Game Boy Advance

Star Wars: The New Droid Army

Cela fait plaisir de retrouver un bon produit estampillé Star Wars. THQ a réussi son pari et signe avec cet opus GBA un très bon jeu d'action, à la durée de vie certaine et à l'ambiance très soignée et prenante. May the Force be with you.

While hardly a breakthrough in Star Wars gaming, The New Droid Army is a fun outing nonetheless. It may be a long, long time from now (in a galaxy far, far away) when the ultra-violent Attack of the Jar Jar Clones first-person shooter is released, but for fans of the series and casual handheld gamers alike, this one is worth checking out in the meantime.

Star Wars: Episode II: The New Droid Army had a lot of potential. Unfortunately, the developers have managed to spill most of it, leaving this game only a little better than mediocre. The sounds and graphics manage to make up for it, though, and since the game is always kept in balance between the bad and the good, it does manage to snatch a reasonable score. The enemies and the replenishing of Force energy draws down it down, but in the end it's about as close to Jedi Knight as you're going to get on a handheld, and that does count for something.

What Star Wars: The New Droid Army does, it does well. But if you are looking for more than constant force enhanced hand-to-hand battles, you might be disappointed.

What it all boils down to is that Star Wars: The New Droid Army is a lot like every other action title out on the GBA. The gameplay is decent, although uninspired, and the game only really suffers from being monotonous. It is unfortunate that a battery save wasn't included as it would have promoted shorter gaming sessions that match the amount of time you can actually stand to play the game in one sitting.

Droid Army's one-note gameplay includes fierce button tapping broken up by stretches of aimless wandering; the vague missions ("make your way to X") don't help. On the plus side, Anakin gains Force powers like Push and Speed, injecting a bit of strategy into the otherwise simplistic action. In combat, the controls are serviceable but clunky, while Anakin executes killer saber combos, targeting enemies isn't always easy. Without varied gameplay, this Droid Army ultimately puts up a weak fight.

As is true of many of the previous Star Wars games for handheld systems, Star Wars: The New Droid Army is a modest action game made better by the characters, story, and music that it borrows from the existing motion-picture franchise. It's a decent game for casual players or for die-hard fans of Star Wars, but not something to recommend to someone with a deep library of GBA games.

New Droid Army is entertaining for the first few levels, but falls incredibly short of being an entertaining game. The dumb AI and lack of gameplay variety keep the game from being the game it could have been given that it takes place in the Star Wars universe. Even fans may grow tired of this one, so avoid it if you can.

I’ve been enjoying most of the Star Wars games for the consoles of late, even though I am getting a little tired of the franchise, but I’ve been starting to dread the arrival of the Gameboy games. It’s ironic that some of the best Star Wars games ever to have been created flourished on the Super Nintendo. It seems like the Gameboy advance is long overdue for a port of one of those games in an effort to redeem a franchise for travelling gamers everywhere.

Every stage plays exactly the same, and the repetition will dull your senses. You'd think the "speed" force power might remedy the situation, but it's only available in five-second spurts! It's easy to cycle through your force powers, but they are almost totally defensive in nature. You'd have to be a very loyal Star Wars fan (perhaps stranded on a desert island) to derive any enjoyment from this by-the-numbers time-waster.