Star Wars games throughout the years are golden examples of some of the absolute best licensed games ever made, as well as some of the worst. Over the next couple of weeks, we’re going to take a look at some of the lesser known golden classics in the franchise, as well as some of the lesser known disasters that have befallen the franchise.
The period between Fall 1983 and Summer of 1997 was generally considered to be a dark time for Star Wars fans. Return of the Jedi was released May 25, 1983. I was born a year later and never grew to fully appreciate the film franchise until years later when the THX remasters were re-released on VHS and then back to theaters in 1997. At that point, I became a borderline religious fanatic. I had so many toys lying around the house that you couldn’t get into my room…in fact, I still can’t. Damn you, Kenner!
Even though I (along millions of other kids) was a Star Wars fanatic, it was still pretty much a bleak existence until the build-up to the prequels began in 1997. You had the three movies on VHS (usually letterboxed), but that was it. The Internet was in its infancy. Almost none of my friends talked about it, and LucasArts had not yet begun to imagine the endless video game potential of the franchise – a fact that today, seems utterly ridiculous, but that was reality in the early 90s. PC Gamers had the awesome X-Wing series, but my family was too poor for a PC. I was a happy Nintendo console gamer, but being a happy console gamer didn’t necessarily make you a happy Star Wars fan…at least it didn’t in the 8-bit age.
“Most” of the Star Wars Trilogy made an appearance on the NES, but like many licensed games of the era, it seemed as though they were actually just generic action/shooter titles that had a license dropped on top. We live in an age where licensed games have truly deliver consistently amazing experiences, since both the license holders and gamers expect a lot. But in the late 80s, even a brand as large as Star Wars wasn’t immune to a shitty licensed game. Take a look at the ridiculously difficult and poorly designed Star Wars for the Nintendo Entertainment System.
This little 1991 title from JVC is a piece of garbage. The only truly impressive parts of the game are the somewhat clever 8-bit reworkings of the classic John Williams score, and the scene of the Millennium Falcon dodging Alderaan chunks, but that’s about it. Any sequence spent on the ground is some of the most unimaginative, insanely difficult crap on the platform. The trench sequence during the Battle of Yavin is particularly embarrassingly poor (spikes and a curved trench?), and they lose another point for not bothering to use the correct theme for the throne room sequence. Piece. Of. Crap. But wait just a minute. There’s something worse.
Remember, this game came out in 1991. That’s pretty late for an NES title. The Super Nintendo was already out. Back in 1987 however, there was a Famicom Star Wars title. It’s completely different, with horrendous graphics, broken hit detection, horrible character design, a difficulty level so high that the game is almost completely unbeatable, as well as a complete total lack of understanding about anything related to the movie source material (Darth Vader in a sand crawler? What the hell?). Don’t believe me? Take a look at this steaming pile of shit.
Yeah. Suddenly the JVC game looks a LOT better, and that’s a hell of a feat. From here, we move on to The Empire Strikes Back for the NES. This one – while still insanely difficult – actually has some redeeming moments. The Battle of Hoth snowspeeder sequence is honestly impressive for a last-gen NES title (you can actually harpoon the AT-ATs), drawing some inspiration from the old Atari 2600 game as well as Defender. The rest is semi-generic platformer action, but at least the action is a little more true to license. You get to ride a tauntaun, Luke gathers Force Powers throughout the game, the movie themes are a little better, and JVC even pulled off a respectable lightsaber sound. Have a look.
JVC was clearly getting better at this, but they were a little late. The Empire Strikes Back released in 1992, by which time Street Fighter II was already out for Super Nintendo. The NES was long past dead, so a Return of the Jedi game was never developed for 8-bit. It’s just as well, because by the time Empire had hit NES, a little Super Nintendo title by the name of Super Star Wars was out, courtesy of Sculptured Software, and it was amazing. You get to play as Luke, Han, and Chewie through a variety of scenarios. The game made good use of the Super NES’s Mode 7 to do the title scroll justice, as well as pull some 16-bit magic for a landspeeder/Jawa showdown, an amazing sampled musical score, and the best video game Death Star trench battle for many years.
Compare that to the crappy Star Wars games on the NES. It got even better though. The next year, Super The Empire Strikes Back hit the system. Everything was better this time around. The Force Powers were added back in and expanded, Luke received one of the coolest double jumps in all of 2D platforming (impenetrable spinning lightsaber), character sprites were rotoscoped after actual movie animations, The Battle of Hoth’s Mode 7 graphics rivaled Pilotwings actually allowing you to hog-tie AT-ATs, and the final lightsaber battle with Darth Vader was one of the best animated sequences of the 16-bit era.
While the NES never saw a Return of the Jedi themed game, the Super Nintendo would in its golden year of 1995. Super Return of the Jedi spent basically every trick in the Super Nintendo’s book. While other games were taking the pre-rendered graphical technique to its peak, Jedi featured traditional 2D art at some of the highest detail the platform ever saw. Mode 7 was used to its fullest extent and even managed to depict the Battle of Endor’s Death Star core run, which by chance is also probably one of the hardest feats to accomplish of all the games of that generation. Jedi was the ultimate Star Wars 2D platforming experience, and it featured seven playable characters: Jedi Luke, Han, Chewie, Wicket, and three versions of Leia (Boushh, Bikini, and Rebel Trooper Leia) who had been overlooked in the previous two titles. You really couldn’t ask for a better 16-bit Star Wars experience.
While the NES titles will probably be left to rot in the annals of cartridge gaming history, all three games in the Super Nintendo Star Wars trilogy are available on the Virtual Console for the Wii. Rest assured, they are hard as hell, but with a little determination (and use of the extensive cheat codes each game features), you’ll persevere.
Next time, we’ll take a look at some of the Star Wars arcade titles that never got a (decent) home port.
