To: Mr. Jim Ward, President LucasArts
From: Michael Anderson, Reviewer for AceGamez

Dear Mr. Ward,

As someone who has supported LucasArts and Star Wars games since Dark Forces, I felt is was my duty and responsibility to write to you and report something egregious that has happened in your company, under your watch.

That terrible thing is LEGO Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy for the Nintendo DS.

Certainly you are familiar with the LEGO Star Wars games - the first game based on The Prequel Trilogy was very successful last year, but some reviewers didn't 'get it' at first. They didn't see that the joy of the game was for everyone -for kids, adults and whole families to enjoy and share. Eventually everyone came around, but many still clamoured for 'their' Trilogy to get bricked. So we were all thrilled when we learned that you were releasing LEGO Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy across every available platform - I was so thrilled, in fact, that I pre-ordered copies for my PC, PSP and DS.

I played the feature-starved GBA version of the original LEGO Star Wars, so I really appreciated what you were planning with the DS version of the sequel. Full 3D environments with all of the cut scenes and extras found in the console versions, including levels specially designed for the DS - that is pretty exciting stuff and the screens we saw in previews looked quite nice. So what happened?

The gameplay is very similar to the original LEGO Star Wars (the 'full version', not the GBA 'lite edition') - everything is centered around the Mos Eisley Cantina, the hub where you go to start levels, replay, buy extras and so on. Your character leads a party of two to five characters through the ships and worlds of the original Star Wars movies in third-person view. You can alternate which character you control while the DS takes care of the others. Each character has special abilities in addition to offensive and defensive moves, and you need to make use of these abilities to progress through each part of the game. Along the way you hunt for LEGO studs of different colors - more is better, as reaching 'True Jedi' status helps unlock extras. You also want to find LEGO Canisters - there are ten on each level - and the rare Power Brick.

The controls remind me quite a bit of the PC version - the D-pad controls movement much like using the arrow keys on a keyboard. This works fine for almost the entire game - except when walking on narrow walkways. Of course, this is the Star Wars universe, where railings are few and far between, so there is a good amount of falling to your death while crossing the walkways one step left, one step up, and so on. The rest of the controls are easy to learn and feel completely natural by the end of the first level. The shoulder buttons and special DS controls (touch screen and microphone) remain almost entirely unused, except when building your own custom LEGO creation.

The graphics and music are pretty disappointing in general. The music is immediately recognizable but sounds more like the midi samples from Dark Forces than a recent Star Wars game - the music in last year's Episode III on DS was better. The same goes for the sound effects; the blaster and lightsaber effects are solid, but gone are all of the cute little sounds that spice up the other versions. Things like the slapping sound when Leia does a close-attack or the popping sound of Chewie pulling off the arms of a Stormtrooper are gone - and the humorous effect is gone with them.

The graphics in many parts of the game are very good - I am very impressed with what your team managed to do on the DS in full 3D. Unfortunately, you pushed too hard - some of the areas in Hoth and Cloud City, and most of Episode VI in fact, have poor or uneven frame rates, plus there is some terrible graphical glitching. In Episode V this consists mostly of a couple of textures disappearing and reappearing, and shots being fired with no visible blaster effects. In Episode VI some of the Endor areas have almost constantly disappearing characters and flashing textures, not to mention poorly connected tethers and other graphical oversights that made navigating areas more difficult than necessary.

The crazy thing is that, as I started Episode VI, I was still enjoying the game and plowing ahead. How can that be, you ask? Because of what makes LEGO Star Wars so much fun - replayability. There are some good levels here and it's a blast to play through them again using a variety of different characters. I love finding everything on each level - no matter how many times it takes - so long as the challenge feels real. I also love the implementation of multiplayer - I only had a few minutes to try out the wireless co-op, but the ease of dropping into and out of games is just fantastic. Likewise, the wireless Battle Arena modes for single-card and multi-card play are loads of fun - my kids and I got in some fun battles.

So far I have told you the story of a game that has improved on the handheld version of its predecessor in almost every way but has some issues - you are probably wondering why I'm making a big deal out of what sounds like an average game. Well, I was just getting to that part.

Firstly, I had a lot of problems with the wireless connections. When playing the co-op mode, the game totally locked up and I needed to restart my DS. I was playing with someone I didn't know in another state and I only had a few minutes while we were in the store, so I didn't consider it that big an issue. Even when I ran into problems battling with my kids on their DS systems I let it slide, since I do most of my DS gaming either alone or over Nintendo WiFi. But my kids do single-cartridge download play on a couple of games all the time and have never run into the dropped connections and lockups that they experienced with this game.

However, the biggest issue I have is with the quality of the game - very uneven would be a good description. Early on it was frustrating but not too bad and in the middle it was pretty good, but by the time I landed in Cloud City it had hit lousy territory and never re-emerged. The ambitions of the designers greatly outstripped the capabilities of the programmers and graphics engine in those areas - the frame rates are bad, the graphics are appearing and disappearing like some bad shell game and some are inexactly located, making it very difficult to pull levers or activate switches. There was even one canister that took me an inordinate amount of time to get because my DS controlled associates would wander off.

Yet the worst part is Episode VI - the second level of that movie, Jabba's Sail Barge, is one of the worst levels I can remember playing in any game. Ever. And I've played some doozies, I can tell you! It is bad because there are blind jumps that you have to make off-screen; it is bad because R2D2 has to use his jets to soar across areas with timed platforms that raise and lower, but often you can't see them to figure out the pattern; it is bad because the level design is not intuitive and doesn't reward exploration with anything but failure. Most of all though, it is bad because it requires cooperation between Luke, Lando and Han, but the characters the player doesn't control are more likely to jump to their death or prevent you from making a precision leap than they are to help you in any way. I got stuck for an hour in one area trying to get Luke and Lando to wait while Han went across to raise a platform… unsuccessfully. I went back to Mos Eisley Cantina a couple of times and restarted the level, but that didn't help. Eventually I shut off my DS and restarted, and that solved the problem … until I got to the other side of the barge and the same thing happened again. I eventually finished that level and proceeded to the worst rendition of the Speeder Bike Chase I have ever seen … but at least that was quick and harmless. The Battle of Endor was offensive in that it was the pinnacle of everything bad about the game - missing sound effects, graphics problems, disappearing characters, bad frame rates, unclear objectives, non-thinking DS-controlled characters and so on. This level also features a log-jumping puzzle that works so poorly in the camera-limited 3D view that I wouldn't be surprised if it has resulted in more than one DS owner testing the aerodynamic properties of their prized handheld!

Mr. Ward, you and your associates have produced some of the finest games I have ever played in over thirty years of gaming. There have been a few clunkers (I won't mention Force Commander … oops, too late!), but I have generally been pleased with the quality of your games. Even games released under time pressure - like Battlefront - turned out fairly well, but this game simply wasn't ready for release and I think it is an affront to gamers that you have put LEGO Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy for the Nintendo DS on the shelves in such a clearly unfinished state. I hope that you will take this message in the spirit that it is intended and rally your talented team to remedy the situation and make things right for those who have bought this game. Until then, all I can do is spread the word and prevent others from making the same mistake as I have. Sincerely yours, Michael Anderson.

Reviewed by Michael Anderson for AceGamez (All Rights Reserved).