Half-Glass Gaming [Episode 15] : A Freaking Sci-Fi Boy Band with Light Swords
Get out your lightsabers and your Millennium Falcons, kids, because we’re talking Star Wars on this week’s episode of the Half-Glass Gaming podcast.
From EA’s Battlefront beta to Super Star Wars (and some even older stuff than that), we cover several decades of Star Wars video games. What was LucasArts up to before they were legally allowed to make Star Wars games? Whatever happened to Star Wars 1313? Are female Storm Troopers a thing? Which little-known NES game featured a Darth Vader who could transform into a pterodactyl? Was the naming format for the Dark Forces games inspired by the Rambo movies? What’s Boba Fett’s pin number?
And we don’t just limit ourselves to video games. We’ve got some stuff to say about Star Wars toys and, of course, the prequel movies too.
Also, the Reverend talks furniture eating, Mandi pits hedgehogs and chipmunks against one another, Josh dodges a meth head to fuel his Snapple addiction, and Julian delivers a heartfelt monologue on George Lucas (and says some stuff about Ben Affleck as Daredevil too).
We’ve stuffed this episode with so much goodies that it’s starting to resemble Jabba the Hutt, so pop on some headphones and give your scruffy-looking nerfherder ears the Half-Glass Gaming treat they deserve.
If you want to learn more about the late 1970s Starhawk game, this Retrovolve article has some great info.
Here’s a full list of games mentioned in this episode:
- Star Wars Battlefront (2015)
- Star Wars: Battlefront II (2005)
- Star Wars: Battlefront (2004)
- Call of Duty (series)
- Forza Motorsport (series)
- Mario Kart (series)
- Need for Speed (series)
- Need for Speed: Most Wanted (2012)
- Burnout (series)
- Battlefield (series)
- Fallout 4
- Harvest Moon (series)
- Not the Robots
- Sonic the Hedgehog (series)
- Super Star Wars
- Super Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back
- Super Star Wars: Return of the Jedi
- Star Wars Episode I: Racer (N64)
- Star Wars: Racer Arcade
- Wipeout (PSOne)
- ToeJam & Earl
- Star Wars: Rogue Squadron (series)
- Star Wars: The Force Unleashed
- Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire
- Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II
- SoulCalibur (series)
- Starblade
- Star Fox
- Star Wars (1987, Japan)
- Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic
- Star Wars Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy
- Star Wars: Dark Forces
- Star Wars Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II
- Star Wars Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast
- Star Wars: Masters of Teräs Käsi
- Maniac Mansion
- Star Wars: The Arcade Game (Atari 2600)
- Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back (Atari 2600)
- Star Wars: Return of the Jedi: Death Star Battle (Atari 2600)
- Star Wars: Jedi Arena (Atari 2600)
- Starhawk (1979 arcade game)
- Starhawk (2012 PS3 game)
- Sam & Max (series)
- The Curse of Monkey Island
- Gladius
- Grim Fandango
- Mercenaries
- The Secret of Monkey Island
- Zombies Ate My Neighbors
- Star Wars 1313
- Uncharted (series)
- Gears of War (series)
- The Witcher 3: The Wild Hunt
- Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain
- LEGO Star Wars
- LEGO Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy
Retrovolve Staff
At Retrovolve, we love discussing, studying, and playing retro games, though not necessarily in that order.
What timing! I’ve just been thinking about playing the Super Star Wars games. They may have deviated from the source material, but they were fun, hard action-platformers. My favourite was Super Empire Strikes Back, but they were all quite good.
Yeah. Empire was my favorite too. I forgot how weird that game is, though! Man!
I’ve heard that they’re making a Star Wars open world game like Mercenaries. It’s being made by the same company that did Dead Space.
That could definitely be cool. I’m not a big fan of Visceral Games myself (although Dead Space 2 was pretty brilliant), but as I stated for the record I loved Mercenaries. I was excited for the sequel which added a bunch of improvements but overall ended up feeling like a half-baked follow up.
I didn’t play previous Battlefront games much and never got that into them, but the Battlefront alpha was sick. There were people saying it was a clone of BF4, but BF4 is boring and this was great. I don’t even like objective based FPS but I couldn’t get enough of Walker Assault.
Battlefront 2 was one of my favorite Star Wars games ever. So I’m really excited for the new Battlefront remake. It feels super slick and super modern, but with a sort of retro, arcadey feel at the same time. I loved the beta, and I’m definitely picking up the full game next month.
IMO KOTOR and 2nd Jedi Knight are the best Star Wars games. I
think it was called Outcast.
Yeah, the second Jedi Knight (which would have been the third Dark Forces game) was Jedi Outcast. Jedi Academy was the one after Outcast. Such a confusing title format!
Saw this and thought of you guys
http://i.imgur.com/ZQIAjuy.jpg
That reminds me: I didn’t see a single tauntaun in the Battlefront beta!
I loved the lightsaber duel mechanics in Jedi Knight I and II. I’d probably play Battlefront if it had more lightsaber action.
Battlefront has a teensy bit of lightsaber action, but only when you get the power-up to play as a hero (for a very short while).
Yeah, it’s not enough for me. I don’t know why so few Star Wars games attempt one-on-one lightsaber action.
To be fair, a really good back and forth melee combat system is likely incredibly difficult to put together, especially when you’re dealing with something like lightsabers, which canonically have a huge number of different styles to be wielded.
Still, you did point out two games in which you felt the lightsabering was done well, so I also agree they should be able to just take those concepts and shove them in somewhere.