The Lost Magic of Lego Star Wars

[Music] okay so it's time for another star wars video game video who knows if it will be an unexpected success or a catastrophic failure if this one doesn't pop it's back to lightsaber duel videos until the rapture and yes i am threatening you guys for a good time speaking of good times my god the first lego star wars game was fantastic wasn't it i remember reading all the previews in a bunch of now sadly defunct gaming magazines it seemed like a weird cash cash-grab tie-in to the then upcoming sixth installment in the star wars saga episode 3 revenge of the sith a peculiar reimagining of a toy brand as a video game to capitalize on the little plastic bricks that had driven parents over the world insane with their expensive prices the new lego star wars collection but all the previews made note of its fun and surprisingly addicting gameplay the loving recreations of the prequel star wars movies the couch co-op with friends as your favorite jedi the sheer number of characters you'd be able to unlock as well as the building block mechanics that actually sounded like total sense and not just a half-hearted tie into the brand quick thing to note all the footage has been recorded off my copy of lego star wars the complete saga on ps3 i know there's some changes across all three games why did they take out yoda's sweet hover chair but for the purpose of what i'm examining in this video the differences won't really matter i don't currently have the means to game capture ps2 games although any recommendations on the best way to do that would be appreciated in the comments for future reference thank you lo and behold 2005's lego star wars the video game was a hit and quickly spawned a sequel in 2006's critically acclaimed lego star wars 2 the original trilogy this game felt like the full potential of the first realised with more fleshed out vehicular combat better puzzles and building mechanics not to mention far more expansive levels a year later came a remastered amalgamation of the two in 2007's lego star wars the complete saga this game felt like the ultimate freaking package as a kid with punched up gameplay for the prequels to complement the sequel's upgrades new characters and unlockables and even lost levels this was the quintessential star wars title and it captured a particular kind of muted magic you like this video please consider subscribing for more videos on games the wars the soups and more and if you really feel like it yeah why not follow the instagram too for cool little edits and photoshops cheers the most shocking thing about the lego games was that they featured next to no voice acting aside from the occasional intruder alert the cutscenes told the story in endearing mumbles and slapstick lego moments [Music] and it was great providing a fun and light-hearted sometimes parody take on all the iconic moments the lego star wars games still simultaneously managed to make you feel all the excitement and the thrills you might have been far blockier versions of ob luke and lando but fighting darth maul blowing up jabba's sail barge and escaping the death star 2 were fantastic and made you feel like you were playing the movies and being those characters my favorite mumbling legos moment across the series is when luke finally looks upon vader with his dying breath this scene in the movie is obviously one of the most important moments in the entire saga finally after learning the ways of the force and becoming a jedi like his father luke skywalker confronted the emperor tossed aside his weapon and used his lightside knowledge in a last-ditch effort to save vader even if it kills him i'll not leave you here i've got to save you you're ready obviously these little plastic lego equivalents cannot capture the scope and majesty of sebastian shaw and mark hamill so rather than ripping out the actors lines and slapping them over the top we'll get to that bs the original lego star wars two doesn't even try to instead they share a brief glance and vader puts his claw on luke's shoulder for comfort even though 90 of the mumbles are gibberish the voices let the occasional audible word slip out you can actually hear lego veda give luke a muffled very good it works because it's a slight format break and the juxtaposition of two characters having a heartbreaking father-son moment with the fact that they're freaking legos who can't talk is just hilarious to me it's the little moments that really make these cutscenes like the fact that lego palpatine's chair is not designed for him and he has to actually stand up before he can awkwardly hop down and then there's things that just work out really well by happenstance like ironically vader's turn is left untarnished in the lego game since lego vader cannot speak because of the new alliance on dialogue the physical comedy was less relied upon to get a laugh now all of that has been degraded too oftentimes the sight gag will be oh look an animal popping up where they shouldn't lull so random the original lego games were silly but they weren't a complete circus by contrast take the original i am your father recreation from lego star wars 2 the original trilogy this line no i am your father is one of the most iconic lines in movie history let alone star wars history the entirety of this scene and the drama at conjures would be difficult to convey without some of those crucial lines so how does a game with no speaking roles handle it well obviously it isn't nearly as emotional or devastating but it's not supposed to be instead the lego games did what they did best they played a serious moment for laughs to show that lucas vader's son the black-clad-towering menace of ultimate destruction gets out a polaroid of him and a pregnant padme [Music] it always gets a laugh out of me and then somehow even though it's blocky plastic proxies for the scene i know and love it actually gets a little bit of pity out of me poor lego vader that little polaroid is all he has of his dead wife and kids who are at this stage dead to him sheesh let's get back to some of the comedy please [Music] oh that's better there's iconic and essential lines in the prequel trilogy too though the destruction of the jedi all begins with those infamous words execute order 66. but lego palpy of course can't say that so he just puts his finger to his throat it's great he doesn't need to say anything taking all this abstract evil in the movies and making it cute and blocky is already funny enough and the violence is great too because the fights are actually well choreographed and staged [Music] there's brief little snippets of action but nothing too fancy but they have a surprising amount of speed and again it's lego it looks hilarious watching them go at each other's throats the point is the original games were funny in a way that has slowly been lost over time instead of goofy physical comedy [Music] most of the comedy is driven by the banter so be it jedi before i delve into where the lego games split into two divergent paths ushered in the age of voice characters and why that mattered i want to build a time machine and why what while you sit there and watch footage of me building a machine that will take me across time and space why not consider doing the same trip through curiosity stream because they have history nature science tech food travel and so much more curiosity stream has thousands of you guessed it streamable documentaries and non-fiction tv shows this is like the ultimate streaming hub of documentaries with 35 collections of curated programs hand-picked by experts [Music] if you use my code ffv you'll get an entire year's subscription for only 14.99 this is a great deal you're getting a lot of bang for your buck i hear you nerds love learning as well so you'll be pleased to know you can stream it on any device anywhere so don't wait any longer if you want your fill of science nature food and so much more hand-picked by the experts who matter give curiosity stream a go don't end up like this poor sap [Music] use code ffv to sign up just 14.99 for the whole year i also think a huge part of the fun behind this game is the visual style nobody would have thought stiff plastic legos leading a video game would be 100 their type on paper but in practice the blocks captured the movies to dorky perfection plus i haven't booted up this game in about six or seven years and i was legitimately surprised at how well the shiny legos and flashy colors held up i don't want to go as far as to say it's pixar quality or anything hyperbolic like that but it does feel like one long animated reprisal of the story lucas told but now in satisfying chronological order in hindsight it seems obvious because the real physical lego star wars sets have been capturing the essence of the franchise since 1999. it's great to see all these sets evolve but lego star wars one to saga is a bit of a nostalgic time capsule for the older bulkier designs oh my god i got a whatsapp message but lego star wars one to saga is a bit of a nostalgic time capsule for the older bulkier designs from the turn of the millennium to 2005. just look at 2005 general grievous oh i had some of the sets that were featured in the games and that was a really awesome physical link it's not hard to see where the market for lego dimensions came from as much as it's clear how the expensive cost to play it burned it to the ground god i still want to play all that doctor who though lego star wars the video game lego star wars to the original trilogy lego star was the complete saga they were all great and tt games continue to make great titles after this oh dear but following directly on from the complete saga in 2008 was where the divergent path began tt released two games lego indiana jones the original adventures and lego batman the video game both titles featured the adorable mumbles we knew and loved and the gameplay was still fantastic fun with some surprisingly welcome additions indie of course structured the game around the you guessed it original adventures just like the war's titles it was easy to keep up with what was happening [Music] lego batman on the other hand opted to tell an original tale where bruce and dick took on a smorgasbord of plastic it was a wafer thin story and some criticism was pointing towards it being hard to follow the first lego game based on original story meant there was nothing like the movie structures to follow we instead lent on the animated series and burton movies for aesthetic but there was none of the storytelling i think this was a mistake for this title at the time there were seven theatrical batman movies you could have mined for content with a whole host of different villains who wouldn't have loved playing through the burton movies or at the time recent nolan movies hell even the more critically panned batman movies like batman and robin could have translated to some cheesy legoised fun the very first game was based on the prequels and those movies have had their abundance of critics it didn't stop the lego star wars game being well received the first lego game based on original story meant there was nothing like the movie structures to follow who would have passed up the chance to have all the different batmen exist in one multiplayer co-op experience i've gotta go to work tonight's a good night they even could have had special abilities based on their movies val kilmer and christian bale legos could have sonar tech george clooney could have had his ice skates i wonder if this was something tt games considered but perhaps it was felt that hanging a children's game on these dark and nolan efforts would have been alienating to the parents they hoped would fork over their hard-earned cash at christmas i would be the first to argue the darker adaptations would probably be even funnier as mumbling bumbling lego but i digress ready oh it would be a misnomer to say that you couldn't understand what was going on it was of course you know for kids but there's no denying the magic of seeing iconic movie moments was lost it was easy to have silent lego people when the iconography and memorable moments from the star wars movies could pull you along this was simultaneously when more story-driven ips were springing up in the gaming world even companies like ea were trying new things like dead space so i see why there was perhaps pressure to reconsider a voiced cast for the later lego games that wouldn't happen before more movie-based titles came out on harry potter parts of the caribbean and a lamer crappier indiana jones game we also got another lego star wars game based on the clone wars it's fun and has some great lightsaber combat but i always found my copy buggy as hell and it features those unfortunate designs from around 2011 that tried to make the lego sets look animated [Music] on the flip side they actually got the tv show voice cost back just to do the mumbles that is mumble dedication and we applaud it in this video when lego batman 2 rolled around everything changed it boasted an impressive cast featuring troy baker as batman freaking clancy brown back from the animated series robin's still around if we eliminate batman robin will probably put on the suit and say he's batman won't be the same laura bailey and more and yeah i'm happy to admit there's lots of this game cutscene-wise that i love i don't listen to music [Music] either you guys know the scar of the game i don't follow sports also can't forget the time when batman and superman swap over their costumes to trick lex and the joker roofing on the animate series fantastic and you can only do that with lego blocks they even swap four pieces [Music] nice plan now we know what they're up to brief back disclaimer lego batman 2 is an overall package is fantastic freaking open world gotham the theme tunes it's basically a batman superman team-up game it rocks still i don't think it was the wrong decision and i totally see why voices entered the lego world but what came after just kind of degraded the tone of the games in general i feel they became less reliant on slapstick they stopped mining the comedy that lay in the fact that these legos can't quite replicate the raw emotions of their live-action counterparts they became more about zingers and cheesy visual gags and that's fine but i don't think it's as good as any of the previous stuff and you want to join the justice league well leave your resume with my assistant angie and we'll get back to you if there's an opening the physical slapstick and the mumbles just age so much better [Music] the other thing that made it worse was when tt continued to make games based on the movies they still required a voice cast but for some reason didn't want to fully voice the games games like lego avengers and lego the force awakens feature painful isolated dialogue from the movies awkwardly inserted into the gameplay handier than you might think yeah i think we lost gentlemen a surprise and it's kind of dumb because not only can you hear that the audio has been isolated from a movie mix half the time the lines are recontextualized anyway there is no version of this when you come out on top what's the point in ripping out the lines verbatim only to make vaguely similar scenes there's not a single terribly isolated line from the movies in lego avengers that improved my experience or helped me keep a grasp of the story better and you know what a series like the lego games are you replaying it for the plot almost all of the lego games choose licenses that contain instantly iconic and memorable set pieces everyone knows why harry potter is fighting that troll everyone knows why india's being chased by that gigantic lego boulder the story really doesn't matter sometimes story in games do matter but they shouldn't always have to games shouldn't feel pressured to measure up to the uncharteds of the gaming world i don't play lego star wars for the story i play it to drop into the action of my favorite scene i've done the homework since i was six years old just let me have it vader and palpatine and dooku [Music] i'm a big believer in story driving everything across a traditional narrative medium like a book or a film but in video games i can take a really engrossing story but i can also get down with a game that is simply a video game again it was 2008 a lot of games were making use of the next gen technology and using it to craft deeper stories and i love all that that era has some of my favorite gaming moments and memories and i see why tt added voices subsequently i just think that personally the lego series doesn't need to put narrative first its priority is being a sandbox simulator for the star wars world in buildable interactive lego form the charm of the recreated stories is a big part of it sure but the gameplay is king i'm happy to be shown some quaint mute legos acting out the real scenes like it's an amdram theater performance when the lego games are based off the movie plots we all know they absolutely don't need any of the lines just look at the trailer we know exactly what moment this is [Music] having the lines of dialogue playing over the legos doesn't make it more immersive for me if anything it takes me out of it lego star wars the skywalker saga looks fantastic and everything i've heard about it so far seems like a slam dunk it's going to feature all the best ideas from the surprisingly innovative lego star wars the force awakens but it's got the scope and iconography of the locations and movies seen in the complete saga judging from the trailer the lightsaber duels look more exciting than ever finn is going to reportedly get a beefed up storyline in the rise of skywalker segments imagine that the series from 2005 that back to the prequels is now actively going to call out and better the plot of the most commercialized written by committee fan service injected drivel to ever come out to star wars name okay i'm going to stop now finn and john boyega were collectively screwed over and it's taking a lego tie-in game to right this wrong head designer at tt games arthur parsons cited this game as the flag bearer for their future titles it doesn't seem like this is going to fall into the category of the lesser lego games that did nothing to reinvent the wheel the skywalker saga should hopefully break the plastic mould i'm sat here looking at the prospect of this game rivalling the original classics and it seems possible the only thing that is just a bit of a shame is all the talking it sticks out like a sore thumb in the trailers just as it always did but i understand completely while we have dialogue in these games now i understand that it would be difficult to ever go back to that charming mumbling 2005 style not him so what is the solution well after the reveal trailer featured mumbles fans reignited hope that the original tone of the games would be making a welcome return it's clear that the intention behind the mumbling trailer was merely a hit of nostalgia but tt games have since teased the inclusion of a mumble toggle in a company tweet and parsons even had this to say at the minute the plan is that the game is fully voiced but we are talking to the team about having an additional mode for grunts now i've never worked in game development but i do know that from the world of tv development having a neat little idea and seeing it implemented in the finished product are two completely different things budgets other cooks in the kitchen schedules time constraints a million and one things can prevent that little detail that should have and would have worked from happening so hey maybe it would have been a long shot to have a mode that switches to pre-recorded mumbles maybe it would be too time-consuming in a game that already has nine movies worth of material to play with and there's probably not enough people out there who would actually care for this mode i don't know how many people missed that old style and whether or not there's as much demand to see it as there is from me but i'd really like to know in the comments if you'd like to see a return to the mumble comedy of the classic games even as an optional setting or is it long since past the time to consider it to say the lego games have lost their magic entirely would be a misnomer tt game's continued efforts in bringing us new licenses with fun gameplay spins should not be discounted and all things considered i think the skywalker saga is going to be fantastic i really do i can't wait but i also have to pull one out for my homies for that sweet charming cast of legos from the 2005 2006 and 2007 games that managed to get across so much with so little and it would be something truly special to recapture that in what is looking to be the lego star wars video game to tie everything together and honor every single entry in the series hi guys matt here thank you for watching another full fat video don't forget to click that subscribe button and hit the bell so you know when a new video drops if you'd like to get in touch with me why not follow me on twitter at full fat videos or on instagram at full underscore fat underscore videos a big personal thank you to our full fat tia patrons dr chike jax merrick and cyrus sulker your ongoing support keeps the lights on until next time keep it full fat

Channel: Full Fat Videos

Views: 714,174

Keywords: the lost magic of lego star wars, lego star wars lost magic, lego star wars not as good as it used to be, lego, legos, lego sets, lego build, lego make, lego animation, lego series, lego games, lego star wars, luke, darth vader, rey, kylo ren, luke skywalker, ps4, playstation, nintendo switch, switch, xbox, pc, r2d2, r2-d2, bb8, bb-8, light sabers, 9 movies, family, skywalker, gamer, gaming, gameplay, lego reveal, lego video game, lego star wars fails, Why lego star wars fails

Id: W5-BI0IIanQ

Length: 24min 48sec (1488 seconds)

Published: Wed Apr 21 2021