Here’s a Lego game. The episodic structure of the TV show lends itself well to a level-based game like this, but my relative unfamiliarity with the source material rendered it slightly unrelatable on top of the disconnected structure undermining the storytelling. I liked the more modern Lego look and feel for the Star Wars setting, and more versatile characters, but some of the new gimmicks like landing a ship and continuing on foot were lame.

Of course, the big new gimmick are the strategy levels. Capturing bases, building structures, wondering what the AI thinks it’s doing. It’s a neat feature that they get a lot of mileage out of but better as a one-off experiment. The levels themselves are fine, but the characters could be more varied; interchangeable Jedi and clones aren’t super compelling. However I did appreciate very much having Starkiller from the Force Unleashed be an available secret character. There’s a lot of bonus content with unlockable “classic” characters (a good use of minikits), the return of Bounty Hunter missions, bland space shooting missions, and many (too many?) optional strategy battles. The hubs are confusing and slow to navigate.

I also played the 3DS version: it’s got more interesting ship levels with full 3D flying, all the level structures are different, there’s nice changes such as an early playable Dooku or inserting Cham Syndulla and the playable Twi’lek Numa on Ryloth. It’s also completely linear and lacks all the strategy battle stuff that make the console version stand out, for obvious reasons of limited hardware. TT Fusion have done their usual good job with a more basic-looking game, as well as adding extra humour scenes outside of the rendered cutscenes as they are wont to do.

Overall both versions get a thumbs up from me. There’s issues but it’s a typical slightly-above-average Lego game. In Jar Jar’s brief appearance, he was even likeable. Shocker.