Wii lightsaber to be "Unleashed" this fall

Way back last June, I pretty much begged George Lucas for a Wii lightsaber game—and it looks like my Jedi prayers have been answered. The first videos of "Star Wars: The Force Unleashed" for the Wii have arrived, and, well... I'm hooked.

I'd already seen a demo of "The Force Unleashed" back in January at CES in Vegas, but the version I saw was for the Xbox 360. In these latest videos, however (available at Yahoo! Games), you can see how gameplay will work on the Wii—and specifically, how you'll wield the Wiimote as a full-on lightsaber.

In the video, the "Star Wars" game producers demonstrate how you'll swing, thurst and parry with the Wiimote—yep, complete with "vooom, vooooooooom!" sound effects—while you'll use the Nunchuk for firing off your Force powers (such as Force Push, Grip, Lightening, and so on).

"You're able to stab, uppercut, people go flying in every direction," said one of the developers in the video. I like the sound of that.

Personally, while I certainly understand (and have written extensively about) the appeal of the Wii, I've never quite wanted one myself—until now, that is. I'm sure the graphics on the Xbox 360 version of "The Force Unleashed" will beat out the Wii's, but wielding a lightsaber with the 360 controller simply won't compare to swining a Wiimote.

Of course, here's the burning question: Will we be able to square off in multiplayer Wii lightsaber battles? No word yet, but let's hope so. Update: As one reader rightly pointed out below, the video details a lightsaber "duel mode" that lets you pick from 20-odd Star Wars characters for one-on-one local battles—nice. But what about online duels? We shall see.

Anyway, in all the rush of last week's CTIA coverage, I missed the announcement that "Star Wars: The Force Unleashed" has just been dated for September 16, 2008—disappointing news, given that this summer was what we'd initially heard. Guess we'll have to tide ourselves over with "Clone Wars" until then.