Thursday 2 December 2010

'Force Unleashed 2' - And Another Thing...

It occurred to me today, whilst trudging fruitlessly through the sodding snow again, that I left out one of my main irritations with The Force Unleashed 2 during my previous post about the game.  And since I love a good whinge, I figure I should bring it up here.  However, I warn you now that this is a story-related issue, so there will be some

SPOILERS

SPOILERS

SPOILERS

SPOILERS

SPOILERS

SPOILERS

Spoilers, yes.

So, at the game's finale, after His Evilness Darth Vader crushes the neck of Juno Eclipse, Starkiller-1's girlfriend and object of obsession for his clone (which'd be you) and you proceed to stab holes in his 7-foot paedo-breathing arse in retaliation, you're faced with one of those pesky BioShock-alike moral choice moments: kill Vader or let the Rebels arrest him.

Is this the face of a man you can pity?

Now, whilst taking Vader's varnished head off with a single lightsaber swipe did sound awfully tempting after struggling through the boss fight with the perma-blocking git, I'm a Star Wars fanboy to the last, and so chose to spare him, curious to see what the 'canon' ending would be (killing Vader before A New Hope would rather bugger up the overall movie plotline, after all).  As a result, Vader is taken into Alliance custody (and it must be said, the ragtag bunch of rebels, who are typically so useless they can actually be out-shot by stormtroopers, do a remarkably good job of keeping him locked up), Starkiller-2 finally reunites with his clone-father's missus, who wasn't quite as dead as she appeared.  And they fly away to, I dunno, have sex or something, with only a chained-up Vader's warning of "As long as she lives, I will always have power over you..." to concern their little minds.  Oh yeah, and Slave 1 following them silently, in typical schlock blockbuster sequel-bait fashion.

Aaaaand roll credits.

That's it?  Seriously, for all my thumb/wrist strain, I get essentially no resolution or revelations, just the promise of another bloody Force Unleashed game, which is pretty much exactly what I don't want for the future of Star Wars?  Urrrrrggh.  As I said in my review, I forgave Unleashed 1 for its various faults based solely on the story, which amongst other things, had a very definite and satisfying ending.  Is there any reason the already-pointless sequel couldn't at least mimic its forebearer in that respect?

Oh yeah, and if you had to set up another game, you could at least have come up with a more interesting cliffhanger, LucasArts.  Ooh, only Vader knows if the original Starkiller is still alive?  Funny, I played the first game and remember him being quite dead at the end.  And what difference does it make, anyway?  Vader's going to escape before the Rebels can do anything important with him - we've all seen A New Hope, we know how this goes.  And what the hell does Boba Fett have to do with it?  Did Vader include some kind of 'get me out of jail' clause in his contract, just in case shit like this went down?  Was Boba feeling charitable towards a fellow wearer of curious headgear?

Stupid.

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