A fun Star Wars themed game that is great for kids.

We all know the Star Wars saga, at least those of us reading this review. A concern I had about buying this game, is my kids really aren't familiar with the characters or story. I read a few positive reviews, and decided to purchase this game for them. The kids are 7 and 11 years old. This was a great decision, the game doesn't require knowledge of the series, though some understanding of the series helps.

On the PS3, this game will be rendered if your set can support it at P1080 60Hz all the time. The graphics are very good, not great as in Ratchet and Clank, but still much better than any prior generation video game. High definition and the high quality cartoon like rendering done by this game helps make the story very credible to young children.

The goal is to complete missions, missions are story fragments from the 6 Star Wars movies (which are called chapters in this game). Scenes we all know, like the first encounter between Luke and Yoda. This is an example of a scene, where the culminating event is Lukes fighter rising out of the swamp for him to fly off in. My kids didn't know the goal, but with some help were able to get to it eventually. The nice part is even without help, my 7 year old would have eventually solved the problem.

In each mission, there is a problem to be solved. The problems get progressively harder, and at times some adult guidance or supervision, or just some hints may be required. Many times, the kids will stop and just enjoy a particular facet of the game. It is very vivid, and fun.

Players can jump from any of the 6 chapters via a gateway conveniently located near the start of the game. Play is semi-linear within a particular mission, but it is possible to skip from one chapter to another via the gateway. It is easy to give up a mission, and re-start or go to a mission in another chapter. There is much humor embedded into this game, for those familiar with the movies. The most famous scenes from the Star Wars movies are re-created in this game.

The Lego Star Wars saga is for one or two players, when in two play mode, it is intended that the players be in co-operative play. Sometimes though the kids just enjoyed blowing each other up. Violence in the game is minimal, and mostly directed toward either inanimate bots, or toward obvious bad guys. There is no blood, or gore, the consequence for being killed is to splash a few Lego parts on the ground which dissolve quickly. As most characters slightly resemble Lego pieces, there is no true sense of gore as you may expect from a slash game. Light sabers are the preferred weapon, but there are blasters, and ray guns as well.

This is a slash, hack, and shoot game. Combined with puzzle solving. The famous Star Wars force is mostly used to create Lego constructions, that is to assemble Lego blocks to make something necessary to solve or help resolve a mission. Assembly doesn't require figuring out which piece goes where, but instead requires you to engage the force. This means repetitively pressing the "O" button, each press gets one more Lego piece in place, the characters handle details of assembly by themselves. Another use for the force is to lift objects, often the object to be lifted is very obvious.

As you progress through the story, you'll acquire game currency which is used to unlock new players to use in open areas. An open area is one in which a mission has been solved. You return to open areas with new characters to open doors, you couldn't open with the characters you initially had. This enables you to collect trophies, solve more puzzles, engage in yet more fighting and have more fun. I'm told this is called replay value.

My kids have solved more than half the game, have spent more than 30 hours playing, and opened up about 20% or so of the game. I've read that the game can be completed opening a bit under 40% of the areas. Solved missions must be re-visited to open up new places, and enhance your characters or game status.

Character death in this game carries very little meaning, the loss of some currency, if there is any, and the child re-appears within seconds. Children learn quickly not to fear exploring, or risking character death as they'll quickly continue right where they left off.

The game is fun, and unless stuck on a mission it is reasonably fast paced. Adults can play with children, and enjoy indirectly the joy of exploring the Star Wars universe for the first time.

Sometimes the kids enjoy rolling around as robots, one of my kids like being an ambulatory Lego block. There is some joy just trying out different roles, even the various roles of robots.

I highly recommend this game for children to play on a PS3. It doesn't require the dexterity, speed or accuracy of many other games. Failure on a mission usually results in a request for help, or the kids moving on to another chapters mission and a return later.

P.S. One final hint, on occasion light sabres are required to function as blaster reflectors, to shoot blasts back and hit targets. You may wish to help your kids understand the concept that light sabres can also bounce back a blaster shot, or they're likely to be stuck a few times early on.