What? Why are you still reading this? Lightsaber Unleashed, the THQ’d official re-release of the PhoneSaber application, is now available from the App Store.
Got it? Good. What do you think? Better than the original? Or totally prequel’d?
Our take after a quicky first look? The UI is… er… underwhelming considering the LucasArts resources. The advertising for the Force Unleashed would be grating if we didn’t understand it was basically subsidizing this freebie (and curse the iPhone sandboxing for not letting it know we already bought the dang Force Unleashed, and disabling the adware!) Tying it to the Force Unleashed also, and unfortunately, limits us to that universe and its characters (one of which I would say demands a SPOILER WARNING, THQ!). No Luke, no Yoda, no Mace Windu (no purple!), no Obi-Wan, etc. On the plus, side, we get music!
Bad Ash Bonus from Jeremy: When you are in the app you will see stars in the background that shine every once in a while. Tap on them for a little voice action… (depending on the character you select).
Nice! And, again, it’s back and its still free.
(Thanks Cherryhead25 for the tip!)
Phone Saber was one of the most popular and talked about apps pretty much since the day Apple’s on-board store launched. Hey, turn your iPhone into a sound-a-like Star Wars lightsaber? What’s not to love?
Well, for THQ — exclusive Lucas licensor of all things Star Wars for all things Mobile — infringement for one. Too their credit, however, rather than just getting Apple to yank the App, THQ brought it onboard, and now they write in to tell us:
We are also [along with the Force Unleashed] relaunching a much bigger and improved Phone Saber Unleashed in September.
No word yet on availability or pricing (still FREE? It would be great publicity… just saying!) but this has got to be hitting every cross-geek squeal point in the system.
May the Phone Saber be with us (again) shortly!
MacBox, the developer of PhoneSaber, has given word that they’ve had to pull the app from iTunes after a request from THQ wireless. The chat: friendly. The news: THQ has the rights to Star Wars IP on mobiles. The result: MacBox had to pull the app.
That’s the bad news. Here’s the awesome news. THQ is going to work with MacBox to make PhoneSaber not only official, but better with actual ‘canon’ sound effects. MacBox is hoping the app will remain free, perhaps in a promotional capacity for the actual THQ game, The Force Unleashed.
via MacRumors, Thanks to Bad Ash for the tip!
