LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga only featured five levels for each of the nine galactic blockbusters it adapts. Given the roughly two-hour runtime of each film in the saga, that leaves limitations on how faithfully the movies can be adapted and means some scenes may sadly have to be left to cinematics - or be omitted altogether.
Previous LEGO Star Wars games have been heavily criticized for having dull and repetitive space battles. However, The Skywalker Saga's upgraded flight mechanics have led to them being praised as among the best in the game, which is fortunate, as they are plentiful.
Almost every movie in The Skywalker Saga features at least one flight-based level, some of which take to the stars, while others stick close to a planet's surface. Despite the excess of these levels throughout the game, LEGO's latest adventure has been criticized for missing three iconic Star Wars space battles.
3 Space Battles Missing in The Skywalker Saga
LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga skimmed over three major space battles - one per trilogy - from across the saga. One of which was tragically cut short, one was missed altogether, and one was told through a traditional ground-based level and cutscene, totally missing out on all the flying fun.
Revenge of the Sith's Battle of Coruscant
Revenge of the Sith opens with among the most visually spectacular space conflicts in the franchise, as Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi take on the Separatists above Coruscant. The dramatic battle lasts roughly five minutes before the Jedi duo board the Invisible Hand to take on Count Dooku and rescue Chancellor Palpatine.
Within the LEGO adaptation, following the traditional opening crawl, the game skips directly into Anakin and Obi-Wan crashing into the hangar of the ship, completely skipping out the iconic flight scene that was once a fan-favorite in previous adaptations.
A New Hope's Battle of Yavin
Moving into A New Hope, TT Games adapted the first Star Wars movie rather faithfully, with almost every key scene getting its moment in the spotlight. That being said, the LEGO levels for the movie ended on a rather disappointing note, with a brief and anticlimactic mission for the Battle of Yavin.
The iconic battle is certainly featured in the game, and players do get the opportunity to complete Luke Skywalker's famous trench run to blow up the Death Star. However, the rest of the space conflict is cut completely, with The Skywalker Saga instead skipping directly into an annoyingly linear trench run.
The Rise of Skywalker's Battle of Exegol
The Rise of Skywalker may not be the most beloved installment in The Skywalker Saga, but it certainly had a hell of an action-packed ending. The final face-off against the Sith Eternal and the Final Order had four layers to it, leading to TT Games adapting it to LEGO form.
Beneath the ground of Exegol, Rey and Ben Solo defeated the cloned Emperor Palpatine, putting an end to the Sith with him. In the skies, Finn and Jannah took on the First Order atop a Star Destroyer, while Poe and the Resistance attempted to take on a fleet of the planet-destroying vessels. Lando, of course, flew in to save the day with a navy of ordinary people who went on to take down the entire Final Order fleet.
The Skywalker Saga opted to tell the ending of The Rise of Skywalker, and therefore the final battle of the game itself, through a ground-based mission. Rey and Ben's boss fight with Palpatine below Exegol was present and glorious, Finn and Jannah got their mission atop the Star Destroyer, but Poe and Lando's flying fun was contained to a cutscene alone.
The Battle of Exegol featured so many iconic ships from across the Star Wars franchise, taking on the First Order in a unique environment on a massive scale. With all of these facts, there was potential for this to be among the biggest and best space battles in the game, but it was unfortunately skimmed over in a brief cinematic.
The Skywalker Saga's Missing Content
LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga had the tough task of adapting nine films into one game. TT Games opted to achieve that objective with five levels per film, one less than the six included in The Complete Saga, which obviously had one less trilogy to tackle at the time.
Given the studio's decision to cut things down, it had a tough task in choosing which scenes warranted levels and which should be skimmed over. It is unfortunate these three iconic space battles didn't make the cut in The Skywalker Saga, but given the abundance of flying levels already in the game, it may have been the right call.
Well, that may be true at least for the Battles of Coruscant and Exegol, but TT Games already allocates a mission to the fight above Yavin. However, this mission runs around five minutes long, is extremely one-dimensional, and skips straight to the dramatic ending as the Death Star is destroyed.
Many have already criticized the low-impact of A New Hope's LEGO conclusion, but perhaps this could have been fixed with a long level that featured more of the Battle of Yavin.
However, it should be noted how extensive the open world, and the game as a whole, is, which arguably makes up for the lack of these space battles in proper levels. Players can join as many dogfights as they want in free roam, which leads to major encounters with capital ships that need to be damaged before docking inside and defeating the captain to commandeer the ship. Later encounters allow gamers to completely blow up capital ships, filling that power fantasy void that players may be looking for from space battles.
Nonetheless, LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga remains an incredible adaptation of the generation-spanning franchise, and is available now on PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and PC.