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When Lego Star Wars took its bow last year, many players thought: "Hey, wouldn't it be freakin' sweet if this clever game concept was based on the Star Wars movies that people actually like, rather than that total abortion of a prequel trilogy?" Could it possibly go wrong? Yes it can, as it turns out. While LucasArts has gone above and beyond the call of duty in crafting a Lego-based version of the seminal space operas packed with hilarious parody, the gameplay drags the whole thing down into the proverbial Sarlacc pit.

A Different Kind of Power Brick

In case you haven't heard, Lego Star Wars won a lot of praise last year for its brilliant combination of two timeless icons of pop culture. The platform action game starred little yellow Lego versions of Anakin Skywalker and all his buddies, traipsing through (and destroying) a world made of little plastic bricks.

Lego Star Wars II, based on the original trilogy, ups the ante. Where the original had occasional touches of humor, this is positively rife with them. Elaborate cut-scenes feature pantomimed parodies of the series' classic moments. What if Luke's new robotic hand didn't work properly? Or if Vader had to produce a Polaroid family picture to prove that he was Luke's daddy? It's as if Spaceballs was actually produced by Lucas himself.

And those are just the cut scenes. The actual gameplay can be just as laugh-out-loud hilarious, like when Chewbacca pops an enemy's little Lego arms off, or when Luke uses the Force to turn a Stormtrooper's helmet backwards. The music is great -- although the constant clickety-clack of bricks can get annoying -- and the enhanced graphics of the 360 version bring the visuals ever closer to looking like real-life plastic.

Force-d Solutions

Unfortunately, the game design leans heavily on these moments of hilarity to provide any value whatsoever. Most of the gameplay is about mowing down wave after wave of enemies. There will always be at least two playable characters that you can switch between, navigating different sections of each level by using their unique abilities. Speaking of which, it's a crime that swinging a lightsaber is so clunky and ineffective that the standard Han Solo blaster is much more fun.

There are a good amount of puzzles to break up the monotony. Sort of. LSWII doesn't have "puzzles" so much as it has "things you have yet to shoot." The vast majority of the game's puzzles solve themselves if you just blow everything up, then use the Force on anything that moves (it'll automatically be floated over to where you need it).

When the game does stump you, it's for the very wrong reasons. This one time, I had to turn right at the end of a hallway to proceed, but there was nothing -- no change in lighting, no camera movement, no nothing -- to let me know that the hallway was not a dead end. I wandered throughout the entire level for what seemed like ages, exploring every nook and cranny while listening to Chewbacca's anguished roar. For the first time in my life, I really understood him. I only got out of the level by humping every wall I could find until one turned out to not be a wall.

Drop In, Tune Out

One way of getting around a boring one-player game is to play it with a buddy, and Lego Star Wars II gets credit for making it as easy as possible. At any time during the game, a second player can pop a controller in and immediately join up. And hey, having a second real live human being helping out can't be any worse than the useless buddy AI.

As a whole, the gameplay would best be described as inelegantly designed. Rather than give you a set number of lives, or set up mission checkpoints and intricate challenges, the designers just give you infinite lives, then throw an arbitrary number of Stormtroopers at you. If you're replaying the game to get all the collectible whatsits and the coveted 100% rating, then sure, you're going to want to stay alive. But the levels are just so utterly boring the first time through that I can't see anyone playing them a second and a third.

If Only Episode III Were This Short

For all its faults, Star Wars fans will still want to plow through LSWII just to see the unpredictable comedy that ensues. If you think you know what's going to happen: you don't. It's worth it for the cut-scenes alone. And it won't take long: you can rip right through the game's story in an afternoon. But it would take a very hardcore Star Wars fan to actually plod on and replay the same levels again and again. As such, LSWII might be best rented.

Article by: Chris Kohler
Video produced by: Matt Keil