Editor’s Note: There are nine versions of this title for various consoles and handhelds. This review represents the Playstation 3 version of the game, which is nearly identical to the Xbox 360 version.

It is a hard life for “Star Wars” video game fans, with titles ranging from near masterpieces to utter wastes of money.

LucasArts’ newest addition to the franchise, “Star Wars: The Force Unleashed,” lands somewhere between the two.

Set between the events of “Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith” and “Episode IV: A New Hope,” the story of “The Force Unleashed” revolves around Darth Vader’s secret apprentice, codenamed Starkiller, as he is sent across the galaxy tracking down and killing the remaining Jedi.

Throughout his journey Starkiller learns more about the Jedi, himself, and other pivotal events that ultimately yield to the original “Star Wars” film trilogy.

“The Force Unleashed” is a hack-and-slash title at its core reminiscent of games such as “God of War,” “Devil May Cry,” and “Heavenly Sword.”

As Starkiller, you wield a lightsaber as your primary weapon, but you also utilize various Force powers such as Force lightning, push, and throw.

Additional combos involving lightsaber attacks and force powers can be attained via the game’s leveling system. This works like a role-playing game by allowing you to accumulate force points by dispatching enemies and using Force spheres to upgrade your combos, strengthen force powers, and improve Starkiller’s attributes such as greater health or strength.

These characteristics are overused and lack originality within the genre, as are the game’s finishing moves on various bosses and large enemies which comes down to nothing more than pushing buttons in sequence with on-screen prompts.

Regardless, the control scheme of “The Force Unleashed” feels natural and is easy to learn, however Starkiller has to face and lock-onto enemies and objects in order to use force powers.

This proves difficult when the game throws unreasonable amounts of foes in your direction without allowing you the time to stand up to defend yourself before being pummeled to the ground a second time.

Force powers look fantastic as the environment reacts in real-time to the shockwave by ripping down trees, flinging enemies across the screen, and creating overall chaos using the Havok physics engine, which is only one of the game’s three physics engines.

Most notable is the Euphoria engine which encodes characters with a survival instinct.

This means that Stormtroopers will do anything in their power to survive being thrown by your Force powers by grabbing onto nearby objects or dodging as objects are thrown at them. This adds a new level of realism and unpredictability to the gameplay.

However, the game’s platforming sequences feel unfair due to touchy controls while jumping and sparse checkpoints when the game saves.

I had to replay a mini-boss battle at least three times because I fell down a hole after the fight and the game restarted prior to the sequence – sheer frustration.

The game also suffers from an ugly menu design and too many loading screens.
Menus are a bland throwback to the original Playstation era with little more than text and boxes and a somewhat lengthy load screen separates gameplay from player upgrades, making it a chore to upgrade Starkiller.

Without question the story of “The Force Unleashed” is its primary strength due to a twisting and enriched experience coupled with outstanding cinematic presentations.

The musical score is a refreshing blend of classic “Star Wars” scores and new music. This diverges from the same stand-by “Star Wars” tracks many other titles in the franchise rely on.

Voice acting is superb in the game’s cinematic moments, which blend seamlessly between pre-rendered visuals and those rendered in real-time using the console’s visual engine.

However, these sequences feel rushed at times and fail to allow the player to make a deeper investment in the story due to their short length.

Visuals during gameplay are just as magnificent as the cinematic sequences and establish the most vibrant and detailed environments in any “Star Wars” title to date.

This is not to say the game does not suffer from any technical shortcomings. “The Force Unleashed” has many audio and visual glitches.

It is not uncommon to find your character floating in mid-air near a cliff side or failing to jump appropriately when near a wall or structure.

In one instance, I had killed an enemy yet he remained standing and motionless until he eventually fell down about 30 seconds later.

“Star Wars: The Force Unleashed” is a beautiful title that does well to serve “Star Wars” fans, but has numerous glitches and recycled formulas that leave the gameplay feeling mediocre at best.

3 stars out of 5.

E-mail the author: Eric Joyce