Developer & Publisher: Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment
Genre: Action Adventure
Reviewed For: PlayStation 5
Also Available On: PC, Xbox, Switch
As a huge Star Wars nerd since I was a child, I’ve been looking forward to Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga since it was first announced. I remember getting Lego Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy for Christmas one year, booting it up on my PS2 and falling in love almost instantly. To this day, it’s a core memory for me, and one that I was excited to replicate with the new game.
The first thing that struck me as I booted up Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga is how incredible it looks. As somebody who warmly holds playing Lego Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy as one of their fondest childhood memories, this looks like how I remember that game looking. Everything is beautiful, there’s familiar music cues, species and characters galore and way more content than you might expect. I’m not kidding when I say if you only expect to play levels from the nine movies of the saga then stop, you’d be in for a hell of a surprise. There’s a massive amount of side missions, a very large selection of puzzles and I’ve not even mentioned the space stuff!
With nine movies worth of levels, you’d expect filler. Brilliantly however the amount of levels per movie are limited to around five, meaning that you hit upon the major events of each movie without feeling like you’re in them for too long. Most levels also have wider open hub worlds, such as in A New Hope when you first arrive at Tatooine. You can travel around the planet and find a whole host of side missions and fun detours if you want, or you can continue to progress the main story. It’s an ingenious way of making sure that the player remains constantly engaged with the game and never gets distracted.
The core gameplay loop remains the same throughout the game, and sticks closely to the already established LEGO routine. Go here, do this, collect collectables. The difference here is that Travellers Tales have deeply revamped the combat system of the game, adding full blown combos. The blaster combat now has a target reticule, with the ability to take cover given to any character which makes for a whole range of possibilities. The camera doesn’t quite agree with taking cover, but that’s a small gripe in the grand scheme of things. On the lightsabre side of things however, you’re basically Dante from Devil May Cry. You can tie together moves, use the force to help you juggle enemies and even throw your lightsaber at them. We’ve came a hell of a long way since Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga, huh?
Speaking of coming a hell of a long way, we have original voice acting in this game! Sure, LEGO games have had voice acting in the past, but each movie has original voice acting done by industry professionals that really sells the sheer writing quality on display here. I wasn’t expecting to, but I laughed out loud multiple times during the game, most notably during an extended joke at the end of A New Hope that references the fact that Chewbacca doesn’t get a medal but everybody else does. I won’t spoil it here but I laughed manically at it.
The attention to detail on display is also rather breathtaking. You can see the LEGO logo on bricks in cutscenes, you can physically see the snow land on the brim on Han’s hood in The Empire Strikes Back. Not in my wildest dreams would I ever have imagined a Star Wars game with this level of attention to detail, let alone a LEGO Star Wars game. The game is utterly gorgeous, graphically on par with some of the best of the best of the new generation of consoles.
Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga is a reminder of why I love the series so much. It’s fun, funny and as engrossing as the best of the original trilogy. Honestly, this might be the best LEGO game ever made, and it’s lived up to the hype after numerous delays. If Lego games can be this wonderful and fun going forward, we’re about to live in a glorious new era indeed.
Sequential Planet was provided review code for Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga by WB Games.
Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga
Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga is an early game of the year contender. The flaws that it has are so miniscule that they're easily brushed aside, and it's wonderful fun throughout.