Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II

Preview from Luke - Monday, 23 August 2010 @ 2:47pm

When Australian Gamer was presented with the opportunity to get a preview of Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II, I had to beat Jae away with a stick so that he would let me go instead of him. The fact is, I'm named after an important character in the Star Wars universe, you've probably heard of him, he's kind of a big deal. Then we have Jae, he hasn't even seen a single Star Wars movie...yes I know, what you heard just then were millions of voices suddenly cry out in terror. So the decision was fairly simple of who to send, and it didn't have anything to do with Jae being out of the country at the time either.

The Force Unleashed II kicks off a few months after the end of last game. Once again players will take control of Starkiller, the secret apprentice to Darth Vader, who has now become a fugitive. While the original game was all about redemption, this time around the theme of the story is identity, as Starkiller believes that he is in fact a clone. LucasArts have promised to deliver another amazing story with the announcement of Yoda and Boba Fett having important roles; they wanted to secure the rights to use these characters to give players a more authentic Star Wars experience.

I started my preview with the opening cinematics taking place on the planet Kamino, where the cloning facility is located as seen in Attack of The Clones. The protagonist decides that taking the stairs is an unconventional method of getting around, and instead decides that jumping out the window and falling a few hundred meters is a much quicker way of escaping. Kamino isn't really a place where you can hang your washing out on the line for a few hours to dry, as it always appears to be stormy as hell. As you free fall outside you'll need to dodge lighting strikes, avoid overhanging parts of the building, and take care of TIE fighters that are flying right at you. After crashing through yet another glass window and landing safely - thanks to the amazing powers of the Force, its time to start wrecking Storm Troopers.

The concept behind the Force Unleashed is basically what happens when you get the powers of the Force and crank them up to 11. But how do you go bigger and outdo that in a sequel? Force Fury is one of LucasArts answers to that. This ability allows you to cut loose with your Force powers and go absolutely ballistic. I was able to crush an AT-ST into a ball of metal and hurl it into the faces of some storm troopers when I unleashed the Force Fury ability, it is truly over the top crazy, I love it!
You'll also have some new Force powers at hand; I managed to convince some oncoming attackers to start fighting each other with the Mind Trick ability. That's not all though. I ask you this, what is better then having a lightsaber? Having two, of course! The developers have now introduced the power to dual wield lightsabers, allowing Starkiller to cause even more physical destruction.

Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II looks fantastic on the console and is up high on my list for one of my most anticipated games for the end of this year. Expect to see it October 26th on the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC, with versions also available on the PSP, Wii and DS.