I actually bought the vintage books not too long ago (RPG, original source book, plus Rebel and Imperial source books), to get a glimpse of that “early EU” even before the Zahn novels, but haven’t actually played it yet with anyone. I also heard it was based on the Ghostbusters RPG, and that now what we used to think of the Star Wars RPG (the second one?) is now a generic sci-fi game system anybody can use for free (is that true?).
First, thanks so much for reading the essay, and for your comments. You really got at the root of some of what I was trying to say - that the “official” Star Wars has changed several times over the decades, leading to different generations of fans having radically different expectations of what Star Wars is, at its heart. This isn’t defined just by generations, of course - plenty of people my age loved the 90s revival and all of the original EU material, and there are younger fans who only like the OT (or a subset even of that). The key thing is, as it has changed over time, Star Wars has failed to remain something that a wide cross-section of fans can actually agree on.
Believe me, there have been many times when I have thought about just diving into the final version of the West End Games main book (the 2nd Edition, Revised and Expanded) with nothing else and seeing what kind of universe I could bash out of it, trying to maintain the feeling I had over 40 years ago now. Haven’t found the time or motivation yet, but who knows? I do know that I think the mechanics of the WEG version are much closer to what I think they should be than the later Wizards of the Coast system, or the current Fantasy Flight Games system.
In regards to the generic D6 game system, it’s not quite free, but the PDFs are available very cheap - you can find them at https://www.drivethrurpg.com/browse/pub/3020/Nocturnal-Media/subcategory/5328_28740/OpenD6---West-End-Games- . There are other publishers who use the OpenD6 system, as well, but D6 Space is probably closest to the original Star Wars RPG in mechanics.