Review of Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga – Galactic Ride

I will also go into detail about the gaming experience in our podcast today.

I discovered the Star Wars movie in the 1990s thanks to a classmate with a German videotape, and as a child, I was obviously completely amazed – the highlight of the movie stunts in the Czech cinemas of that time was Arabela, and here I could see the battles of giant spaceships, laser swords and so on. Although Prequely ruined my relationship with the show and the new trilogy nearly killed it, I can still make an impression looking at a Falcon or an X-Wing. As a child, I loved to collect real Lego – at that time I built spaceships, for example, from a set of this set, dedicated to completely different topics. I’ve played Lego video games myself since the beginning, before they all felt the same. However, I couldn’t turn down the opportunity to play through all 9 films of the saga in a brand new video game. And most of the time it was a lot of fun, with surprisingly good storytelling.

• Platform: PS5 (peer review), PS4, PC, X1, XSX | S, switch
• Publication date: 5. 4. 2022
• Producer: TT Games (England)
• Genre: action adventure
• Czech location: Not
• Multiplayer: yes (co-op pro 2)
• Data to download: 38 GB
• Game time: 10+ hours
• Price: 1499 CZK (Xzone)

Full retelling

The structure of the game is divided into a menu of nine episodes (movies), and at the beginning you can choose any of the first films of each trilogy (for example, you can start with A New Hope, The Phantom Menace, or The Force Awakens). As soon as you play the first movie of this trilogy, you will open the second, and after it ends, the third will eventually open. There are five “levels” in each episode, but they are quite varied in form and scale – sometimes they are the classic labyrinths of corridors and rooms to pass, sometimes they are much more open “urban mushrooms”, and in some cases, of course, this is a flying passage. whether you’re bombing the Death Star or racing Pod Racers. This is not a remake of old Lego games, everything is brand new.

The levels are connected in different ways – sometimes they linearly transition into each other, and sometimes you can start them by reaching a certain place in the “open world” or by flying to a certain place on the “galactic map”. Of course, you always have a clear idea of ​​where to go for the next step in the main story. If you only follow this basic line, you should be able to finish each episode in about an hour. But if you decide to do all sorts of side activities, collect all the legos, complete all the puzzles, talk to all the characters, and so on, your playing time will easily increase several times. There are no customizable difficulties in the game, but you can make them easier by setting up “Accessibility”.

At the beginning, you can choose any of the first films of each trilogy.

It was a pleasant surprise for me how, within this simple structure and relatively little playing time, the creators managed to retell the story of each film. Among other things, they borrowed characters from the films, but also the new dubbing and of course the music taken from the films cannot be missed. Moreover, the beginning of each series has been reworked almost one to one, including the opening credits, so goosebumps on the skin of hardcore fans are guaranteed. Not only does it all sound good, it also looks good – I often thought of Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart while playing, although the very consistent Lego style here means, of course, that the graphics are simpler. The game runs smoothly, it may be a pity that it was not possible to better hide the recording screens, which in some places greatly disrupt the smooth flow of the game. Of course, the emphasis is on making the game accessible to the whole family, so some of the tougher movie scenes are deliberately reworked into a comedic way (for example, the final duel between Anakin and Obi-Wan). But in general, the story works as it should and there are even a few small innovations that more significantly tie the individual trilogies together and enrich them in an interesting way. Anyway, I have a huge desire to watch movies again. The difficulty of the game is negligible, after death you will immediately be born in the same place and lose “only” collected cubes.

Diversity and Gradient

As I pointed out above, one of the advantages of the game is the relatively high diversity on all fronts – of course, you will change dozens of characters, dozens of spaceships and visit dozens of planets or locations. In addition, you will either jump, then fence or shoot, or solve simple puzzles, so that later you can fly a spaceship or participate in races. The highlight of each movie is usually a good boss fight, which has mechanics that are difficult enough for a family game – bosses signal attacks with colored flashes and animations, they can be reflected by cover or counterattack. Together with the reasonable length of each level and episode, the result of the overall gaming experience is a high gradient that makes you feel like you’re on a big roller coaster full of wild and often very beautiful rides, not to mention the nice gradation of the story. I wonder how the game will affect someone who has not seen the films.

Unfortunately, there are also some disadvantages. You can play the game together, but only locally, “on the same couch”, as they say – there is no online multiplayer. If for some reason you must stop playing the level, there is no checkpoint in it, so next time you will have to repeat it from the beginning (I managed to break the mission script twice, so I had to start the level again from the beginning). And said boss fights are properly epic (even when playing Duel of Fates), but I often felt like the boss had too many lives and the fight was too long. Despite these criticisms, I really enjoyed watching all nine films and I can imagine that with the right teammate, the experience could have been even better. It’s the perfect game for intergenerational collaboration or playing player versus non-player.