LEGO Star Wars - The Skywalker Saga in preview: Will no stone be left unturned? (with video!)

This is an article from our content partner "PC Games". You can find the original article by author Maci Naeem Cheema here.

If someone had said a few years ago that another Lego Star Wars game would be one of the big hype titles of the first half of 2022 alongside mega-hits like From Software's new title Elden Ring (our full review of the open-world masterpiece), Horizon Forbidden West, and Playstation icon Gran Turismo 7, most would probably have laughed out loud and heartily.

But thanks to countless innovations and sensible (as well as important!) revisions in the area of gameplay, the surprisingly impressive graphics splendor that puts every previous Lego game in the shade, as well as an enormously attractive and modern open-world approach consisting of 24 planets, this is actually the case - we can hardly believe it ourselves. Developer TT Games and publisher Warner Bros. spent a whole five years working on the new brick adventure. In our final preview of Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga, we'll find out what the results are, how it feels in the first sections of the game, and whether the hype within the video game community is justified.

If you'd rather watch our preview in the form of a video with gameplay scenes, we recommend our preview video, which we've put right here.

Finally an end to "Play the same game again!"

TT Games' countless Lego games, which debuted in 2005 with "Lego Star Wars - The Video Game," are based on the biggest franchises in the entertainment landscape. Whether Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter or Marvel, if there is a brand with huge fan support, you can be sure: TT Games will make a Lego game out of it. This has actually worked quite well for many years, but as seen in the prime example of Ubisoft: Every gameplay formula that is often used eventually gets dusty and worn out. It was as clear as Grogu's beloved bone broth that this would eventually happen with the playfully very simple and monotonous Lego games.

But now it's finally over. With Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga, TT Games presents a thick game package with a total of nine main films of the legendary star war to replay. The game features a full-fledged and brand-new battle system, a lot of innovations in terms of level and puzzle design, a semi-open game world and much more. So you'll be able to play the original trilogy around Luke, Han and Leia, but also the prequels as well as the Disney sequels, which established a new main character in Rey. The episodes, which consist of five missions, present a similar structure, as has been the case dozens of times in the past, but the fresh open-world approach creates a Star Wars feeling that fans rarely get to see within the gaming cosmos.

What does the future hold for Star Wars? You can find all the planned movies and series here, and an analysis of where the series should go is also available!

With Hypersprung into a new era of blocks?

In our play session, we were allowed to take a look at the lovingly designed episode menu, in which you select a first in each of the three trilogies, but the development team suggested "A New Hope" to us - understandably. Hardly any other film bristles with so much nostalgia and Star Wars flair. However, we found that a bit of a pity, because in direct contrast we would have been quite interested to see what the new-quality block adaptation of some of the more controversial films, such as the disastrous Disney finale "Skywalker's Ascent", would have looked like - unfortunately, we'll have to wait until the test for that.

The intro mission of course takes us to the Alderaan cruiser "Tantive IV", where we, in the form of Princess Leia and Captain Antilles, have to fend off the attack of the Empire including Darth Vader and secure the plans of the Death Star - in the usual charming Lego humor including professional dubbing. The voices are all captured well, but for nostalgics there is also the famous "mumble mode", which heaves the conversations within the Lego adventure back into the Lego past.

The Lego revolution on the part of TT Games is not only found in the promo material, in fact there are a lot of new things for Lego fans: Already in the first seconds of the game, countless innovations become apparent. Instead of relying on a static camera perspective - as was the case in the past - the new Lego Star Wars adventure presents itself with a dynamic third-person view. This not only makes exploring the many iconic locations much more fascinating, it also offers the possibility to go modern and new ways with the battle system. Independent aiming and various abilities such as targeted Force attacks or lightsaber throws finally make their way into the Lego universe.

As a droid, Jedi or bounty hunter into the Lego fray 2.0

The more than 300 playable characters from the Star Wars universe are divided into various groups, including heroes, Jedis, Sith, bounty hunters and droids. Depending on the category, they have different skills that can be unlocked with the help of collected Kyber Stones, which are hidden all over the game world.

However, you shouldn't expect new powerful attacks that influence the previous gameplay. For example, one of the first skills we unlock with Luke Skywalker is increased sprint speed. Also important to mention is that the skill trees are shared within a category, so Obi-Wan Kenobi and Rey share the exact same powers.

Things get far more exciting with "tactical" options in the humorous battles. For example, if we shoot at the heads of stormtroopers with our blaster, they lose their helmets and nervously and clumsily try to collect their Imperial face shields again. If you focus on the feet instead, you can watch the enemies bounce around on one leg and in pain - actually fun.

The variety in enemies also refreshingly loosens up the gameplay. Sometimes we have to deal with standard stormtroopers, at other times with special units that take us under fire with massive Lego projectiles. Likewise, from now on it's possible to pack various attacks into combos, parry attacks with the lightsaber and much more. Of course, this doesn't develop into a similarly complex battle system as in Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, but it is a rancor step towards the future compared to the past - by the way, the famous reptile species is also available as a playable character!

In terms of playable star warriors, you can look forward to very different versions of iconic characters, such as Obi-Wan from the Clone Wars era as well as his aged form Ben Kenobi. But also underrepresented Star Wars characters like Mama the Hutt or the little Anzellan Babu Frik. Which brings us to the biggest plus points of Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga: The wonderfully designed worlds and the fascinating Star Wars flair of the new Lego galaxy.

Nine movies, 24 planets, one galaxy

The completely redesigned environments, which did not simply rest on past games, present a fantastic overall picture that is bursting with lovingly designed details - especially if you compare the areas directly with those from older Lego Star Wars games. Unlike in the past, spaceships, whether their interiors or exteriors, show up almost completely assembled from Lego bricks. In addition, the new light engine makes for wonderful gameplay moments, which come into their own nicely, especially in the open-world areas, creating a nostalgic feeling that fits perfectly with the larger Star Wars universe.

The further we play through the various movie stories, the more planets and environments are unlocked, which we are then free to explore with characters of our choice. This isn't necessarily new, but the overall interconnectedness of all the planets results in a huge open game world that we can travel around at will with our favorite spaceship. The total of 24 planets includes famous Star Wars locations like Tatooine, Coruscant or Bespin, but also brand-new showplaces from the Disney trilogy, like the red salt-covered planet Crait or the secret base of Darth Sidious from Star Wars: Skywalker's Rise.

Within the varied game worlds, there are also countless secrets to find, such as the Kyber stones that are important for the skill system, or fun puzzles that finally demand more from us than the absolute minimum. We were also surprised by the fact that environments affect the look of our character. For example, if we walk through Tatooine's desert, we'll find a lot of sand and dirt on our Lego clothes. The same applies to our means of transportation - great!

In addition, we really liked the fact that you can actually make decisions from time to time about how you want to progress in a certain level - as far as we can tell so far, this doesn't have a particularly big impact, but it does give the simple gameplay a loosening up touch.

A lot of new meets old-fashioned fascination

All of this adds up to an exciting Lego adventure that doesn't need to hide from big current games. The great strength here, however, actually remains the exact same one that made Lego games so great and popular in the past: The unmistakable charm and witty humor full of puns and clever allusions. For example, when at the beginning of "A New Hope" our hero Luke Skywalker secretly sips a blue milk, it's quite amusing in relation to "Star Wars Episode 8: The Last Jedi".

A special For Star Wars fans, besides the silly interpretation of the complete original story, there is a Star Wars atmosphere that is rarely seen in the field of video games. All the points mentioned are definitely strong arguments for the new Lego adventure, but we actually found the most impressive to be the great captured atmosphere. When we stand as Luke Skywalker in the dunes of Tatooine at the beginning of his long journey to become the venerable Jedi Master and behold the beautifully designed sky with its two suns, we simply have to admit: It's been a long time since a Star Wars game has given us such a strong feeling of reminiscing about the old days in a galaxy far, far away, full of nostalgia. Hah, nice.

Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga will be released on April 05, 2022 for all current gaming platforms, including Nintendo Switch! In addition, fans can look forward to post-launch content on Rogue One, Solo, The Mandalorian and much more - including fan favorite and glutton Grogu, who will unfortunately not be playable and serve purely as a sidekick for Mando.

Editor's opinion: Wonderfully captured, charming and full of Star Wars fascination - top!

While I haven't played every one of the 7389 Lego games of the last 25 years - has anyone?! -, but I would still say that I have learned to hate and love quite a few Lego adventures over the many years. My absolute favorite remains undisputedly Lego Island, released in 1997, which wonderfully set itself apart from the rest of the game lineup at the time with a lot of charm and humor. However, the many more recent licensed titles have often bored me so much that it wasn't even enough to play for two to three hours. However, TT Games' latest brick adventure has finally really grabbed me again - but whether the quality can be maintained over a gameplay of 20 hours (including the total failure "The Rise of Skywalker", ohweh!) remains to be seen.

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