Star Wars: The Clone Wars is probably the best piece of on-screen expanded media from the overall franchise. One throwaway line from A New Hope, indicating a past war that Obi-Wan fought in alongside Luke's father, gave rise to a whole self-contained saga of Clone Wars stories. It was a brilliant move on George Lucas' part, paving that little pathway for future storytelling like that, and it has produced some of the most thrilling, intriguing plotlines in the Star Wars story. Like any good war story, The Clone Wars is plentiful with tales of derring-do, espionage and proper action-adventure. This game, Jedi Alliance, while being short and a bit repetitive, fits snugly among the other excellent Clone Wars stories, providing a solid, exciting story from beginning to end.
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| Image Credit: IGN |
Jedi Alliance isn't a long game, and there isn't a ton of depth to it, so this won't be a huge review, but I did enjoy the game and think it deserves some love. One of the immediate standout traits is that the game looks excellent for an original DS title. I think that is helped by The Clone Wars' iconic aesthetic translating really well to the somewhat limited hardware of the Nintendo handheld. You didn't see a ton of high fidelity, 3D games on the DS, it was a strange halfway point where a lot of games still functioned like Game Boy Advance titles, save for the odd game like Super Mario 64 DS. The 3DS is where we really started seeing more graphically impressive games appear on the handheld, like the several different N64 remasters or PlayStation 1 and PlayStation 2 ports. So, when I saw how pretty Jedi Alliance was, I was thoroughly impressed that it was running on the console at all. The environments are diverse and beautiful, with unique stages and settings to suit the goal of each mission. The aquatic planet of Rodia especially stood out to me, where you infiltrate a facility, explore underwater tunnels and chambers before ultimately facing off with a terrifying sea serpent. I eagerly anticipated seeing where each stage would be set, and what environments they would have me navigating. I can't think of a single planet that I didn't enjoy.
The gameplay of Jedi Alliance is indubitably the weakest aspect of the game. This is one of those DS games that was WAY too emphatic on using touch-screen controls, which is honestly surprising to me, given that the game came out a few years after the launch of the console. Typically you get the gimmick heavy games right around the launch of a new console. This game almost feels like it would be on a mobile platform, when it comes to how its played. Battles consist of just tapping the screen rapidly to swipe your lightsaber and strike down whichever droid or enemy stands in your way. There are some very limited Force abilities as well, but they aren't fun to use. In the battles that you get into against another lightsaber wielder, you are just constantly pounding your screen to try and break their guard and get in a few hits before having to repeat the whole process again against your next enemy. The combat left much to be desired and never became challenging or gained any depth or required strategy. There are also quick-time events that have you drag your stylus on the screen to match whichever direction is being indicated. I have mixed feelings on these. They created genuinely thrilling set pieces that simply would not have happened through actual gameplay, but quick-time events are inherently uninteresting. They take gameplay out of the player's hands and relegate it to being a triggered cutscene. The legitimate downside to these quick-time events is that the touch-screen functionality in them often failed and it resulted in having to repeat many instances several times before it would finally register my input. There are also a handful of different puzzles that appear several times throughout the course of the game. They were just the right level of challenge to not be annoying or break the stride of the gameplay, and there was enough variety between them, that it didn't feel too repetitive. One of the biggest perks of this game is that there's a decent sized roster of Jedi to choose from, including two of my favorites: Kit Fisto and Plo Koon. You already know I played as those two at every chance that I could. Mace Windu, Obi-Wan, Anakin and Ahsoka rounded out the other four options.
The plot of Jedi Alliance was genuinely pretty interesting. The Jedi Luminara Unduli is attacked on her ship and taken hostage by unknown assailants. Anakin and Ahsoka are sent to investigate and discover that Nightsisters from Dathomir are the culprits. What ensues is a galaxy-spanning caper involving the Nightsisters and Count Dooku, where the Jedi Council is dispatched to several different planets to try and find out what their goal is, and where Luminara was taken. Kyber crystals, the Force-attuned rocks that Jedi use to build lightsabers, are being used by the Nightsisters and the Separatists to create a superweapon. The Jedi must pursue them and destroy the superweapon before it can be used. My only complaint with this is The Clone Wars' over-reliance on the Nightsisters in their storytelling. I swear Dathomir is in every single Star Wars project, starting with The Clone Wars. I get tired of seeing the witches, though they were creepy and novel when we were first introduced to them. That aside though, this felt like the perfect, authentic type of threat that would feature in a story arc in The Clone Wars TV show. I learned that the game was developed in the same studio where the show was made, and they were being made at the same time. This proximity no doubt lent a hand in helping the game feel so truthful to its counterpart.
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| Image Credit: IGN |
There was actually a Wii game called Lightsaber Duels that served as a companion to this game, as they were released on the exact same day. It's a fighting game, and got mediocre reviews, but I'll have to play it eventually. A Star Wars fighting game sounds fun to me. I never played the controversial PS1 title Masters of Teräs Käsi, so I have no experience with a fighting game from this universe. Plo Koon and Kit Fisto are in Lightsaber Duels too, so it's my sacred duty to rep my dawgs when I can.
I know my review sounded pretty mixed, and it was for good reason. I think the gameplay is pretty lacking in this game, which is obviously critically important in a video game, but the environments and story are satisfying and fun to explore, and with the limited gameplay elements, it almost feels like a visual novel or something at times. If you go into it expecting to be disappointed, you might be pleasantly surprised. I got this game used for five dollars, and that was a perfect price for it. If you can find it for cheap, pick it up and I don't think you'll regret it.
VERDICT: Recommended
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