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With Star Wars: The Force Unleashed coming out later this year, it's a perfect time to look at the history of LucasArts video games. Unfortunately, the long road of Star Wars tie-in games hasn't always been pretty. We've come a long way since the old 8-bit games of 1983, and here are some of the high and low points of the past 25 years.
- The first game to bear the Star Wars name was The Empire Strikes Back for the Atari 2600. You could fly around as Luke Skywalker taking down AT-ATs which inexplicably had one tiny space on their backsides which allowed you to destroy them easily. Too bad the Rebels didn't know about this in the movie.
- They followed that one up with the equally forgettable The Return of the Jedi: Death Star Attack on the same system, and it faded like a an iron-on tranfer that's been washed 2,000 times.
- Probably the worst (or at least simplest) Star Wars game to come out of the Halls of Lucas was 1983s Jedi Arena, which featured an overhead shot of... two dueling lightsabers. The little Star Wars target probe would pop out every now and then to irritate the crap out of you, and you'd try to vanquish your opponent.
- The real Star Wars game that most people think of and remember as the first in the genre was the coin-op game Star Wars from Atari in 1983. The thing came in both standup and sitdown versions, and featured digitized voices from the game. It was vector graphic goodness, and for some reason it was also addictive as hell. You could even "Use the Force" by not firing a shot during the trench run on the Death Star for bonus points.
- Atari also put out versions of Return of the Jedi in 1983, and a strangely out of order The Empire Strikes Back in 1984. Jedi featured a weird 3/4 angle looking down at speeder bikes, but Empire returned to the vector graphic format. You could find Jedi at theaters across America, but Empire was extremely hard to come by.
- Star Wars games faded from the limelight until 1991 when Ubisoft Games released Star Wars on the Nintendo, but the game really looked best on the Super Nintendo where it appeared as Super Star Wars, Super Empire Strikes Back, and Super Return of the Jedi. These were side-scrollers that were surprisingly fun to play, especially since the Jawas would say "Utinnin!' over and over.
- Part of what I can blame my low grades for in college was the release of Star Wars: X-Wing in 1993. It was a flight and combat simulator based on the X-Wing, and it was obsessively fun because... well, you're in the cockpit of an X-Wing. What kid hasn't dreamed about that? It had expansion packs for more missions, different kinds of ships, and later led to Star Wars: TIE Fighter in 1994.
- By 1996, the Star Wars gaming renaissance was in full swing, and LucasArts released Shadows of the Empire for the Nintendo 64. It was set between Empire and Jedi, and followed the exploits of Dash Rendar, a sort of Han Solo-ish mercenary. In fact, Shadows of the Empire was also a novel, a comic book, an action figure line, and a soundtrack release for Lucas, in an attempt to take advantage of all types of multimedia at once.
- In 1997, the popularity of fighting games on gaming consoles was hard to resist, so LucasArts released Masters of Teras Kasi, where you could pit Chewbacca against Luke Skywalker, and so forth. The game had some decent animations, but mostly sucky gameplay. Just explain to me in what world a Gamorrean Guard could beat Darth Vader.
- With the prequels came more opportunities for video games, and there were a slew of forgettable Episode I games on the consoles and on PCs. However, Episode I Racer in 1999, which was a game solely about podracing, can still be found in most arcades around the country. It's not half bad, even if that movie did suck.
- In 2001 LucasArts created a launch game for the Nintendo GameCube with Rogue Squadron II: Rogue Leader, which features the word "rogue" in the title two times, just so you're sure. It was a sequel to 1998's Rogue Squadron, which was a Nintendo 64 (and later Windows) title. It spanned all three movies, and tried to fill in gaps in the story.
- In 2001, 2002, and 2003 LucasArts released Star Wars Starfighter, Jedi Starfighter, and The Clone Wars, all with declining sales, and they featured elements like stale gameplay, and repetitive missions.
- 2001 was also the year that LucasArts tried to go after the hardcore strategy gamers with Galactic Battlegrounds. It featured gameplay similar to Warcraft (not World of, mind you, which hadn't been invented yet).
- 2002 was a year of Star Wars sequel games, giving us not only Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast (which was a sequel to Dark Forces: Jedi Knight, which was itself a sequel to Dark Forces) but also Racer Revenge, which was an update to the Episode I Racer game.
- Dark Forces actually followed a character created specifically for the video games, Kyle Katarn. He was originally an Imperial Officer, but later turned and became a spy for the rebellion. He was played by actor Jason Court for Dark Forces: Jedi Knight II.
- 2003 saw both the release of Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic and Star Wars Galaxies, both of which were the first Star Wars roleplaying games. Knights was set 4,000 years before A New Hope, but Galaxies was in the "current" Star Wars universe. However, while Knights was a huge hit and spawned a sequel (and possibly an upcoming third game), Galaxies was reviled for having sucky gameplay and things like dancing Wookies.
- In 2004 Lucas brought Battlefield style gaming to the table with Star Wars Battlefront, where you could play as a single soldier in massive battles set in the Star Wars storyline and universe.
- Republic Commando in 2005 was, for my money, one of the most underrated Star Wars games, featuring you as a clone trooper who had to issue squadron commands to the other clones under his command. It was set amidst plot holes in the prequels, and was genuinely Anakin-free fun.
- However, one of the most fun Star Wars games, both in gameplay and with the supplied tongue-in-cheek humor was Lego Star Wars: The Video Game. It was irreverent, sassy, and pure dumb fun. It was followed up with Lego Star Wars: The Original Trilogy in 2006 and Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga in 2007. Later this year you'll also be able to pick up Lego Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures.
- While there are many to choose from, what wins the award for the crappiest game ever to bear the Star Wars name? That would have to be Star Wars: Super Bombad Racing from 2001. It featured big-headed versions of the movie characters racing around go-kart style. While the Star Wars Lego titles could take something like this and make it fun, this game just sucked, bombad.
Comments
Galactic Battlegrounds I oddly loved, it was just Age of Empires II with Star Wars characters and you got to control the Droid Army! Ahh the long range cannon, imagine a giant spherical Droideka, it was the bees knees, that Droid Army was best thing to come out of Episode I.
I also still stand by Republic Commando being a jolly good and oven overlooked romp.
oooh, the 2600 and the arcade... good times.
What makes me feel old is that I think I've played most of the pre prequel games when they first came out.
ESB for the 2600 was cool at the time, but the gameplay sucked.
Played ESB vector graphics twice while on holiday in Florida, till my parents physically dragged my 13 year old ass out of the arcade for dinner.
Lucasfilm did a great job with the Star Wars X-wing/Tie Fighter Series. I wish they continued the series. Sigh. Still play those games from time to time (I have a 9 year old desk top that has them loaded.) A real challenge was attacking a Calamari cruiser loaded with concussion missiles in an unshielded Tie (can't repell fire of that magnitude.)
x-wing vs. tie fighter was 40 dollars well spent back in 96'.
I actually kind of liked episode 1 for playstation, but it was a little bit of a dissapointment.
Gotta give my all time favorite to Shadows of the empire for 64. The Hoth stage, was so great and it actually made me interested in the book which I eventually read and like.
I loved the original Rogue Squadron - I had it for my Mac when I was 12 or 13, and man was that addictive...
How could you only touch upon Dark Forces? It was the first Star Wars FPS and was one of the best star wars games ever. Especially since it was one of the only games that didn't even touch on Jedi. Although they changed that for Jedi Knight and effectively killed the series with Jedi Academy
That's really weird, because I was reading along wondering if you were going to mention the really fun racing game my friends and I had played one summer whose name I couldn't remember. It's no Mario Kart, but it's not execrable. The Mac version of Knights of the Old Republic, on the other hand, has pretty miserable game play.
I dropped so many quarters on that vector-graphics Star Wars coin-op at the convenience store by school. Hearing Han Solo go, "Woo-hoo! You're all clear kid, now let's blow this thing and go home!" as I finished the trench run, that's every 12 year old's wet dream. Well, at least in 1983 . . . before internet porn . . .
The follow up to X-Wing on the PC, Tie Fighter, is the single most awesome flight game I've ever played. There was a Tri-pannel TIE fighter in one of the expansion packs called the Defender I think that was the perfect space fighter.
If only the Trek franchise could have had the track record of Star Wars! :(
@ManchuCandidate: If only I'd had the forsight to hold on to an old system for exactly that purpose!
Don't forget Star Wars: X-Wing Alliance; last (possibly least) in the long line of X-Wing sequels.
@Epaminondas: That's what virtual machines are for! All sorts of info out there (DOSBox is an easy method). Google = your friend.
Anyone remember the Star Wars game for the Gameboy? I think it's another version of that side-scroller. Kinda average really, and some of the levels were stupidly hard.
jedi knight 2 jedi outcst is great. i just got it in " star wars the best of pc" . even today it is a fantastic game.
What, no Star Wars: Rebellion? I remember this PC game as being from about 1997, I think. Take over the galaxy; play as the rebels or the Empire. Send characters on missions: diplomatic, sabotage, reconnaissance. Build fleets of fighters and capital ships and pit them against the opponent in a weird semi-turn-based 3d environment that was rendered positively embarrassing when Homeworld came out a year or so later. Discover new Jedi, and train them.
Weirdly, there's a very similar game in the Trek universe called Birth of the Federation. The Trek one had better graphics, but no characters, and right now it's like $75 on eBay, while I think Rebellion is still pretty cheap.
My two favorite Star Wars games would be Dark Forces (the 1995 original) and Tie Fighter Collectors CDRom. Dark Forces easily had one of the best stories seen in an FPS until Half-Life came out nearly four years later. Tie Fighter combined one of the best space simulators with better graphics and the sublime experience of being a minion of the Galactic Empire.
Worst of all time, easily Force Commander. Worst interface EVER. Next up from that, probably the Rebel Assault games, but that may just be because I hate rail shooters as if they drank my milkshake.
Come on, Rebel Assault!!! That was my first taste of star wars gaming goodness and was a good set up for X-Wing et all.
Actually, there was an (unlicensed) Star Wars game for the Apple II that dates back to at least 1979. It was a simple joystick-controlled shoot-the-Tie-Fighter arcade-type game; graphics were pretty primitive, to say the least. Think of the Tie Fighter targeting display that Darth Vader used in the original Star Wars, but with 1979-era Apple II graphics and a Tie Fighter outline instead of an X-Wing outline.
I saw it in San Diego before moving to Houston (which is why I can date it to 1979 -- I moved in August 1979) at a little mom-and-pop computer store in La Mesa, CA. The owners were using it as a demo for the Apple II that was on display. ..bruce..
What, no Star Wars: Bounty Hunter? Well, I can see why. It wasn't a very good game. Also, I've played Starfighter, Jedi Starfighter, and Clone Wars. I really enjoyed Jedi Starfighter, while the other two were pretty bad.
There was a Rebel Assault I and II. In retrospect, the games were pretty bad. Rebel Assault I was pretty much Star Wars, with all the characters replaced with generic ones (Luke = Rookie 1). Rebel Assault II was pretty cool, and had cheesey full motion video cut scenes. It had a TON of easter eggs!
This list is only a brief history, leaving out most of the crappy ones out.
As far as I am concerned Episode I Racer was the only great thing to come out of the prequel business.
Rogue Squadron made having an N64 worth it. I still blow the dist off of mine and play it from time to time. When are they going to release another Star Wars flight sim?
Dark forces was fantastic. It and Quake were the holy duo of shooters back when processors still went into slots.
@ zafner
I agree. This list lacks Rebellion. It may be an old game, but I still enjoying playing it from time to time. There is nothing more satisfying then cruising around the galaxy with a Death Star destroying Rebel planets or watching a fleet of Star Destroyers bombard all life from a planet.
@TheName: Yeah, I second on X-Wing:Alliance. This was the best among the x-wing tie fighter series. I really wish they would create a next gen version of this whole series.
rebellion was god-awful. i can understand why it was left off. it's literally a joke in the gaming community. similarly there was also force commander which was probably one of the most poorly designed rts' ever made.
a few people also mentioned alliance. which, for my money is probably the best of all of the x-wing spin offs. but also missing is x-wing vs. tie-fighter where they tried to get in on the new "deathmatch" craze that doom had started.
also, there was obi wan. which was kind of like a retarded double dragon/tomb raider mash up that was just awful. which reminds me of this great old man murray post (the omm guys now write games at valve like portal, tf2 and left4dead):
[www.oldmanmurray.com]
Sorry, you just forfited all credibillity by misspelling wookiee.
Mir'osik!
i remember my parents taking the family out to see 'jewel of the nile'. i remember leaving in the middle to go to the bathroom, which was just a clever ruse to get my addicted butt in front of the vector 'star wars' in the lobby.
if my kid was supposedly in the bathroom for as long as i was that day, i'd like to think i'd be a little more concerned than my parents were.
You guys forgot the monster sized Star Wars game in arcades that was hanging around in 2001. It was 3D raster graphics and covered the original series of movies, had giant stereo speakers, surround sound and screens for passer-byes to gawk at your playing skillz.
Why hasn't anyone mentioned Yoda Stories yet? Sure, it was crappy and very, very repetitive, but still fun to play!
Are we discounting roleplaying games that are non-electronic when we say "first roleplaying game?" Greg Costikyan's Star Wars RPG was released in 1987 and, besides being a fun book and a terrific game, was a milestone of RPG design. Yeah, it was a paper game, but those games are being routinely pillaged and paid homage in modern RPGs, which are their direct descendants. Hell, KOTOR even uses d20 System mechanics -- a direct import of paper-RPG system work.
I'm just saying.
@dave the wet sprocket: Jewel of the Nile is really hard to tear yourself away from.
@dave the wet sprocket: In defense of your parents, I mean.
You forgot the original Star Fox for SNES. Granted it wasn't a Star Wars game, but it made up for the disappointment of Super Star Wars until such time as I had a computer fast enough to play X-Wing.
I still fire it up every now and then because the "space armada" level is exactly what I want in a Star Wars shooter, right down to the music.
No kidding man--don't write an article on star wars games and forget some of the most amazing ones--you left out Rebellion(yeah, some people hate it, but once you "got" the game, it was amazing...), TIE Fighter (and it's expansions), Jedi Knight II? One of the best games lucasarts ever did.
And that "weird" view in Return of the Jedi was a pretty common view for games back then (think Zaxxon), and that game was EVERYWHERE. And it was hard as shit to beat. WTB THOSE games on Wii VC, sigh.
Does Afterlife count as a star wars game, since you could summon the death star to take out the underworld?
@oldbenway: It was just a condensed version of the games, and yes I hated Rebellion. But I mentioned TIE Fighter and Jedi Knight II both.
Blockbuster never has any good games in
I don't wanna play Bombad Racing
I mean, what the heck is that?
-Brak, from "White Kids Love Hip Hop"
@Discrete-Daniel: Wasn't Star Wars for the Nintendo, and then Super Star Wars for the SNES?
Call me an Imperial Minion; I completed Tie Fighter, but couldn't for the life of me finish the third X-Wing mission (which invloved zipping around in an A-Wing, trying to scan Star Destroyers as more and more of them keep popping out of hyperspace).
Huh. For some reason, I played the Empire Strikes Back coin-op more than either of the other two. The AT-AT level was a lot of fun, because you could destroy them two different ways; either shoot them directly in the eye (presumably killing the drivers) or by deploying the tow cable and tripping them.
Now that I think about it, it seems odd that those snowspeeders had tow cables to begin with.
If any of you fellas liked Rogue Squadron II: Rogue Leader enough to feed your X-Wing addiction and subsequently bought Rogue III: Rebel Strike which turned out to be the most horrbile lets run around shooting Stormtroopers shit fest game ever, all is not lost. As you can play the classic coin op games via the passcode screen, just do this:
Star Wars arcade game:
Enter RTJPFC!G as a password and accept it, then enter TIMEWARP as a second password and accept it.
Empire Strikes Back arcade game:
Enter !H!F?HXS as a password and accept it, then enter KOOLSTUF as a second password and accept it.
Return Of The Jedi arcade game:
Enter !?ATH!RD as a password and accept it, then enter GAME?YES as a second password and accept it.
Vintage gaming at your fingertips, also you have to walk up to the cabinets dressed Darth Vader to access them, how cool is that?
@Kevin Kelly: Yes. Star Wars was for the NES. Super Star Wars was for the SNES.
Star Fox a 3D shooter developed by Nintendo for the SNES.
You are forgetting about the Star Wars Galaxies emulater. People actually fighting big bad Sony.
Jedi Outcast was not only a good Star Wars game, it was just plain, old-fashioned good. Academy suffered from an ambitious change in format that suffered from terrible execution.
I liked Star Wars Galaxies. Also, one good thing about Force Commander was the heavy metal version of the Imperial March it used as a theme.
Yeah, swg actually had a credit to USD transfer rate on ebay.
The Empire Strikes Back arcade game was so herd to find because it was actually a mod kit for the Star Wars game. Arcade owners were reluctant to spend the money and effort to upgrade a game that was already pulling in plenty of quarters.