The Force is almost with them: Not Quite Star Wars Games.

[Phosphor Dot Fossils]

OK, gamers of all ages, here's a fun little exercise for you. Can you think of any games which aren't licensed Star Wars games, which definitely owe something thematically to Star Wars?

First off, it has to be something more specific than "it's a space game," and it has to be an element of the game itself, as opposed to the box art featuring an X-Wing-like ship. Here are two examples I can think of off the top of my head:

Star Fire by Exidy - late 70s coin-op. The enemy fighters are obviously TIE fighters. The enemy motherships are obviously Star Destroyers. Even the "Star Fire" name on the screen is displayed in a very obviously Star Wars-inspired font. Exidy must've used Jedi mind tricks to get past the lawyers on this one.

Star Strike - Intellivision. You're the only fighter zooming down the trench of a massive space station, trying to fend off enemy fighters and prevent the station's superweapon from destroying an Earthlike planet.

Any others come to mind like this, where there's some obvious Star Wars influence on display...and yet it's not Lucasfilm-approved?

[Dangerboy]

Psi-Ops and Second Sight for the PS2/Xbox features what could be considered "Jedi Mind Trick" and "Force-like" Powers.

Snake's Revenge on NES had you firing a missile down a very, very small vent that was "about the size of a wamprat back home".

Shadow Squadron on the 32x had one boss fight where you had to carefully fly into the very core fo a huge ship, and take out the reactor....first time I played it I was reminded of the RotJ deathstar sequence.

[it290]

Yeah, Shadow Squadron was the first one that came to mind. Of course, in the same vein, the Wing Commander series clearly has some Star Wars influences.

Another one would be the Asteroids clone called 'Asteriods' (note the last few letters) on the Amiga. Not only do you have to deal with asteroids and UFOs, but also star destroyers, super star destroyers, and little x-wing looking ships.

[Mayhem]

Attack of the Mutant Camels for C64. Jeff Minter's "homage" to the Parker Bros 2600 Empire Strikes Back game.

[GobopopRevisited]

Conker's Bad Fur Day is packed with Star Wars Refferences (though they are dirrect refferences instead of clear rip-offs... so it probably doesn't count)

Space Quest Games as well...

[davidbrit2]

Hmm, Tony Hawk's Underground 2 actually has the infamous "Star Wars Kid" hidden in it. You go up to him and press circle to "feel the force" or whatever, and he starts going nuts with his curtain rod, complete with mouthed sound effects, and a symphonic backing reminiscent of Williams' work. Does that count? ;-)

Oh, and Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 lets you unlock and play as Darth Maul, but I'm pretty sure that's licensed. Heh.

[DynastyLawyer]

Phantasy Star Online. It owes a lot.

[NE146]

Tunnel Hunt is one.. has tie fighter-like enemies.

http://images.webmagic.com/klov.com/screens/T/wTunnel_Hunt.png http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v48/b2stoys/thunt.jpg

However a good one is SPACE ENCOUNTERS: Mame doesn't do it justice though as it needs overlay support. But in it you control a Tie-Fighter like ship flying through a Death-Star like trench

Here it is in Mame.. (which as usual does crap justice to older games).
http://images.webmagic.com/klov.com/screens/S/vSpace_Encounters.png

However a simple look at the flyer brings back exactly how the game is supposed to look ;)
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v48/b2stoys/SPACEENCOUNT.jpg

[Crush Crawfish]

The final level in viewtiful joe is more or less one big star wars parody, complete with "Die Fighters" and an "I am your father!" line. :)

[Cirrus]

OK, gamers of all ages, here's a fun little exercise for you. Can you think of any games which aren't licensed Star Wars games, which definitely owe something thematically to Star Wars?

First off, it has to be something more specific than "it's a space game," and it has to be an element of the game itself, as opposed to the box art featuring an X-Wing-like ship. Here are two examples I can think of off the top of my head:

Star Fire by Exidy - late 70s coin-op. The enemy fighters are obviously TIE fighters. The enemy motherships are obviously Star Destroyers. Even the "Star Fire" name on the screen is displayed in a very obviously Star Wars-inspired font. Exidy must've used Jedi mind tricks to get past the lawyers on this one.

Star Strike - Intellivision. You're the only fighter zooming down the trench of a massive space station, trying to fend off enemy fighters and prevent the station's superweapon from destroying an Earthlike planet.

Any others come to mind like this, where there's some obvious Star Wars influence on display...and yet it's not Lucasfilm-approved?


Here's a screenshot of the Star Fire title screen, to better illustrate:
http://images.webmagic.com/klov.com/screens/S/vStar_Fire.png

[bargora]

Atari's Star Raiders also had a very TIE Fighter-looking sort of enemy, and was (as most of you know) a first-person view space shooter. Although the other two types of enemies could have easily been a Cylon Raider and a Cylon mothership.

[Arcturius]

The Star Fox games all have little refferances to Star Wars and various other films.

[calthaer]

System Shock and System Shock 2 had that "laser rapier" (read: light sabre).

[CartCollector]

Star Fox most definitely. The opening level in Assault is that big battle scene in Return of the Jedi. And Arwings... remove the "r"... what have you got? A-wings! Looks just like them sometimes.
Also, Star Fox has all sorts of refrences as he said... You know General Pepper? They're making a Beatles reference there. And Falco Lombardi is supposed to be based off of the Italian actor Carlo Lombardi (i'm told. I wouldn't know.)

[Queen Of The Felines]

Silent Hill 3 has a lightsaber as a hidden weapon.

Kristine

[jslithy]

In Ultima I, there's a totally out of place space sequence, where you have to shoot down fighters that look exactly like X-Wings (or were they Tie Fighters?) in order to achieve the title "Space Ace." Only then will the princess tell you the location of the time machine...what a crazy game.

[Push Upstairs]

Power Stone 2 has a "light sword" you can unlock and use to whoop up on people.

3 guesses as to what it is supposed to be.


That Ultima sounds like some wacky shit, didn't the game also make a reference to the kitty aliens from the "Wing Commander" games as well? (The Kilrathi?)

[calthaer]

That Ultima sounds like some wacky shit, didn't the game also make a reference to the kitty aliens from the "Wing Commander" games as well? (The Kilrathi?)

Not sure if it was the first Ultima, but I know Ultima VII had this farm where the farmer had a Kilrathi spaceship crash land in his field. I think he also had a Pitchfork of Slaughtering stored in his shed, too.

[Kid Fenris]

The climax of Xenosaga: Episode I includes an obvious homage to the Death Star escape scene from Return of the Jedi. Watch as the Elsa flies out of Proto Merkabah and you'll expect to see the Millennium Falcon.

Of course, the Final Fantasy series has countless nods to the movies. Biggs and Wedge are perhaps the most widely known Star Wars reference in video games, and it's been said that Golbez from Final Fantasy IV (II) owes much to Darth Vader, with his dark-armored appearance and foreboding entrance music. Also note the line-for-line quote from The Phantom Menace just before the last boss in Final Fantasy IX.

[kingpong]

However a good one is SPACE ENCOUNTERS: Mame doesn't do it justice though as it needs overlay support. But in it you control a Tie-Fighter like ship flying through a Death-Star like trench

Here it is in Mame.. (which as usual does crap justice to older games).
http://images.webmagic.com/klov.com/screens/S/vSpace_Encounters.png



As usual, MAME does have artwork support for an older game. The artwork for Space Encounters adds color to the game. Get your MAME setup up to par before you go spouting off about how poorly MAME does older games. It doesn't look like the image on the flyer though, so I don't know if it just a bad piece of artwork or what. I know of a place that has a few Space Encounters cabinets, maybe I can go check them out.

[Kid Ice]

One of my favorite little gaming jokes:

Q: What's the best Star Wars videogame ever made?

A: Colony Wars

[KJN]

http://kim.c64.org/games/screenshots/full/death_star_03.gif
Death Star, an old C64 game by Rabbit Software.

Another one is Death Star Interceptor by System 3.

Several games have light sabres, Disgaea and ICO springs to mind.

[Raedon]

INTV - Star Strike

the good ol' trench run. Top selling INTV game 1982.. I had this one and I remember I could play until I got bored because it is a "pattern" game.

[Jorpho]

C'mon! Buck Rogers and the Planet of Zoom, peeps!
http://www.klov.com/game_detail.php?letter=&game_id=7227

Exidy's Victory for arcade and ColecoVision (remember, the CBS version doesn't suck!) is also highly reminiscent. I guess the bombers look something like B-wings, and the Quarks are perhaps imperial probe droids.

[Wavelflack]

There are a lot of games where you shoot "tie fighters". I think they are in Nexar, Starmaster, and Star Raiders. There are more examples, but I think enemy ships becoming "tie fighter" shaped and the preponderance of false lightsabers in games are the biggest examples of uncredited influence.

[Jorpho]

That reminds me: Am I the only person who thought "Irritating Stick" was a game about lightsabers upon first seeing the cover art?

[jslithy]

That Ultima sounds like some wacky shit, didn't the game also make a reference to the kitty aliens from the "Wing Commander" games as well? (The Kilrathi?)

In Ultima Underworld II, you find a race of cat people that are supposed to be some race from Wing Commander. I'm not sure which one, because I've never played any Wing Commander games.

[Pantechnicon]

Starblade (Arcade, Sega CD, PSX) borrows quite generously from the Star Wars mythos. The whole first half of the game is about getting to the mechanized planet "Red Eye", therewith flying into the center of the thing to knock out the power source a la the battle of Endor in Return of the Jedi.

http://www.sokutsu.com/IMG/jpg/05-16.jpg
Not hard to see the Death Star in this thing is it?

http://www.sokutsu.com/IMG/jpg/13-10.jpg
"What about that tower?" -"You worry about those fighters, I'll worry about the tower!"

http://www.sokutsu.com/IMG/jpg/10-10.jpg
Hyperspace jump, Millenium Falcon style.

Great game, btw, and if you haven't played it in the sitdown cab then you haven't played it at all.

[Jorpho]

Oh, and let's not forget Inca and Inca II, two CD-ROM adventures for the PC. Some more bizarre trench-flying in those.

[kirin jensen]

Star Hawk by Cinematronics, kids....... :D