LEGO Star Wars for Game Boy Adv Reviews by Gamers

To see a Lego-licensed game on the Game Boy Advance is not a surprise; it's a familiar kids' brand that's been exploited several times on the handheld in titles such as Lego Racers and the Bionicle spin-off series. But to actually play a Lego-licensed game that's not catering to the kids? That's the surprise. Lego Star Wars: The Video Game for the GBA is definitely going to be a hard sell to gamers who sneer at anything "kiddy" related on store shelves, but if you're willing to take that jump, you're going to get an unexpectedly deep and fun romp through Episode I, Episode II and Episode III through the eyes of clickable pieces of colored plastic.

Lego Star Wars is a videogame that features a curious blending of two unique properties, but it's a successful presentation because both properties compliment each other in the format extraordinarily well. It's hard -- no, make that impossible -- to take little Lego Jedi and Droids seriously, and it's pretty obvious that the designers thought exactly the same thing and simply went wild with the idea of anchoring the Star Wars franchise into the world of Lego People. On the whole its a clever satire on both Lego toys and Star Wars, all the while offering up a pretty kick-ass game throughout the "joke."

This GBA game, just like the console title it's based upon, is a retelling of the first three Episodes of the Star Wars story. You know, the tale of a young Jedi pulled to the Dark Side of the Force to become the infamous Darth Vader? I didn't ruin anything for you, did I? Lego Star Wars is broken down into these three Episodes, and this structure actually allows players to freely choose which Episode they want to play without the need for unlocking the other two. So, if you want a sneak peek at the upcoming film, you're free to snoop in at the levels based around Revenge of the Jedi, but since the entire story's told in pretty humorous pantomimed cutscenes with symbol icons representing "dialogue," this Lego game's not going to give a whole lot of spoilers away. These cutscenes are intentionally vague and funny, stripping down important and sometimes emotional situations in the film using mute Lego actors -- try not to laugh when Anakin's mom bites the dust in Episode II. I dare you.

The entire game design is full-on action in an angled, isometric perspective. Throughout the adventure players will gain control of characters such as Qui-Gon Jinn, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Anakin Skywalker, Padme Amidala...even annoying bit players like Jar-Jar Binks. Control is surprisingly tight, and the action plentiful, requiring players to have a good grasp on Lightsaber handling and blaster shots, as well as a nice balance of platform jumping. Though much of the game is a run/jump/shoot-n-slash creation, Lego Star Wars isn't entirely mindless; certain characters have specific abilities, like Jar Jar Binks' high jump or R2D2's hover, and in many cases you can't get through to the next portion of the Episode without having to swap back and forth between the set of available playable folk.

Replay comes in the form of a decent number of hidden unlockables. Every completed area can be revisited with a new assortment of characters, which can sometimes get a little weird when you have, say, Padme rescue Padme in Episode I. In each level, there are specific "Death Star" spots to trigger, and scoring all the hidden spots in all three Episodes promises a nice extra unlockable specific to the task. It's a shame that the designers couldn't manage the same cooperative multiplayer mode that the PlayStation and Xbox versions enjoy, but after you experience the bout of slowdown in some of the more congested areas of Lego Star Wars, it's pretty clear why this feature was left out of the GBA rendition.

It's pretty obvious that the developers of the GBA version had a blast producing Lego Star Wars, as the character animation and background level design really flows together well in the presentation. Areas are definitely "Lego" in construction, with bumped floors and walls, and special Lego brick platforms to create using Jedi powers throughout the action The audio work in the game is also pulled off admirably, offering some of the best PCM versions of the Star Wars soundtrack pieces on the weaker GBA sound hardware.

The action does tend to get a little repetitive in places, so it's a really, really good thing that the designers offer a "Save Anywhere" function to the cartridge SRAM. A little more "mystery" and exploration to the level design could have spiced up the action a bit. As it stands, it's pretty clear what needs to be done about 95% of the time; sparkly bits surrounding items is a gigantic "Use Jedi Power Here" indicator that's more obvious than a buzzing neon sign. But at least the game's not short on energy and stuff to destroy; Lego Star Wars does this extremely well.

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