Video Game Edition
It's that time of year again! For our annual discourse on Star Wars, we have a new topic to dive into: Star Wars video games. Strap in while we head to lightspeed!
Developed by Kenner in 1979, this device let fans play out their own space battles. Think Battleship, but with imaginary starfighters. This was the first officially licensed electronic game of any sort officially developed for the franchise.
There were various editions of the Star Wars films made for video game consoles during the 1980s, but the first game that could really be considered well made or popular was Super Star Wars, released in 1991 for the Super Nintendo.
In 1993 Star Wars: X-wing was released, the first of many flight simulation games based on the franchise.
Two years later in 1995, Star Wars was operating under its own developer, LucasArts. One of their earliest and most successful games was Dark Forces. This was a Star Wars game built upon and inspired by the popular Doom franchise. It was followed by several sequels, including Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II, Mysteries of the Sith, and Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast.
If you were a fan of arcades and pizza parlors of the 1990s and early 2000s, chances are you found this mammoth machine. Released in 1998, this was only the fifth or so game from the franchise to populate such establishments. It was notable for being so large and covering iconic scenes from all three films, in full 3D.
In 1999, Star Wars released a new, very popular franchise. For the Nintendo 64 and PC, Rogue Squadron provided a fully 3D flight simulator experience fully playable via game controllers. The game was hugely successful and spawned two further sequels released on Nintendo Gamecube.
Basically a launch title for the Nintendo 64, Shadows of the Empire was a big release. There was a huge multimedia project going and Star Wars released multiple pieces of media related to this title. In addition to the video game, there were brand new action figures, a comic book, and a novelization! Until the retconning of various stories by Disney in 2012, this was the official story told between Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi.
In 2003, Star Wars released arguably the best roleplaying game in the whole franchise, and one of the best of all time. Knights of the Old Republic was a genre defining release for Microsoft Xbox. It spawned a sequel a few years later and eventually an MMO.
The first Massively Multiplayer Online game released for the franchise was Star Wars Galaxies. Released in 2003, this game allowed players to live in an online world as a member of the Rebellion or the Empire. It received multiple expansions until the servers were shut down in 2011.
Star Wars: The Force Unleased released in 2008. The game was notable for bringing realistic physics to the franchise, allowing players to make use of force powers in incredibly cinematic ways. Like Shadows of the Empire, this was another big multimedia effort by LucasArts, creating games for numerous platforms, a comic book, action figures, and a novelization.
The shut down of Star Wars Galaxies was strategically planned to make room for a brand new MMO. Star Wars: The Old Republic released in 2011, as both a new modern game to play, while also serving as a follow-up story to the beloved KOTOR series. The game is still online and will be celebrating its 15th anniversary later this year.
The end of an era. Kinect Star Wars brought full motion control to the franchise via the Kinect addon for Xbox 360. This was the last game published by LucasArts before the purchase by Disney in 2012.
The purchase changed things for all Star Wars media, not just the films. All ongoing game development was cancelled, and LucasArts was shutdown. Games that had been worked on, like the Boba Fett-led 1313, and Star Wars Battlefront 3 were cancelled. Moving forward, Disney licensed Electronic Arts to serve as the sole producer and distributor of Star Wars games moving forward.
The most popular game released by EA during this time was Jedi: Fallen Order. Though a wholly unique game, it was heavily inspired by the physics-based combat of The Force Unleashed, providing an even more immersive play as a jedi. It would be followed by a sequel, Jedi: Survivor.
Luckily, one of the games brought back by EA was the Battlefront franchise. The original Star Wars Battlefront games released in 2004 and 2005 for the Xbox. A third game for consoles was planned but ended up being cancelled. EA brought back the franchise, and released a sequel in 2017 as well.
Most recently, Disney has been rereleasing several of the older video games available on modern consoles! Fan favorites like Star Wars Racer, Dark Forces, Republic Commando, and the Battlefront games are all available on Xbox One, PS5, and Nintendo Switch.
Our final entry is our most recent! Star Wars Galactic Racer will release later this year on PS5, Xbox X, and PC. It is a spiritual successor to the 1999 game, Star Wars Episode 1: Racer. Word has it you can even race against Sebulba again!
And that's not all! Though you won't find any of these beloved Star Wars games in our collection, the St. Tammany Parish Library is happy to advertise our brand new Teen Video Game collection, opens a new window. Patrons with a valid library card can browse and check out a variety of video games for their system of choice.
Let us know in the comment your favorite Star Wars video game, if you have one!
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