Star Wars : The Force Unleashed on PS3

Note : this post is not for the usual WFW crowd :)

I just finished playing SW : TFU for the PS3 on the default difficulty and was just amazed. If you're a Star Wars fan, this game is really exciting and REALLY well done. I don't quite understand all of the negative gamer press it got when it came out. I think this is one of the best and most fun single player games I've ever played. The sheer number of ways you can defeat your enemies in allmost endless combinations makes for a really enjoyable experience.

A couple helpful tips/walkthrough for anyone else who might be playing this game and can't figure it out :

The trick to defeating Rahm Kota is ... well, there is none, he's a wuss. Use your blocking (L2) button when he turns green and then go to town on him with your combos. You will get as many tries as you need on the cinematic so just keep working at it. The Leaping Slam seems to work well on Kota. When he's on the ground, never miss a chance to spear him by tapping square.

On Raxus Prime, I found throwing things with the Force to be very effective. Works even better if you throw a little lightning on whatever you are throwing. Kazdan Paratus can be a real pain but I found if you kept zapping him, eventually he would go down. The Junk Titans are great for getting health points back. I would typically keep jump, jump, dash behind the junk titans to let my force powers recharge.

Felucia - this was the first level where I started to get legitimately pissed off. The lightsaber is almost worthless against the Felucians as they can block and they have shields. Luckily, the Felucians ALWAYS charge you, so what you do is wait for them to get in range, pick them up with the force and then throw them at another Felucian. When they collide, sometimes you get a two for one. That's awesome. Once again, it pays to to get them sparking with lightning before you let them fly. Shaak Ti is another hard one, but you just have to mind your holocrons to get enough force powers and keep hacking away with combo's. Once again, when the Felucians spawn, pick them up and throw them at one another or her. She seemed to be susceptible to the Force Push when I played.

Empirical - The only pain in the butt are those darn Purge Troopers. Use the force lightning to get him to sit still then use a lightning force - lightsaber combo.

Cloud City - the Ugnaughts are health. Don't forget that if you get in a pinch. The Shadow Trooper is a mild pain but you'll get through it. Don't attack him when his shield is up and don't let him get combos off - keep wailing on yer square button

Imperial Kashyyk - The only really hard part of Kashyyk is finding and killing the Snipers. A good tip for the Jump Troopers is to force grip them, get some lightning going and then let em fly. The flamethrowing stormtroopers - buzz them with lightning, then you can force grip them. Ozzik Sturn is a joke - I'm not even going to dignify that with a response.

Imperial Felucia - about the same as the other Felucia - you just have to pick the Felucians up and throw them. With Maris Brood, I honestly found the best strategy was to just keep swinging away with the lightsaber until you hit her and then her invisibility doesn't work anymore.

Imperial Raxus Prime - the Star Destroyer. Ok, the trick is to get those TIE fighters down as quickly as possible so that you have more time to pull down the Star Destroyer. I had my Force Grip set as a toggle and I would just try to pluck them out of the air and throw them at one another. Then you line up the Star Destroyer and pull. Hold that down until the TIE fighters start firing on you, then let it go and repeat. For whatever reason, I was only able to grab TIE fighter when they dove off to my left, never to the right. Proxy is a pain in the butt, no doubt about it. The key is to not lose health until he changes into Darth Maul, cuz you'll need it. Try to keep Maul at a distance because his super quick lightsaber flurry is deadly. Recommend lightning and force push.

The Death Star - ho lee crap. I have never dropped into a festival quite like that. The way I finally beat it is to keep running from one hanger to the other (where the turrets are) and picking off the enemies as they came to me. That was just unreal though. I think enemies will continually respawn there, so there's no way to "win" other than punching a hole in the floor and diving through. Word of warning, I missed two holocrons by falling through that floor, so watch out. The rest of the level is somewhat nondescript, although I must say seeing the Death Star deathray in action firsthand is a Star Wars fanboy's wet dream. The entrance to the Emperor's throne room is also very satisfying.

OK, Darth Vader. Round one with Vader is just getting off enough combo's to take his health down a third so that he will lead you into the next room. It's not easy, but it can be done. Breaking his force grip is maddeningly difficult. In the next room do not bother charging him, he will just force choke you and send you across the room face first. Use the force grip to rip down the metal structures on the wall and whip them at Vader one after another. Speed counts here, so do don't get fancy. After his health goes down another third, he jumps to the back of the room where you just have to score some lucky combo's to key the final sequence.

There is a fourth possible sequence with Vader but I didn't play it so I don't know it. I won't ruin the plot mechanism that makes this possible because it's really cool.

The Emperor. Do not bother with your lightsaber against the Emperor. He will just use force lightning while your guard is down. I was never able to knock the Emperor down - my advice is don't try. When he gets his force lightning sphere going, hide behind one of the two low walls and raise your guard. You can't attack him anyways. After he throws the last item at you, RUN! Get to the nearest piece of debris and whip it at him. Charge it up with lightning if you've got time. Use force lightning on the emperor and block his with your block button. If you block right, you will send his lightning back at him which is probably the best way to beat him. I think you get 3 rounds of Imperial guards, but those are just health savers. They are maddeningly easy to defeat and are very susceptible to force lightning.

I also found Achievement Hunter very helpful in locating holocrons. There's some guy named Blade Runner on Youtube who does a really unbelievable detailed video walkthrough. Lastly, I found this walk through last night which looks very helpful and includes videos : Star Wars The Force Unleashed Walkthrough - Mahalo

Good Luck and MFTBWY!

edit : just finished the second round through on easy (so I could speed through it). The alternate "dark side" ending is not quite as satisfying as it introduces some massive continuity problems with the existing SW films.