriously. Don't. If you have any taste at all, it'll infuriate you. Avoid if you're a Star Wars fan as well, because it makes Darth Vader seem like more of a complete pussy than the prequel films.

Well done Lucasarts. You have plumbed new depths of mediocrity.