Trivia / The Force Unleashed

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• Acting for Two: Sam Witwer voices both Galen Marek/Starkiller and Emperor Palpatine.
• Casting Gag: Catherine Taber, the voice actor for Padmé Amidala in nearly every piece of Star Wars fiction at the time save for the actual movies themselves and the 2003-5 Clone Wars miniseries, voices Padmé's daughter, Leia. She would later voice Leia in Disney Infinity.
• Creator Killer: The underperformance of The Force Unleashed II led to the shuttering of projects that were dependent on its success and other games that were in early development (such as The Force Unleashed III, Battlefront III, Battlefront IV, Battlefront: First Assault, 1313, and a game starring Darth Maul called Battle of the Sith Lords), ended LucasArts's status as an independent developer, opting to license all future titles. Even then, the studio never truly recovered despite the success of Star Wars: The Old Republic, and the division was put out of its misery in 2013, shortly after Disney acquired Lucasfilm and made an exclusivity deal with Electronic Arts to produce Star Wars titles for a decade. It wasn't until 2021 that a successor, Lucasfilm Games, returned to being a proper division licensing Star Wars assets to other developers.
• Development Gag:
  • Galen Marek's code name "Starkiller" was Luke's surname in the prototypical Star Wars.
  • Similarly, "Juno Eclipse" was Asajj Ventress's working name.
  • In the DLC, the path to Jabba's Palace includes the gate seen in Ralph McQuarrie's concept art.
• Follow the Leader: In case if it hasn't been made clear by now, The Force Unleashed follows many of the same conventions that God of War established only a few years prior.
• Franchise Killer: The second game's disappointing numbers (combined with the closing of LucasArts three years later in 2013 and the halting of any new material for the newly redubbed Legends continuity on new owner Disney's orders in order to create their own continuity) killed the possibility of a third game, and Starkiller's adventures were Left Hanging.
• Marth Debuted in "Smash Bros.": Starkiller was included as a playable character in Soul Calibur IV, which was actually released before the Force Unleashed itself.
• Novelization First: The respective novels for both games came out before each game was released.
• Promoted Fanboy: Sam Witwer and Matt Sloan.
• Role Reprise: Jimmy Smits reprises his role as Bail Organa from Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith.
• What Could Have Been:
  • Starkiller's real name was originally going to be Jacob Nion. Some versions of the game mistakenly call Starkiller's father Kento Nion in the credits (and in the Playstation 2 version, the Databanks), perhaps a reference to this.
  • Darth Vader's apprentice was to use Starkiller only as a call sign, and was supposed to have an actual Darth title, but this was dropped when the official suggestions from George Lucas were Darth Icky or Darth Insanius.
  • PROXY would have been a "Corpse droid" where he often harvested organs to complete himself. However, because of his not fitting in with the team dynamic, and more obviously because the only way to give a comical aspect to him (grafting organs into himself) was considered too gruesome for what was intended to be a "T" rated game, he was redesigned to be a holodroid.
  • Before creating the character of Rahm Kota, the makers wanted Starkiller's Jedi mentor to be the Force Ghost of either Qui-Gon Jinn or a reformed Darth Plagueis.
  • Had Star Wars The Force Unleashed III not been canceled, it would have Starkiller team up with his former master Darth Vader against a new threat by Emperor Palpatine.
  • At one point, they considered making Ozzik Sturn some kind of shapeshifting alien before deciding to make him a big game hunter who was entirely human.
  • A webcomic about Shaak Ti before being found by Starkiller was planned but presumably cancelled. It was to be written by now-Story Group member Pablo Hidalgo and illustrated by Tom Hodges.
  • The game was originally going to focus on a Wookiee Freedom Fighter, but due to the fact the protagonist doesn't talk, George rejected it and the creators decided to make the protagonist a Jedi.

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