I am one of the these geeks who isn’t the biggest fan of Star Wars. Sure it is an enjoyable series to watch and the concept of the light saber is damn awesome. But story wise I have defiantly seen better. As for Star Wars games there are very few good ones. Knights of the old republic I have a lot of respect for as an RPG. But one that has always stuck out from the rest was The Force Unleashed, the game where you follow Darth Vader’s secret apprentice in what is a pretty awesome 3rd person action game.

The Force Unleashed combat was nice and varied, the very idea of lifting storm troopers into the air, throwing force lightning at them and then launching them into a pack of enemies was awesome, the boss fights were nice and challenging and you really did feel like an all-powerful Jedi or Sith Lord.

Now the Force Unleashed II demo has made its way to X Box LIVE and I have really been anticipating this game. As a hack and slash fan this game has been looking quite tasty, due to the fact you can wield duel light sabers, this is what I thought lacked in the first game. Also there are a couple of new abilities to the Force Unleashed II Including the Jedi mind trick, where you hypnotize your enemies into either betraying their team mates, committing suicide or running away frightened. So the game has a lot to offer.

The Demo itself is a fantastic insight into what the Force Unleashed II has to offer, again you play as Starkiller, Darth Vader’s secret apprentice.  But this time you are a lot more powerful, I think it safe to say that the demo gives you the chance to play a really powerful version of Starkiller, after looking at the menu and seeing most of his stats up to max, the demo itself gives you the chance to play Starkiller after you have leveled him up quite a bit, meaning the game it self will not have all the abilities you have in the demo from the get go. The Force unleashed I demo did the same and even though it is cool and all, it is a little disappointing when you come to play the full game.

The demo lets you play through a level where your basic objective is to escape Lord Vader’s cloning plant, so this is the perfect opportunity to utilise all of Starkillers new powers to attack your enemies. The dual light sabers work like a dream the amount of combos you can pull off with them is both fun to do and beautiful to watch.

One of the new features to the Force Unleashed II is the Jedi mind trick. This is a simple feature that can hypnotize your enemies away from battle. What I didn’t like about the new feature was that you can’t select what you would like your enemies to do. It just picks a mind trick at random, I can see how this is convenient in the heat of battle, but if you’re in a stealthy situation I would like to pick what I was telling my enemy to do, that said it is pretty cool seeing you enemies turn on each other, or jump off the nearest bridge.

The end of the demo saw Starkiller take out a couple of AT-ST units.  This gave me the opportunity to use another new feature, the Force Rush mode. Kind of like the devil trigger you see in Devil May Cry this makes Starkiller pretty much unstoppable, his powers are upgraded 20 fold and he is invincible. it is truly a beautiful thing to use and watch. Weather it is only available in certain bits of the game or unlocked at that particular point of the game I don’t know, but if it like a true devil trigger I am all for it.

The Force Unleashed II look like a brilliant game to play, I can not wait for the full version of the game.

Garv

So I went and tried the demo for a laugh to see if it was any good. I was hooked, I never thought I would see the day where i would enjoy a Star Wars game as much as this one. Sure Knights Of The Old Republic is a gaming classic but to be honest I never got fully into that title *hides* But with The Force Unleashed you actually felt like a Jedi master, throwing people around at will with the force and just causing mayhem. I think I liked it because you were in fact a superhero. If your still mulling over the idea of the first game check out my review, it may sway you.

So where am I going with all of this? Another review? A DLC announcement perhaps? Well I am glad to say it is non of the above and the sequel to The Force Unleashed has been announced. It was announced last month at the Spike TV Video Game Awards that the sequel will be gracing out consoles by the back end of 2010. Yes I know, the Spike TV awards were back last month but this is still news to me.

So what will the next outing for Starkiller entail? Well as you can probably gather not much has been announced at all but it seems the story carries on from the good ending from the last game. I assume this because in the teaser trailer for the second outing. Our old buddy Starkiller is wielding two (yes two how cool is that, better be a game feature) blue light sabers. This makes a hell of a lot of sence because the Ultimate Sith Edition of the first game was released not so long ago, and showed the story of Starkiller as he became one with the dark side. So it will be very interesting to see how Starkiller develops as one of the good Jedi and also it will be very interesting to see how they pick up from where the last game left off, not wanting to spoil what happened for the people who haven’t played The Force Unleashed but wouldn’t this be a little…..impossible?

So I for one will be eagerly awaiting the next installment in the chapter of Starkiller’s story, I wander how it work within the original Star Wars trilogy time line. Sadly we are just going to have to wait till some more information arises, till then, sit back and relax as you watch this Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II teaser trailer.

Garv