Grown-up graphics
Six years on, and we're into the age of HD gaming, and the graphics have become more grown up too. The scenery here looks much more akin to Republic Heroes - the first Clone Wars tie-in, released in 2009 - so the figures and ships, just as basic and brick-like as before, and as the real toys are, seem out of place.
New kit for Fisto
Scaled down into standard-definition for the Wii - and then undoubteldy upscaled back by your flat-panel TV - the graphics look rather poor, though they'll clearly be more impressive on the other, higher resolution platforms.
The Wii also suffers during some of the new game elements. In one level, for example, you flip between the viewpoints of Obi-Wan Kenobi and novice Jedi Ahsoka Tano. Switch to one, and the other's environment shrinks to a live-action view in the corner of the screen with a very noticeable impact on the framerate.
The battlefield levels have an impact on the Wii's performance too, though PS3 and Xbox 360 gamers shouldn't be affected.
And, as many of us older types like to grumble, more and more of the game is assembled out of new, specialist parts, not the generic bricks of yesteryear.
Bricking it
Verdict
Fanboy cynics will grumble about the source material, but who cares, The Clone Wars is actually quite good. Gaming cynics will mutter about rehashing a six-year-old set of games that were never much of a challenge anyway. Those are fairer points, but Lego Star Wars was never about that. They were about having fun, and Lego Star Wars III is no less enjoyable for any of that.
This is now the ultimate casual gaming power in the universe. I suggest we play it. ®
More Games Reviews |
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Lego Star Wars III: The Clone Wars
COMMENTS
Thumbs Up
The interface is, as you say, clunky but I've wasted many happy hours on this. I love it!
Definitely one for the old farts like us who remember making things out of proper blocks. If only 7-year-old me had had the infinite bucket-o-blocks you get with LDD.
nice
but it looks like the simple "pick up and play for 5 mins" feel has been lost. I loved the way you could dip in and out of the older lego games. Adding RTS elements seems a bit off to me.
Anyway, did anyone else think that in the context of Lego, Kit Fisto sounded like a porn name?
2-player mode
My 11-yr-old son has the PS3 version and he and his 15-yr-old brother have been playing it in two player mode ... I think there's a major upgrade here in that unlike the previous versions where the two characters could not move off the same screen (or, worse, one character could cause screen to scroll and other character would get pushed in same direction by opposite screen edge and as a result fall off a ledge - cue major inter-sibbling squabble) now it seems to cope with split screen + its a dynamic split screen which can rotate from left/right through above/below to right/left as the two characters move there relative posiitons around - looked quite clever the way it worked + the way the split moves was also very reminiscent of the scene cuts in the original SW films!
N.b. I suspect that if (like my son) you've seen every episode of SW:TCW several times then the game may make a lot more sense!
85%
How can you give this 85% when you on give Black Ops / Crysis2 etc etc X%
Oh you mean you reviewed as a GAME i.e. how much FUN it is.
Sorry.
Interesting review. Take a look at this too...
http://ldd.lego.com/
Free. Slightly clunky user interface, but it's bearable, and quite a surprising find if you were never aware of its existence.
Different strokes for different folks, of course, but if you're an old fart who plays / used to play with lego, this might just hit the spot.
