Malygris's Star Wars: The Force Unleashed - Ultimate Sith Edition review

Welcome to Honest Gamers!

Thank you for writing a PC review that actually covers system requirements. A lot of reviewers don't do this or give only a brief overview of it. I haven't played PC games in years, myself, but when I did there was nothing more frustrating to read a killer review of a game than pick it up to find that, as you say, the suggested system is more of a REQUIRED system.

I really liked this review. It goes from a meaningful discussion of the game's problems to a heartfelt plug for what was good about it, without getting confused in the transitions. I look forward to seeing what else you will write for the site.

Thanks for the welcome. To be honest, I probably wouldn't have mentioned the system requirements at all, but they slapped me in the face so hard that I couldn't ignore them. In light of the fact that it's a port of a 2008 console game, I figured there were bound to be other people who made the same mistake I did and suffered for it, so it definitely struck me as something worth talking about.

Given the horror story you tell, I cannot blame you in the slightest for paying as much attention to the system specs as you did. It turns out to be a significant point and I'd in fact feel a bit cheated by a review that ignores something I'll really want to know.

From the sounds of it, if I ever want to play this, I need to stick to console. I imagine that´s what you intended to make me walk away with. If so you succeeded. Remapping keys and then not have the QTEs match up, that´s a sigificant error, and as a software developer it makes me weep for their testing procedures. If indeed the port received more than token testing at all - if not that could also explain why the system specs are apparently astronomical. If they never even TRIED it on other systems than the ones provided to their developers...

"(...)with cookie-cutter characters and a forgettable story being overshadowed by the intoxicating fun of sheer creative mayhem."

Good sentence.. even if I disagree. :) I mean... unlike in Dark Messiah, you can never sneak up on an enemy and chop their head off. Or do finishing moves that avoid the "mature" rating by removing the blood and murder in cold blood thing. You can't choose the path you play, that adds some immersion and participation in the story..

Aside from the abysmal job in porting this, I actually managed to get some pretty good gameplay out of this. My biggest peeve aside from the ridiculous system req, is the forced perspective during boss fights. Your view is straight ahead and you move Starkiller around in front of you. The lack of perspective change completely ruins the fight sequence (imo) It also makes it very difficult to try to line up & target your opponent instead of every other targetable item on the screen. It is absolutely the worst on the Raxus fight against Paratus... I love the visuals & locales, but this particular aspect nearly kept me from playing any further...

The perspective change was another big issue I ran into and unlike you, it's what finally prompted me to just give up on the game entirely. The straw that broke the camel's back, as it were. I didn't bother mentioning it because there was just so much technically wrong with the thing that picking on individual design decisions, despite how obviously idiotic they were, just felt like piling on.

Honestly, the more I think about it, the more I think a 4/10 score was a bit on the generous side.

Let's not forget artificial lengthening of fight sequences a la the controller-snappingly frustrating Star Destroyer bit. Y'know, the one that spawns TIE fighters regularly, and resets the destroyer's orbit while you fight them off.

I didn't play that. I'd heard back things about it across the board but particularly on the PC version, and when I watched a video of the sequence on YouTube it struck me as just monstrously, offensively idiotic. I'll admit that a big part of that is the rebellious Star Wars nerd in me: Darth Vader, the baddest of the bad, was impressive because he could choke people by pointing at them and yet this guy can single-handedly rip a Star Destroyer out of the sky? I don't think so.

It was just such a huge failure on so many levels. The port was of obscenely poor quality and the Star Wars mythos, which I loved when I was young and it was new, has become a punchline. It's extremely rare that I give up on a game before it's done and even rarer when I don't feel a hint of regret in doing so, but I was glad to see this thing off my hard drive forever.