Despite the rumor to the contrary, it appears that Star Wars: Battlefront III is not in development at Pandemic, the studio responsible for the first two games. Just last week an employee from Rebellion — where Battlefront III development moved after its initial stint at Free Radical — reportedly stated that development had shifted to Pandemic. According to Mathew Everett, community manager at Pandemic, the game “is not currently” with the studio. He added that only LucasArts would know the fate of the title at this point.

Depending on your point of view, this news is either a terrible blow or a tremendous relief (unless you’re just middlin’, of course). Given the popularity of the most recent Star Wars title, The Force Unleashed, we imagine Battlefront III will find a home somewhere. Here’s hoping Jabba is finally playable.

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Definitely a step in the correct direction for LucasArts, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed represents what is both right and wrong with gaming today. It features a relatively unique style of play, as well as a sort of new perspective on the creation of the rebellion in Star Wars.

It fits into a 3rd-person fighting game in the vein of God of War or Devil May Cry, as far as you play one strong, powerful individual against hordes of hapless foes. That, however, is where the comparison ends, because, as awesome as Kratos was, he couldn’t pluck TIE Fighters out of space and drop them on stormtroopers.
You play as Galen Marek, the secret apprentice to Darth Vader code-named ‘Starkiller.’ Vader discovers him, a force-gifted young child, after hunting and killing his Jedi father during a gameplay sequence where you actually play as the Dark Lord, running around Kashyyk and force choking Wookies. After which Starkiller is trained in the dark side of the Force to kill Jedi, and eventually, according to Vader, overthrow the Emporer with him. Naturally, there’s betrayal, brutality, and confusing emotion (much like most other Star Wars offerings) throughout the story.
The story takes getting used to, as odd as that sounds. Most folks come into the game expecting Starkiller to be this incredibly stoic, merciless tough guy like Kratos, but he appears to have motivation and drive beyond selfishness and bloody-minded brutality. This might alienate some folks expecting otherwise, but the character does fit decently after one gets used to it. Occasionally the dialogue gets awkward with the new Star Wars trademark of forced humor, but the instances are pretty rare.

The gameplay works very well and the mechanics are fluid and intuitive. The Force powers you acquire throughout are as entertaining as they are brutal, and there really just isn’t anything like tapping a button to lift a fellow then hurl him into the stratosphere. Of course, some aspects make it really suck. Such as when the character gets knocked over by an opponent. The other people you’re fighting surround you while you loll on the ground counting the stars around your head and pummel you into a gooey paste. This especially happens in boss fights, and you will simply lose before you realize you’ve been knocked over.

A few design choices are not always the greatest, either. It seemed difficult to contemplate a scenario where pulling a Star Destroyer out of atmosphere into a planet would be anything but awesome, but Force Unleashed found a way to muck it up. Instead of just a cutscene, you enter a sort of ‘boss battle.’ Swarms of TIEs come at you, which you have to painstakingly destroy. Then you must use the thumbsticks to properly align the nose of the warship before entering a pull-down sequence. Then it sends another flock of TIEs. While you fight them, its nose tilts to the side again, and you have to re-align it before pulling again. You have to do this around four or five times, and it gets really frustrating.

Overall, however, in spite of bad design choices and other frustrating issues, Force Unleashed fits a niche very similar to Assassin’s Creed: it’s got its flaws and frustrations, but the overall experience is still very fun with plenty of unique things to make it worth a playthrough or two.

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Two popular iPhone games, Zombieville USA and Star Wars: The Force Unleashed, got the free, lite versions in the AppStore. And while we see this as a good thing — now when every iPhone/iPod Touch user will be able to try these games out before spending some money — I must say I was disappointed with both titles. The problem is that both demo versions are super short. It takes about 5 minutes to complete the Star Wars demo level and even less for the Zombieville USA. However, I must be fair to add that both games seem quite entertaining and that I’ll probably push the button and acquire full versions. Still, even though we’re talking about “lite” versions, I did expect to see something that could be played for at least 15 minutes. This way it’s kinda ridiculous. Sure the idea is to make money and push free version downloaders into buying full-blown apps, but folks – give us just a little bit more (like 2 more levels) and we’ll love you even more. People who don’t want to buy your games, won’t buy them even if you provided 3 free levels, and showing some respect to the regular folks, which I believe are a majority of iPhone users, could be certainly beneficial in the long run.

Here’s a link to the free Zombieville USA version and here’s the link to free Star Wars: The Force Unleashed.

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The competition was tough, but in the end, writers Haden Blackman, Cameron Suey, John Staffor and Shawn Pitman took home the second Video Game Writing Award bestowed by the Writers Guild of America.

The writers won the award for their work on Star Wars: The Force Unleashed in a ceremony held over the weekend. They went up against the writing teams working on Fallout 3, Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3, Tomb Raider: Underworld, Dangerous High School Girls in Trouble.

As of now, to be eligible for the WGA award, the game writers must be a member of the WGA’s Videogame Writers Caucus, which some see as a fledgling writers union for game writers. Some of criticized this practice, saying that the award ceremony is a membership drive used to recruit people into the Writers Caucas, and that WGA awards should be given out to writers not in the guild.

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During the 2008 holiday season, U.S. retailers reported the strongest sales for STAR WARS toys and products in the 31 years since the first STAR WARS movie was released theatrically, even as the overall retail economy faced significant challenges. Sales of STAR WARS video games also reached new heights in 2008, driven by the huge success of STAR WARS: THE FORCE UNLEASHED. Following its release in September, STAR WARS: THE FORCE UNLEASED became the fastest selling STAR WARS video game in history with sales now exceeding 5.7M units worldwide.

In addition, STAR WARS books topped the charts with 14 titles appearing on the New York Times best sellers list, with both STAR WARS: THE FORCE UNLEASHED novelization, and STAR WARS: LEGACY OF THE FORCE: REVELATION, reaching the number one spot. The smash-hit, animated STAR WARS: THE CLONE WARS will return to Cartoon Network the fall of 2009 for a second season, continuing the adventures of Anakin Skywalker, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Ahsoka Tano, and the heroic Jedi Knights.

The October 3, 2008 premiere of STAR WARS: THE CLONE WARS scored as the most-watched series debut in Cartoon Network history, according to Nielsen Media Research. Since its premiere, STAR WARS: THE CLONE WARS (Friday 9 p.m.) has ranked #1 in its time period on all television with boys 2-11, boys 6-11, and tween boys 9-14 through January 2009. It is also a worldwide hit, airing in 166 countries around the globe. Cartoon Network is scheduled to air the final first-season episode of STAR WARS: THE CLONE WARS at 9 p.m. Friday, March 20.

As the series has continued its popularity, the official STAR WARS website WWW.STARWARS.COM has seen a 30 percent jump in site traffic with millions of fans now viewing free full video episodes of the animated series, playing new STAR WARS games, reading the latest news and online web comic, or just watching some of the hundreds of exclusive STAR WARS fan films and videos on the site. Produced by Lucasfilm Animation, STAR WARS: THE CLONE WARS features the voices of Matt Lanter (Heroes) as Anakin Skywalker, Ashley Eckstein (That’s So Raven) as Ahsoka Tano, James Arnold Taylor (Celebrity Deathmatch) as Obi-Wan Kenobi and Tom Kane (Wolverine & the X-Men) as Yoda.

Dave Filoni is the supervising director of the series and Cary Silver is producer. George Lucas serves as executive producer and creator of STAR WARS: THE CLONE WARS.

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I remember this time a year ago, I was watching the trailer for Star Wars: The Force Unleashed and remember thinking “ZOMG! this is going to be a cool game!” and I eagerly anticipated its release. The months went on, new trailers came out and new screenshots were obvious evidence that Star Wars: The Force Unleashed was going to be 2008’s game of the year, even while up against Grand Theft Auto, Fallout 3 and other blockbusters for the year.

Then, the demo came out and while it was a beautiful looking game and had some really neat features and eye candy, it was about as much of a letdown as if Lucasarts had cancelled the whole project. To me, the game was dead. I eventually got bored after finishing a handful of other games, but like this reviewer, the whole experience was somewhat uneventful.

Since there’s really nothing Star Wars to look forward to in the near future, we decided to poke around for some Force Unleashed player reviews and here’s what we came up with:

I first played Star Wars: The Force Unleashed as a demo on the Playstation Network Store and I thought it was pretty good. Albeit, the controls were a bit strange & cumbersome but overall not too bad. Plus I figured with a few more months until launch the issues would likely be ironed out. Well, I was wrong. But more on that in a bit.

First I’ll touch on what I actually like about the game. Being a moderate fan of the original Star Wars Trilogy it’s simply fantastic to get a bit more of the story of the events that transpired prior to the setting of Episode 4. To my understanding this is the first ever video game where the story is adopted as part of the official Star Wars Canon.

The game places you as Darth Vader’s apprentice known as by the code name ‘Starkiller’. Initially, you’ll begin by proving yourself capable by hunting down various Jedi throughout the Galaxy. Vader’s intention is to overthrow the Emperor with Starkiller’s help. Or so it seems. The story is definitely a highlight that I won’t spoil here.

Graphically the game is quite visually appealing. Character models are well done and the environments are significantly varied from planet to planet and even on starship’s and eventually the Death Star. By in large some of the best graphics are on Starkiller’s Force powers such as Force Lightning.

The major problem that this game – and to a larger extent Action/Adventure games in general – is the camera and controls. The player is given very little input into the camera itself so you’ll be relying mostly on the game. Too often the camera is at the wrong angle for a particular jump or completely ignoring a group of enemies pouring murderous fire just off screen. It’s extremely frustrating to constantly have to run from a group of unseen enemies because the camera won’t focus accurately. Or miss a jump over and over because of poor camera placement.

Controls are similarly flawed. Even simple Force moves like picking something up and hitting an enemy require the use of multiple buttons. Even when you remember the right sequence the results are often mixed. How many times I tried to hurl an object at an enemy only to watch it go the opposite direction and miss entirely are too numerous to count. Force Unleashed also uses liberal amounts of scripted button sequences particularly for larger enemies and for boss fights. These sequences usually require an insane amount of dexterity or just sheer hit and miss tactics. I found myself often having to repeat a sequence because buttons require almost millisecond timing.

The Force Unleashed also uses a paper thin leveling system that rewards the player abilities in 3 areas – Talents, Powers & Combos. Earn a level or find an upgrade sphere and you can use those to upgrade an ability of choice in each respective area. The main issue I have with the system is that it’s far too simplistic and not varied enough to maintain the game through repeated plays. Even playing the game casually I was able to max out almost all of my abilities.

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The series, set between Star Wars: Episode II and Star Wars: Episode III, features the untold stories within the epic battle. Star Wars: The Clone Wars launched in the U.S. on Cartoon Network on October 3. The new Lucasfilm Animation series clocked in as the most-watched series premiere in the network’s history.

“The Clone Wars is really a continuation of the feature films, and I wanted it to have the same look, feel and depth of the movies,” said George Lucas, who serves as executive producer. “I think we’ve succeeded in making it visually very different than anything else on TV. We’ve put a lot of emphasis on the story and character, because we wanted to make a series that everyone could enjoy. Young people can enjoy the characters, the action and the humor; older kids will like the depth of the story and the quality of the animation. For parents and adults, and for people who have been Star Wars fans for a long time, the series is exciting because it’s one-of-a-kind—a dramatic, action-oriented animated series, done in an interesting style.”

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One of the more interesting aspects of Star Wars Battlefront III, one of the games left in limbo after the closing of Free Radical, was its “what if?” scenarios, which would retell some of the more important stories of the Star Wars mythos in different ways. Some new concept art unearthed by Kotaku has revealed just how awesome this concept had the potential to be, by asking one question: What if Obi-Wan Kenobi turned to the dark side?

The new images show a decidedly evil Kenobi, complete with yellow eyes, tattered black robes, and a red lightsaber in hand. Accompanying the art is this brief description of the new Obi-Wan: “An old man, gnarled by the corruption of the dark side. Mostly a hermit, he wanders searching for places and things with strong connections to the dark side. Any artifacts he finds (e.g. force crystals, talismans, bones) he keeps about his person in pouches or threaded through his clothes. Currently found in the swamps of Dagobah.”

Development of the game has now been shifted to Rebellion Developments, and we can only pray that they decide to include Dark Obi-Wan as a character. Seeing one of the most upstanding characters in the Star Wars universe turned bad is undeniably cool, and now that it’s been teased, to have not have it in the game will be extremely disappointing.

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From the moment the theme music kicks and the titles roll slowly up screen, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed is true to the real Star Wars – and by that we mean anything from Episode IV onwards. Sure, the music is a little tinny and the characters are poorly sketched but the atmosphere and action are superb.

As an apprentice to Darth Vadar at his most wicked, your mission starts with you slaughtering a Jedi Knight – plus a host of Imperial witnesses lest the Emperor get wind of Vadar’s machinations. The weapons at your disposal are your trusty light sabre (no skimping on the sound effects here, thankfully) plus some handy Force abilities. These include chucking stuff around, healing yourself and the ever-useful mind trick: apparently, this is THE mobile Star Wars game you’ve been waiting for.

The Force Unleashed uses an innovative system called CellWeaver that requires you to ‘weave’ patterns on a three-by-three grid using the control button or number keys. Successfully complete a pattern and you can deploy an offensive power or block an attack. It sounds complicated but you soon pick it up, with skimming your thumb around the control button feeling as close to waving a light sabre as you’re likely to get on a mobile phone.

If you don’t fancy the Story mode, you can revisit unlocked Chapters or just enjoy a kill fest in Survival Battle, where you’ll keep having baddies, er, we mean goodies, thrown against you until you die.
There’s plenty of enjoy in The Force Unleashed, from lovingly crafted cut scenes to some great battles in familiar (and not so familiar) locations. We’re happy to report that the Force is indeed strong in this one.

Details
Price: £8
Rating: 12+
Size: 22MB
Download: N-Gage

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No, you’re not tapping into some “all-powerful force controlling everything,” as Han Solo said in the movies. But you are reaching out with mind power via one of the first mass-market brain-to-computer products. “It’s been a fantasy everyone has had, using The Force,” says Howard Roffman, president of Lucas Licensing.

Mind-control games may be the coming thing: Mattel plans to demonstrate a Mind Flex game (also due this fall), which uses brain-wave activity to move a ball through a tabletop obstacle course, at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas on Thursday.

In the Force Trainer, a wireless headset reads your brain activity, in a simplified version of EEG medical tests, and the circuitry translates it to physical action. If you focus well enough, the training sphere, which looks like a ping-pong ball, will rise in the tower.

A state of deep concentration is needed to achieve a Force-full effect. “When you concentrate, it activates the training remote,” says Frank Adler of toymaker Uncle Milton Industries, which is creating the Trainer. “There is a flow of air that will move the (ball). You can actually feel like you are in a zone.”

Star Wars sound effects and audio clips emitted from the base unit “cue you in to progress to the next level (from Padawan to Jedi) or when to move the sphere up or down to keep challenging yourself,” Adler says.

“Until today, EEG technology has been designed for rigorous medical and clinical applications with little regard to price (and) ease of use,” says Greg Hyver of NeuroSky, which developed the brain-wave technology for both games. “We are putting this exciting technology into everyone’s living room.”

Source: USA Today

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