logo Sign In

What is/was the best SW Game ever, on any platform? — Page 3

Author
Time
 (Edited)

Rogue Squadrion II: Rebel Leader on the Gamecube was my absolute favorite. 

A close second is the original Rogue Squadron on the PC.

Third is the Star Wars Arcade game with the vector graphics - but only if played on the actual arcade game with the real controller.  Using MAME with a mouse just isn't the same.

Fourth is Battlefront on the PC (didn't like Battlefront 2 that much)

Fifth is Rogue Squadron III on the Gamecube.  Just never got into it as much as Rogue Squadron II.  I am currently replaying Rogue Squadron II and it is still very fun and challenging.

Author
Time

CP3S said:

Pfft! Shameless knockoff, indeed!

Not to mention it was also the first to allow overlapping levels so that you could have multi-story buildings and even real bridges. Or that it actually had a story with fully voiced cutscenes.

I also recall reading a long time ago someone discussing the inner workings of the Jedi engine. About how the devs actually used window portals looking into other parts of the map to make various sections feel larger. Which was something completely unheard of at the time.

Forum Moderator
Author
Time

Best. Game. Ever. Even outside of Star Wars. The only video game that I still proudly own and play about once a year. And it's the sole reason why I'm glad the prequels were made (... kind of) - they spawned this entertainment masterpiece.

Author
Time

haraldo23 said:

Best. Game. Ever. Even outside of Star Wars. The only video game that I still proudly own and play about once a year. And it's the sole reason why I'm glad the prequels were made (... kind of) - they spawned this entertainment masterpiece.

Did you ever play..

- Cannon Fodder on the Amiga 500+

- Frogger on the Dragon 32

- Turrican II on the Commodore 64

- Prince of Persia on the IBM PS1

- Goldeneye on the N64

- Blade Runner on a Windows 95 PC

- Dues Ex: Human Revolution on the PS3

...to name but a few. But a general rule would be if it was on the Amiga or the N64 it was probably brilliant!

VIZ TOP TIPS! - PARENTS. Impress your children by showing them a floppy disk and telling them it’s a 3D model of a save icon.

Author
Time

Goldeneye was fantastic. Developer RARE did some great games. 

Author
Time

Hey, it's me. said:

Goldeneye was fantastic. Developer RARE did some great games. 

I know. When watching those pre-fight breakdown's that robert Downey Jr imagines in Sherlock Holmes, it always reminds me of the kind of mental preperation I had to do to beat Goldeneye on 007 difficulty. During the loading screen I'd be planning my first seconds of action...

"Attract knife with watch... equip knife... guard opens door... throw knife at first guard... catch guard's falling AK-47... throw knife at 2nd guard before he can open fire... release girl from 2nd cell... open door... throw knife at 3rd guard... round corner... etc"

You would have to have the whole level thought through like that. I lost weeks to that game... in a good way.

VIZ TOP TIPS! - PARENTS. Impress your children by showing them a floppy disk and telling them it’s a 3D model of a save icon.

Author
Time

Most definitely, you had to be meticulous and fast. Especially in the later levels. I also thought Banjo Kazooie was a terrific game. Perfect Dark was good but a bit of a letdown.

Author
Time

Ryan McAvoy said:

haraldo23 said:

Best. Game. Ever. Even outside of Star Wars. The only video game that I still proudly own and play about once a year. And it's the sole reason why I'm glad the prequels were made (... kind of) - they spawned this entertainment masterpiece.

Did you ever play..

- Cannon Fodder on the Amiga 500+

- Frogger on the Dragon 32

- Turrican II on the Commodore 64

- Prince of Persia on the IBM PS1

- Goldeneye on the N64

- Blade Runner on a Windows 95 PC

- Dues Ex: Human Revolution on the PS3

...to name but a few. But a general rule would be if it was on the Amiga or the N64 it was probably brilliant!

I've played some of those and I've played a ton of others. However, the cool thing about RC was the fact that it was set in the Star Wars Universe (which I [really wanna] love) as well as this interesting, dynamic sort of brotherly camaraderie that other video games (even bigger ones like Gears of War) just don't have.

The tone was perfect, the story felt very enticing, the goals were clear... The gameplay and variety of levels, and the length of the game - everything about it was perfect. A great, but also different kind of Star Wars experience.

But it wasn't just that. There were also little things. For instance, I liked how it took a huge step away from what [modern] Star Wars fans usually prefer: colorful lightsaber raves and Jedi [who fight and act like anime characters]. The music was it's own thing. And the story - it wasn't some important, game changing, history space occupying storyline that most Star Wars writers strive for - it was just 4 dudes in middle of a war, trying to accomplish their little mission and make it through alive. Some real charming simplicity...

The game also put 'WAR' back into STAR WARS and... you know, while I love violence in movies/video games (and RC did have a good chunk of it) - I liked how you were mostly just killing robots. As action packed as it was, you never really felt like you were being violent and killing a bunch of poor bastards. You were just disarming bombs and protecting yourself and your team from soulless killing machines... for the most part.

Anyways, this reply is getting too fat... So, in short: there are a lot of reasons why I love "Star Wars: Republic Commando" and here you have about 2% of them. And I hope they made sense.

Author
Time

Ryan McAvoy said:

Would love to play some old SW PC games but I can never get win 7 to install them.  Once win 7 has the game installed it runs it fine, which is wierd.

 

 

This is a few months late, but since the thread has already been necro'd, I may as well explain this and share the workaround.

Basically, modern computers almost all run 64 bit versions of Windows. 64 bit versions of Windows are backwards compatible with 32 bit programs, but not 16 bit programs, whereas the older 32 bit versions of Windows did, in fact, work with 16 bit programs.

 

The upshot of this is a lot of older Windows games had 16 bit installers, even though the games themselves were 32 bit programs. This is why the installers don't work, but the games usually do. There is an exception for some games from the early 2000's that used some graphics card tricks that are just no longer supported (Sadly Episode I Racer is one of these, and it's so badly affected that it's totally unplayable), and there's also some /really/ old Windows games where the whole program was 16 bit, but those are fairly rare. Most of these older games have fanmade installers for them. If you just google "Windows 7 installer (insert game name here)," you'll probably find what you're looking for. There's this one site in particular where this guy from Germany has made installers for basically all of the 90's/early 2000's Star Wars games.

Also, if you're trying to  play a DOS game, that's really easy to get going with. There's a free and open source emulator called DosBox that will get you up and running in no time. When you buy an old DOS game from Steam or GoG.com, it actually comes with a copy of DosBox set up to run the game from a shortcut -- there's no updating done to the games themselves. If you have a copy of an older version of Windows (3.x, 95, and 98 are all good options) you can even install it within DosBox to play those pesky 16 bit Windows games. I've got a copy of Sim City that I run in Windows 3.1 on a Windows 7 machine that way.

 

Wall of text over, my favorite Star Wars games/series are the Dark Forces series, the X-Wing series, and Episode I Racer. Battlefront II comes next, but it's an also ran compared to these old greats. Episode I racer remains the best racing game I've ever played, Dark Forces and Jedi Knight (I still haven't played the other two, although I've had digital copies for over a year now) were great early FPS games, both of which pioneered new things in the genre (Dark Forces basically beat Duke Nukem to everything but the eye candy, Jedi Knight had an unusual engine that allowed for absolutely massive levels) and both of which had great level design. Shame the source code is lost, they were state of the art at the time in a lot of ways. I'm actually doing a playthrough of Dark Forces right now. I recently set DosBox up with a decent software synthesizer so I can hear the general midi version of the soundtrack, and it's amazing. Totally blows away the Soundblaster version I had as a kid. I also have a Roland MT-32 emulator set up, but from what I understand the only Star Wars game that had that as the best option was the original floppy disc release of X-Wing. Sounds great on Wing Commander, though.

And then there's the X-Wing games. Good lord did they eat up my time as a kid. I got my first joystick to play TIE Fighter, along with the Rebel Assault games, and when it broke years later I wound up getting a second one to play X-Wing Alliance -- which I still have, and since it's a USB model, I can still use it with newer computers. That last one was a lucky find, actually. I ran across a used copy in high school, when I didn't even know there was a game in the series after X-Wing Vs. Tie Fighter. Talk about a nice surprise.

Incidentally, there's a mod for Jedi Knight that takes care of the butt ugly textures and models, called Jedi Knight Enhanced. The modding community for that game is great, they've even made patches and alternate launchers that take care of a lot of the weird incompatibilities it has with modern computers. Shame nobody ever updated the models and textures for the Mysteries of the Sith expansion, but at least you can still play it.

 

And holy crap was that a wall of text. Anyone still reading, pat yourself on the back, you have a lot of patience.

Author
Time

Sigh... thinking about X-Wing, Dark Forces, and Rebel Assault brings me back to such a happy, simpler time when I was a teen in the early/mid 90s.  Such a great time to be a Star Wars fan, and a PC game fan.  Yesterday I actually fired up X-Wing on my laptop and read through some of the old mission briefings.  Man, they bring back memories.  I probably did play them too much though!

Anyone remember different camera angles from ROTJ?

Author
Time
 (Edited)

First SpilkaBilka and now Owyn_Merrilin joined the club! I salute you!

I've lost count how many times I've finished X-Wing, TIE Fighter and Dark Forces. STAR WARS setting aside, these were great games on their own (controls, difficulty etc.).

@Owyn_Merrilin: you may wish to fiddle with DOSBOX to be able to emulate Gravis Ultrasound (requires additional download, no actual GUS hardware needed). I'd say when it's supported (TIE Fighter and Dark Forces do this natively) it gives the best music playback for DOS(BOX) games.

Briefings sound the best when read by Guy Siner! He sounds as Imperial as you can get XD

I saw the original theatrical release of the Old Trilogy on the big screen and I'm proud of it...
How did I accomplish that (considering my age) is my secret...
Author
Time

The pod racer game for the N64 was absolutely amazing. I also remember renting Dark Forces a couple times and loving it too, but my memory is hazy on that one.

Rogue Squadron and Republic Commando are great, but the two Battlefront's are probably the best.

Shout out to the first couple of Lego Star Wars games as well, really fun stuff there.

Author
Time

I won't answer the original question- all of my favourites have been well covered...

But not a single mention of the Force Unleashed games?  Has everyone here given them a fair shake?

I played the demo for the first game and decided I would pass on it.  I had a friend pressure me into playing the full game, and I'm glad I did.  I found the game much more enjoyable than I would have thought- given the demo.  I also fell more in love with the game when I played it on its hardest difficulty.  What was once just a button masher became a tactical skill based game.  (Watch out for the boss at the end of level 2, however.  He was darn near impossible on 'nightmare')

Force Unleashed 2 felt more like a 6 hour DLC than a sequel, but as long as you only paid $10 for it (like me!) then you could just consider it a pretty darn good $10 stand alone DLC!

The best parts, however, are the OT Infinities DLC.  They are 3 "What if?" missions that take the place of ANH, ESB, and RotJ.  Lots of fun.  You kill Obi-Wan (twice!), Han, Chewie, Leia and Luke  (by throwing the Falcon at him- no joke!)

The story is fun, and well told, though I wouldn't consider it canon.  It has good characters and is, I would argue, the most OTish Lucasfilm product of the past 20 years.

IT'S MY TRILOGY, AND I WANT IT NOW!

"[George Lucas] rebooted the franchise in 1997 without telling anyone." -skyjedi2005

"Yeah, well, George says a lot of things..." a young 1997 xhonzi on RASSM

"They're my movies." -George Lucas. 19 people won oscars for their work on Star Wars (1977) and George Lucas wasn't one of them.

Rewrite the Prequels!

 

Author
Time

xhonzi said:

But not a single mention of the Force Unleashed games?  Has everyone here given them a fair shake?

I played the demo for the first game and decided I would pass on it.  I had a friend pressure me into playing the full game, and I'm glad I did.  I found the game much more enjoyable than I would have thought- given the demo.

Same reaction here when I played a bit of it... meh, then turned it off. Didn't like the character animation or the general feel of how it played. Maybe I should give it another go if you say it gets better.

VIZ TOP TIPS! - PARENTS. Impress your children by showing them a floppy disk and telling them it’s a 3D model of a save icon.

Author
Time

Ryan McAvoy said:

xhonzi said:

But not a single mention of the Force Unleashed games?  Has everyone here given them a fair shake?

I played the demo for the first game and decided I would pass on it.  I had a friend pressure me into playing the full game, and I'm glad I did.  I found the game much more enjoyable than I would have thought- given the demo.

Same reaction here when I played a bit of it... meh, then turned it off. Didn't like the character animation or the general feel of how it played. Maybe I should give it another go if you say it gets better.

Certainly to each their own, but mine is not the only opinion that the game was much better than the demo let on.

IT'S MY TRILOGY, AND I WANT IT NOW!

"[George Lucas] rebooted the franchise in 1997 without telling anyone." -skyjedi2005

"Yeah, well, George says a lot of things..." a young 1997 xhonzi on RASSM

"They're my movies." -George Lucas. 19 people won oscars for their work on Star Wars (1977) and George Lucas wasn't one of them.

Rewrite the Prequels!

 

Author
Time
 (Edited)

Just joined the forum - hi all.

I had a quick read through the replies and haven't seen any mention of Sega's 1997 Star Wars Trilogy Arcade.

If you've not played it it's an on rails shooter spread across the three original films. Great graphics, cool scoring system and it sticks to the films. Nothing new in there, just the original designs.

It was never ported to any system but it's playable using the supermodel3 emu - hook it up to a flight stick and it's "just like the real arcade game"

 

 

 

Author
Time

^That's a freaking awesome game.

Force Unleashed is actually pretty amazing. Never played the second one, though.

Author
Time

dan76 said:

Sega's 1997 Star Wars Trilogy Arcade

 This one?

I saw the original theatrical release of the Old Trilogy on the big screen and I'm proud of it...
How did I accomplish that (considering my age) is my secret...
Author
Time
 (Edited)

xhonzi said:

But not a single mention of the Force Unleashed games?

That is the single worst SW game I have ever played. I wish I could delete the brain memory of it. The storyline is insulting to the characters of Vader and Emperor, to say the least. Some dumb worthless character defeating both Emperor and Vader. Stupid and ridiculous. I mean how could a crap like this get a green light at LucasArts? Oh I forgot... it was developed by LucasArts. No wonder the new owners closed it down.

真実