Which Star Wars video games have you played and liked?

[cheshire]

Whill has given us several threads about defining the Star Wars experience in our introduction to the D6 RPG, the novels, and our first experiences with Star Wars. So, I thought I would bring the conversation to a different medium.

I remember my first experience with Star Wars gaming was with the Empire Strikes Back game released for the Atari 2600 in 1982. And though I loved the game, I could hardly call it a defining moment in my video gaming experience.

I think the first time I really felt like a game really captured the environment for me was a little over a decade later. I was following the release of X-Wing months before it hit the shelf. When it was finally released in the spring of '93, I felt transported to a galaxy far far away. Granted, the music and graphics are primitive by today's standards, but the fact that the sound track responded to your actions (providing uplifting music when completing mission goals, or ominous music with the arrival of the Empire), it really captured the Star Wars feel for me. Granted, much of it was wish fulfillment, being able to pilot an X-Wing as it is anything else. I mean, since I was five I was pretending to shoot down TIE Fighters, and the game brought some life to that imagination.

I'd played a few other Star Wars video games through the years. I bought the Star Wars cartridge for the NES, and of course played TIE-Fighter in college. But technology advanced and my computer didn't keep up with the times. So, I didn't do much in the way of Star Wars gaming for a while. (As such, I never played X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter, but I hear it was grand multiplay fun.)

However, I did pick up Dark Forces II: Jedi Knight and Jedi Outcast well after their release. Though I enjoyed Dark Forces II, the one that really brought home the Star Wars feel was Jedi Outcast. I'm not sure if it was the integrated soundtrack or whether the play control was just less frustrating. And even though I thought some of the ideas in the game had jumped the shark (especially being able to use both Dark and Light powers without repercussion), I thoroughly loved the game, and felt that I was living in a Star Wars adventure.

Though I spent time revisiting my favorites with their later incarnations (such as X-Wing Alliance and Jedi Academy -- especially Jedi Academy's multiplayer options), I don't think I got entirely hooked again until Knights of the Old Republic.

KOTOR had a wonderfully immersive story line, and re-created so many things that made Star Wars fun. The fact that you could play through the story as a PC RPG adventure was excellent fun. Great characters, customizeable character options, fantastic original soundtrack, and just plain good fun made this one a favorite for me.
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Before we take any of this too seriously, just remember that in the middle episode a little rubber puppet moves a spaceship with his mind.

[Mikael Hasselstein]

I got hooked by X-Wing, but it was on a friend's computer at a time that I didn't have a real computer to play it on. (I had a Commodore 64 ). I also didn't hang out with that friend all that much.

I really got into it with TIE Fighter, many years later, when the game was essentially obsolete already, compared to contemporary games. (I had a 286 just when the Pentium was the thing to have.)

When I finally got a computer that was contemporary with its times (this would have been in the late 90s), I got that first-person Jedi Knight game. I forget the name of it. It was alright, but first-person shooters are not really my thing.

A year or so ago I played a bit of Empire at War, which I enjoyed for a bit, but then it got somewhat repetitive. For whatever reason, I didn't really take to EaW: Forces of Corruption.

That's pretty much it.

[Whill]

I'm a old video game grognard. My dad had a used Pong game on their tiny black n' white bedroom TV but my brother and I weren't allowed to play it without his supervision. I feel video games reached their pinnacle with stand up arcade games, and home video games reach theirs with Atari. (I never got a first gen Nintendo due to me still mourning the loss of the joystick.) I'm not much of a video gamer, and my manual dexterity is not what it once was. I did play a few SW games over the years but I have a short list.

Stand-up Arcade games
Star Wars (Original when I was a kid - I believe this was only the first Death Star trench run with graphics similar to the movies's tactical display but it's hard to recall.)
Star Wars "trilogy" game (I don't remember what it was called - In more recent years a local movie theater had a game with scenes from all 3 classic films that I played a few times.)

Atari 2600 (my family owned as a child but it's long gone now)
The Empire Strikes Back (side-view, destroy AT-ATs in a snow speeder)
Jedi Arena (top-view lightsaber dueling that used paddle controllers)

SNES (a roommate had, I beat all these games)
Super Star Wars
Super The Empire Strikes Back
Super Return of the Jedi

PlayStation (a roommate had)
Rebel Assault II
Masters of Teräs Käsi (loved this game)

Nintendo 64 (a friend had)
Shadows of the Empire
Episode I: Racer

PS2 (a roommate had)
Battlefront (I didn't play much - I think this was probably too hard for me)

Jakks Pacific Plug It In & Play TV Games
Revenge of the Sith (I own - Too hard!)
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[garhkal]

For me, i started with the older Arcade stand ups for SW and ESB. Then the newer one which has the trilogy on it.
For Pc (and console) i loved playing rogues squadron on nintendo 64, Xwing, Tie fighter, Xwing vs Tie fighter, Xwing alliance, Dark forces, dark forces 2, Jedi outcast, and Empire at war.
Base tie fighter, and Xwing vs tie (especially the balance of power add on) were always my 2 faves.
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[Barrataria]

I loved the SW trench X-Wing game too, but lived far from an arcade and my quarters also had to cover Galaga and a couple other doozies of the day.

I think my next foray was into SW:Rebellion, which I played for many, many, many hours. Kind of a silly game, and I don't think I ever finished but I loved it.

I also ended up with TIE Fighter at some point, and I really loved that because it seemed to be the first time that an Imperial point of view was really accessible. Makes the rank and file less cartoony-evil, I think, and it enriched my SW games a lot (and my SWU design) in the future.

Since then, I'm more or less off video games after a few too many lost weekends with Civilization or other feeder bar games. I realized I lack time for RPGs, so any game time I invest should go towards that. I still occasionally play a game here or there, and have a baseball text sim I play quite a bit, but I always feared MMORPGs so although I'd love to play the SW version I didn't want to watch my life go down the tubes. Not saying that's inevitable, but given my experience with some real time sim games I didn't want to find out.
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"A special effect without a story is a pretty boring thing"- George Lucas

[griff]

I have played a lot of Star Wars video games only four did I like to play over and over. The line graphic x-wing from the 80s, battlefield, Lego Star Wars, and Lego Star Wars two.
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"EXECUTE ORDER 67. Wait a minute, that doesn't sound like order 67..... No, wait. Yes, yes it does. EXECUTE ORDER 68" Palpatine's last moments - robot chicken.

[garhkal]

[cheshire]

[Whill]

The first couple Lego Star Wars movies are pretty good, but I've never played the games.
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[Barrataria]

[Zarm R'keeg]

Star Wars video games were my primary experience in video games growing up. Heck, even when I played Civilization II (back when you could still create your own civilization), I was Bail Organa of the Alderaanians, and every city was a SW planet name.

The Dark Forces series remains a special favorite (including all expansions), both Jedi Knight, and Outcast... which, along with TRON 2.0, Prince of Persia: Sands of Time, and the original HALO, basically compose my quartette of 'perfect' First/Third person games, and for me the pinnacle of all gaming, ever. (That is actually not hyperbole; I am serious.)

One of my other favorites was Star Wars: Rebellion... I liked the expansiveness, the fun cut-scene movies that feel like a nice reward... even the clever defeat endings. And nice graphical destruction of iconic ships in visually interesting ways for the victories. It is a classic, with lots of great mechanics, fun EU references, nifty details, and fun gameplay (except for the starship battles, which admittedly sucked). In fact, I just bought a fresh copy of this game at the thrift store last week... just in case my son would ever want to give it a play-through.

Rebel Assault II was another favorite- gameplay was just 'okay,' but it felt and looked like getting another OT movie, and that makes it awesome in my book. A lot of cool stuff we'd never seen before in that one (as well as the disappointing revelation that someone had already thought of cloaked TIEs. Oh well... there went my first fan-fic!)

Republic Commando is great, too. The LEGO games are awesome (of course). I love the IDEA of KOTOR... I just haven't had the time to actually invest in playing it yet. And Behind the Magic (both for the Deleted Scenes and the Stormtrooper Weapons Tests) was a childhood favorite.

Episode 1 Racer and Racer's Revenge are at a lower tier, but still quite enjoyable. Battlefront was cool for a while, but then seemed to kinda take over Star Wars gaming, so I started to resent it a bit. TFU was good gameplay, but I couldn't stand the story.

Super Star Wars is a classic, but not a favorite because it is too hard for my limited gamer-skills. Still, I will always have affection for watching OTHERS play it. Same with the Original Trilogy Arcade game, the X-wing games (those TIEs move to fast- I can never hit them! Ever!) and Rogue Squadron games. I did play and beat the Gameboy version of ANH and the NES ESB... I was pretty proud of that.

My dream-game (I would buy ANY system that this is realeased on) remains a ROTS-game-style adaptation of all six movies (possibly just porting and updating the graphics on the TPM game), including the expanded side-quests and stuff-you-didn't-see missions. Full next-gen graphics and ROTS/TFU-refined game mechanics to a playable, expanded version of all six film storylines? SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY! (if only they'd make it...)
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Hard core OT, all the way!

[garhkal]

I preferred battlefront 2 to the first.
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[RyanDarkstar]

I've been enjoying The Old Republic lately, especially because of the voice acting. And it's pretty, too.

Although I've played just about every Star Wars game available, these are my favorites:
Knights of the Old Republic - simply awesome! Great companions, fantastic story.
TIE Fighter - it's glorious to serve my Emperor.
X-wing Alliance - not only do I belong to a family of Traders, I'm a Rebel, too.
Dark Forces series - Kyle Katarn: commando, Jedi, superhero. Really enjoyed the live-action scenes in Dark Forces 2: Jedi Knight.
Rebellion - good or bad, it's nice to be in control. And Zarm, those cutscenes are great! My favorite's the capture of Coruscant. What is that Corellian ship?
Rebel Assault 2 - again, gotta go with Zarm, it's a passable game, but it's a great movie!
Battlefront 2 - clones and stormtroopers, oh my!
The Force Unleashed - super-antihero Jedi one-man wrecking crew.
Star Wars Trilogy Arcade - best coin-operated game I've played.
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[Zarm R'keeg]

[CommanderFocs]

Has anybody here heard of/played Republic Commando? I recently got the game on my xbox one for only 5 bucks, I instantly fell in love with it. For anybody who hasn't heard of it before it is basically a single-player, first person shooter where you play as Delta Squad's leader and command a squad of clone commandos through different missions. Each member of Delta Squad has special talents and abilities which you need for different situations. I love how the game lets you command your squad members to do different things like take sniper positions or form up on you. The graphics aren't much compared to what we have today but for 2005 they aren't too bad. The controls are a bit weird and hard to master, especially for somebody who doesn't play video games a ton but everything else is awesome. The story of the game is pretty good and it has a nice flow to it. The feeling of the game is really what stands out. The game actually makes you feel like you are the leader of an elite squad of clone commandos that go around destroying droids and completing challenging missions. I wish EA could do a remake of Republic Commando or make a game similar to Republic Commando but without the classic EA microtransactions and game-breaking glitches/bugs. The game may not be for everybody but I think it is awesome and I highly recommend it to anybody who likes star wars or first-person shooters. 10/10 game.
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