Topic: Top 5 Star Wars games

[Goldleaderone]

I just want to get everyone's opinion here. I wanted to do a top 5 list of everyone's favorite SW games. Just a fun little topic, and I may do a video on my youtube channel soon.


5: Star Wars Trilogy Arcade Game. I don't know how many quarters I spent on this game, but I played this to death at the movie theater. This game was so much fun to play. It had all the major battles from the films into one game, plus 2 duels with Boba Fett and Darth Vader. It took me the longest time to beat this game on one credit while completing every level, even the duels against Fett and Vader. Even to this day I think the graphics look pretty good.

4: Shadows of the Empire. This was probably my first SW game I played. SOTE is my favorite EU story. To play as Dash, one of my favorite characters in my favorite SW timeline? I'm in. The Hoth battle was cool, the on-foot missions were fun, and Skyhook Battle was awesome. A shame the only level where you can control the Outrider. I would spend hours (exaggerating lol) outside the Skyhook blasting TIEs and StarVipers and see how long I could last. Skyhook Battle was the level that completely drew me in to starfighter combat. I liked that mission so much I recreated it for X-Wing Alliance.

3: Rogue Squadron. This was my go-to game. Every level, you pilot a craft. No on-foot missions. I loved the different types of missions, the story, the gameplay, being able to pilot crafts other then the X-Wing. I loved the interaction between characters, loved they brought in Zev, Wedge, Dak/Dack, Hobbie in the squad. It wouldn't feel right flying with some random pilots as wingmen. To me it felt right, I was a bit more 'comfortable' flying, if that makes sense. Kasan Moor was a good character as well. I would be interested to see more background on Moff Serrdon. Nice to see a cameo by Han as well.

2: Rogue Squadron 2: Rogue Leader. A sequel to one of my favorite games, and again all flying missions? Yes! And the graphics look like you're playing a movie? YES! Oh and it takes place through all 3 of the original films? Shut up and take my money! Honestly, this one and number 3 can easily be flip flopped. I liked this game for the same reasons as the original Rogue Squadron pretty much. I liked how gameplay switched over to Wedge mid-game, which was cool. Denis Lawson coming back to voice Wedge was an awesome bonus. The only things it really lacked were the character interaction that the original Rogue Squadron had. I felt like it wasn't there this time. The game was a bit too short, and it introduces the B-Wing but you get to fly it in one mission. However, the Endor and Endurance levels.. wow..

1: X-Wing Alliance.  This game has to be one of THE BEST investments I've made. I loved the story with the Azzameens, and again, the gameplay, different missions, crafts, etc. The dialogue in every mission was spot on, it was cool to hear your wingmen interact with each other and adjust according to the mission. I loved the easter eggs, tie-ins to the movies, I even got hyped up when I got to fly with Luke and Dash in the Suprosa mission.. until I found myself in the cockpit of a Y-Wing lol. I remember playing this game online back in the days of the MSN Gaming Zone. What makes this game above the rest is the ability to create your own missions in the skirmish room. You can use a lot of crafts you didn't get to use in single player, create different mission types - attack, strike, recon, escort, etc. One last thing I loved about this game is it can be easily modified (as I said earlier, I recreated Skyhook Battle from Shadows). There's still an active community that continues to mod this game today. Only gripe I have about XWA is the ending - what happened to Antan?

Honorable Mention - Rogue Squadron 3: Rebel Strike. While I feel this game took a step back from the previous one, its still part of the series and I don't mind it. There are only a few missions I do play from this game. I thought the split campaign between Luke and Wedge was a decent addition, the on-foot missions were not. I think by this game, Factor 5 was running out of ideas for missions. I thought the story was somewhat lacking, and feel the ships, namely the X-Wing, were a bit sluggish this time around. Sometimes I have a hard time shooting TIEs, whereas in Rogue Squadron 2 I did not. I wasn't too fond of Chris Cox's portrayal of Wedge. I wish they brought back Robert Foster at least, who usually voices Wedge. The handful of missions I do like and the co - op is what makes this game an honorable mention.


These are really the only SW games I've played. I've played Battlefront 1 & 2, but not enough for them to make this list. If I played more, and I didn't rank each Rogue Squadron game individually I would have had more games to choose from. I just love space combat in Star Wars I guess haha. To this day I still find myself playing these awesome games. I miss my childhood.

[Tamer]

I like your list, all the flight sims were awesome in my opinion.

And then there was Republic Commando, still imo the best first person shooter ever made.

[DocOutlands]

West End Games "Star Wars Roleplaying Game" - origin of much of the EU material
Battlefront II - better controls than I, should have allowed for Phase I armor and brought the maps and atmospheric vehicles available in BFI

[Rezikai]

1: Dark Forces (series across multiple platforms) I was always a fan of the series early on. Later they delved the series more into Jedi's and while I'm not a hater of force users as much as many of my Imperial brethren I leave the force using for those wanting to use hokey religions and ancient weapons. But this franchise had a warm spot for me that isn't hearburn, so later when the franchised moved away from just having a Non-bearded Kyle Katarn be a mercenary for hire in the underworlds of the galaxy and transitioned the franchise to Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II, then Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast, and later Star Wars Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy, (Kyle's not a playable character in the 4th game) I kept with it and would still pick one up today... I just hope a reboot sometime will take it back to its gun-for-hire rebelion and imperial logistics slugging it out more so then a lightsabery game.

NOTE: Two rejected concepts for future games in the series include Jedi Knight III: Brink of Darkness and Jedi Master. Jedi Master was one of the many video game concepts LucasArts considered for what would later become Star Wars: The Force Unleashed.

2: Rogue Squadron (N64) As a long time Rogue Squadron lover of the EU this game and its later sequels for Gamecube were instant pick ups for me I enjoyed the 1st game slightly more then the 2nd only because it was longer with more story even including the DarkEmpire story from the EU pitting the Rogue's against Clone Palpatine's World Devastators. The later versions on Game Cuber were graphically amazing for its day and the "feel" of the movies returned for me, especially after seeing the mass waves of ties surprise attacking at the battle of Endor. When RS: Rebel Strike came out I was overly excited but the missions weren't that great the ground fighting which features prominently in the Rogue Squadron comics and novels lacked with Rebel Strike as the movement was clunky and more linear. While not a terrible SW game like the old Nintendo Games or the PS1 Star Wars game like SW: Demolition (which i still own btw) I felt it lacked. Enough to drop the franchise to #2 on the list.

3: SW: TIE FIGHTER (PC) What is more to be said? (for its day) Cutting edge animation and AI opponents? check. Imperial might? check. Grand Admiral Thrawn in a game? check. To be honest TIE FIGHTER was just X-Wing from the Imperial side but what an improvement. I can't tell you how many days I skipped class to spend it playing at my friends house. The graphics for the time were amazing even the renderings of the empires commanders vader, thrawn and the rest for it's day were spellbinding. Again this as a sister expac to a reboot of the Rogue Squadron franchise is begging to be done.

4: Star Wars Galaxies :An Empire Divided -Pre NGE (PC MMORPG) What can I say, an MMO based on Star Wars... it should have been a blockbuster that's still playing right to this very day... "should have". I'll not go into the long... long laundry list of stuff that helped demise this game and its franchise having spawned 3 expacs. I'll say this, While the game was still in development for it's realease on June 26 2003, 2 years earlier in 2001 a year into development they announced it's 1st expansion. I've knew a few people in the gaming industry then who helped show me the well documented history of SOE rushing products litterally months and years before they are ready to release (see EQ2, and Brad Mcquaid later debacle with Vanguard) and then instead of polishing these fixes they barrel ahead needing "New" product within a 6 month cycle for expacs as many, many broke EQ1 expac raiders will tell you.

For all of it's faults... Galaxies put the fantasy back into the Star Wars OT universe for me which by 2003 at it's release had so much EU written by then that the era of the OT characters were passing on to the younger kids. From the immense character design (which to this day rivals if not surpasses nearly all MMO character designs) to in-game trading/merchanting/currency levels.. even designing your own garments... it was a living world. With that we had plenty of the Galactic Conflict to boot I remember in beta getting lost on Correllia and later after release finding that spot again. Or how a person could choose their own style of play since grouping wasn't forced (pun intended). Space Battles weren't as great as I'd like but it was learning curve, beast wranglers for fullfilling my "petter" taste for a class. Social interaction was so heavy never before had I seen so many other Empire Lovers as I. It felt like more then a game with them, hell I remember when the 1st player to unlock Jedi initiate as a player was found out/announced and the next day the Empire put a huge bounty on her. It was awesome.

Many blame Lucas while many blame SOE (and Verant studios) for the craziness of the NGE, I'll say this- one was the keymaster giving the keys to the gatekeeper... the Gatekeepers were the ones to bring in more money with good ideas for the medium and the medium was games. One is still a multi Billion dollar franchise as was just acquired by Disney the other isn't even near Mickey's Radar and has struggled for years... you can make the call on that.

5: Knights of the Old Republic, I, II, MMO (SW:TOR) KoToR's franchise was last into my list because as awesome as KoToR I, II, MMO, are again I'm not a fan of Jedi's and to be honest aside from the awesome Sith Emperor (who they kinda hurt characterwise in the comics) it felt like games about Star Wars but not about the "wars" of Star Wars... more about political conflict using militaries as tools for advancement rather then peace keepers and liberators. Maybe it's my OT biased. If there was a list of best stories of SW games KoToR's series would be in there easily as #1 or #2 especially with their heavy RPG influence but again its just not for me.

Honorable Mentions: The Force Unleashed I & II. SW Battlefronts
Personal opinion is the only reason KoToR isn't slotted into the #4 or #5 slot I've always been more of a fan of the Galactic Conflict rather then hokey jedi's trying to be so badass with whichever double ended sabre that used to be able to be separated and reattached with Exar Kun but wasnt with Maul, yes I'm jaded. TFU had a decent plot and excellent graphics more so then the Battlefronts series imo but again it's about Vader's secret apprentice and the "New Version" of the birth of the Rebellion (apparently they decided to toss out the old WestEndGames version of Tarkin killing thousands of people crushing them under his ship) which I didn't mind it showed some of the side characters like Garm Ibis and Bail Organa I was disappointed that AT-AT's had to wait until later/expacs/addons it made me a Sad-Panda. But overall TFU isn't a bad game at all, hell many consider it a GREAT game. Just not me... I'm not a big fan of laser-sword wielding telekinetics that use their influence for one side or the other over governments. I was always more of a fan of the "wars" part of Star Wars let the politicians worry about how we get there IMO.

Battlefronts I really wanted to put on the list I actually had to swap it out for the KoToR franchise not because I think Battlefront's storytelling and graphics are superior, far from it. KoToR's franchise had so many more hours of gameplay with continued storytelling and while the list I made is more about the "wars" and Battlefront is heavy on it. Much of it felt "planted" we knew why were in these battles we knew we'd get a reset at the end of the round like Socom/Countrystrike/ModernWarfare and go at it again. I think mostly it's because I'm more of an RPG fan then FPS fan (which makes no sense since I have DarkForces at #1 eh? lol) but story telling counts alot for me hence why a Jedi heavy franchise I usually don't care for like KoToR is won out over Battlefronts.