Zero Punctuation reviews Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II

If you've never seen a Zero Punctuation review, you're missing out.  The fast-talking Brit Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw provides visually and vocally animated reviews of games.  This week he tackles Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II (previously blogged about here). Check it out:



Via The Escapist.

Augmented Reality comes to Star Wars mobile gaming

Photo via Vertigore

If you can tear yourself away from The Force Unleashed II long enough, I think this new Star Wars game for the mobile arena is worth a look.  Using "augmented reality," which is the term for using real-time photo or video imagery "augmented" by computer display info, the new game Star Wars Arcade: Falcon Gunner allows you to defend your own city (or any other location where you might choose to play) against an onslaught of Imperial TIE fighters.  Augmented reality is an exciting development for gaming that will prove to be a real differentiator for mobile gaming platforms.  The game is coming soon for iPad, iPhone 3GS and iPhone 4, and iPod Touch 4th Generation from developer Vertigore and publisher THQ Wireless.  Check out the YouTube video from Gizmodo which shows off how cool this kind of game can be:

The Force is Unleashed today.

Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II is now out, and the reviews are coming in.  Joystiq gives it just three out of five stars, calling it "a desperate cash grab" (ouch!).  Games Radar is more generous, giving it eight out of ten and giving the game credit for fixing a lot of problems that were in the original.

I still haven't played through the demo, but will probably get this game.  How about you?  Did you get it?  Will you?  What's your review?

The Guardian visits

In conjunction with the release of Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II today, UK newspaper The Guardian is launching a multi-part behind the scenes report of a visit to Lucasarts.  Click on the photo (nice welcoming party!) for part one of the story by Keith Stuart.

The Force Unleashed II Coming Next Week

Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II comes to PCs, Xbox, Playstation 3 and Wii next week.  I just downloaded the demo on Xbox and it's pretty cool.  The original Force Unleashed was a huge hit.  The official release from LucasArts says of the sequel:

"With Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II, the epic story continues as players once again assume the role of the devastatingly powerful Starkiller - Darth Vader's secret apprentice set during the largely unexplored era between Star Wars: Episode III Revenge of the Sith and Star Wars: Episode IV A New Hope."

The demo is pretty cool.. the gameplay is great and the environments look incredible.  Even the cutscenes and voice acting will please even the most die hard fans, though I did chuckle at one of the Stormtroopers yelling "Man down!" after I shot the trooper next to him.  I wonder how many times in the original movies that would have been yelled!

Somewhat related, I'm auctioning off a few Xbox 360 games on eBay:

*NEW SEALED* Final Fantasy XIII  (Xbox 360, 2010) 
Halo 3 ODST & Forza 3 Game Pack Xbox 360 -- USED ONCE

Dark Forces Promo Poster and CD-ROM 1995

Star Wars Dark Forces Promo Poster and CD-ROM 1995

Star Wars is huge now, with Star Wars: The Clone Wars bringing a whole new generation to the franchise, and the upcoming Star Wars: The Old Republic MMO bound to attract new gamers to Star Wars too.  It's interesting to look back at Dark Forces, one of the early big video game hits from Lucasfilm/Lucasarts.  If you're unfamiliar with the game from 1995, there's a great wikipedia entry about Dark Forces:

Dark Forces is a first-person shooter (FPS). The player controls protagonist Kyle Katarn from a first-person perspective, with a focus on combat against various creatures and characters from the Star Wars universe, though the game also includes environmental puzzles and hazards. Dark Forces follows a central storyline outlined in mission briefings and cut scenes. Each mission includes specific objectives which are related to the story. The missions take place in a variety of environments across the Star Wars universe, including a Star Destroyer interior, Jabba the Hutt's space yacht, and the planet Coruscant where the player must infiltrate a computer vault.

It was a great game on the PC and Mac, unfortunately the ports to the Playstation didn't turn out very well.  Before the prequels came out, Hasbro even made some figures from it.  Pictured are a promotional giveaway poster and demo disc from the game now available for auction on eBay: Star Wars Dark Forces Promo Poster and CD-ROM.