Star Wars: The Force Unleashed
Introduction and Genre
Star Wars: The Force Unleashed is an action-adventure hack and slash game that was released by LucasArts in 2008 as a project that “Bridges the gap between the first two Star Wars trilogies”. The game was originally developed for the PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and Wii consoles as well as iOS, N-Gage, Nintendo DS and PlayStation Portable. The game features unique combat and physics that were very innovative at the time. The game was originally meant to be the third installment in the “Knights of the Old Republic” series,
Star Wars: TFU is a game that is heavily influenced by the film and comic series of Star Wars. Since it was developed by LucasArts (Lucasfilm Games) which is a multi-media company founded by George Lucas the creator behind the original Star Wars franchise.
Similar Games
Star Wars The force unleashed is a third-person hack and slash action-adventure game that features fast paced sandbox gameplay. The game features unique powers and abilities that allow the player to breeze through large groups of enemies in a child’s Star Wars dream. There are lots of similar games to SW:TFU some examples are Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Darksiders, and Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor. This selection of games plays similarly to SW:TFU in the hack and slash action-adventure and role-play elements that The force unleashed offers. SW:TFU was released before Darksiders and Middle-earth but after Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic a game which was also developed by LucasArts.
Characters and Themes
Star Wars: The force unleashed is not directly related to the cinema story of Star Wars as the players character “Starkiller” was made so powerful for game reasons that if he were introduced to the cannon story of Star Wars he would easily be the most powerful character. That being said, in the first level of the game you start off as Darth Vader, a massively well-known character in media. The use of this character to start the game really lets the player know that they are in Star Wars game and creates drama and excitement for the later game.
Designer
The game was developed and published by developers under LucasArts, formerly LucasArts Entertainment. The company was founded in 1979 by George Lucas to explore areas of entertainment outside of film. In the early years LucasArts created action games such as “Ballblazer” and “Rescue on Fractalus” a set of games released as a pair in 1985. These games were released on the Atari console which, as well as the Star Wars movies, contributed to the funding of LucasArts. LucasArts has a large selection of games under their belt like “The Secret of Monkey Island” and as well as countless major movies like the Star Wars and Indiana Jones series of films. List of LucasArts games this list shows all of the games that LucasArts has developed since 1985.
Recently, LucasArts/LucasFilm was purchased by Disney for $4.05 billion who now have creative control over the Star Wars series. Thankfully, Star Wars the force unleashed was released in 2008 four years before LucasArts was sold in 2012. Some of the most important titles from LucasArts include the games, “Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga”, “Lego Indian Jones: The Original Adventures” and the “Star Wars: Battlefront” series.
Why I have chosen this game
Star Wars The force unleashed is a game that has heavy ties to media so for this reason I think it is good to look at for structuralism as a large amount of the games story is built on media that most people already know about. There is a lot of iconic bits from the Star Wars cinema universe such as the well know Darth Vader theme music that is used as a tool to create drama and ambience in the same way that it is in the movies. Because of this I think that the game creates a good balance of new story with old traits that really makes the player feel like they are playing a roll whilst still being apart of Star Wars.
Seb Crowhurst Game Development 