HecklerSpray

Grown Up Gossip & Internet Villainy

Top 5 Best & Worst Star Wars Videogames

By hecklerspray staff

Star Wars Videogames games Teras KasiStar Wars, Star Wars, Star bloody sodding Wars. It's still everywhere, even though it's supposed to have finished and Lucas is supposed to be firmly locked in his ranch rolling about on his vast piles of money while dressed as Jar Jar sodding Binks.

But no, he just can't leave it alone. Sodding sod. There's the upcoming not-a-movie movie, the TV series (The Wire crossed with Star Wars?! Yes please, thanks) and the new videogame The Force Unleashed all on the horizon, and it's unlikely that things will slow down any time soon.

But what does all this talk do? Well, it reminds us of all the Star Wars crap we've had rammed down our throats for three decades. Specifically, it reminds us of Star Wars videogames and how mixed a bag they've managed to be over the years. Some have been that good that you can't help but immediately fornicate with the disc/cartridge/arcade machine (risky as the latter may be, with it being a public situation), whereas many more have been so bad it makes you wish Hitler had won.

Nevertheless, in our endless quest to list the tits off everything, here we present our definitive, mega ultra, never-to-be-questioned top five best and worst Star Wars games ever. Now you may think this list has been done a thousand times before all over the internerd and, well, you're right. But shut up, because this time hecklerspray is talking and you better damn well listen.

IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER (except for Teras Kasi, which is the worst game ever made, ever)…

BEST

1. Knights of the Old Republic (KOTOR)



So it's a stodgy traditional RPG based on some Dungeons and Dragons rules with only semi-real time combat. So what? You get to design your own Jedi and lightsaber and can follow the path of the Dark Side (or Light if you're a pansy), choking every bugger in the universe into submission, stealing from helpless peasants and not helping old people across the road. Take THAT, Yoda! It's just a shame that the sequel, though just as playable as the first, was ultimately an unfinished mess.

2. The X Wing series (including Tie Fighter!)


Do you remember the 90s? Do you? DO YOU?! Ah, good. When PCs were something of a luxury and we could visit our rich friend's house to play on X-Wing. You were a Rebel pilot, fighting the good fight for freedom in the galaxy. Then they went and brought out Tie Fighter, where you were an utter bastard, crushing the Rebellion. Brillo. The series went on with a few more spin offs, culminating in X-Wing Alliance, a game in which you participated in the attack on the second Death Star in the Millennium Falcon. Damn, we need to go and find our joystick…

3. The Dark Forces/Jedi Knight series


The original Dark Forces game was a solid affair, though written off by many as a simple Doom clone with Stormtroopers. Which, to be fair, it was. By the time the sequel rolled around things changed to the point that involuntary erections were caused the world over. Starting off as a non-Jedi pleb, a short time into the game you received a lightsaber and training in the force. From then on the game went from 'alright' to 'oh dear christ I just chopped his arm off then threw ten of his mates down a chasm USING MY MIND'.

The further sequels weren't as mindblowing as number two, but all of them provided a laugh. And one even provided the real Lando Calrissian! The real one! Though to be fair he probably does do pretty much anything for money these days.

4. The Super series


Super Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi were classics back in the 16-bit days of the SNES, and a bona fide reason why Nintendo's console shat all over the Mega Drive, quality-wise (ah, re-opening age old arguments).

Taking place in the world of the original trilogy, the games saw players fighting through hordes of baddies, aliens, shockingly aggressive indigenous life and AT-ATs. Highlight of the series has to go to Empire – the Hoth defence level is the stuff of legend, and the continue screen where Yoda asks 'Try Again?' only to state "Try not, do, or do not. There is no try" when you press 'yes' (the pedantic little shit) are two immortal highlights of a fantastic series.


5. The Rogue Squadron series


Let's be honest here, the first game wasn't amazing. It was good, entertaining at the very least, but it came across as shockingly mediocre in comparison to fellow N64 title Shadows of the Empire.

Then came Rogue Squadron II, and all mediocrity gave way to one of the best Star Wars experiences ever committed to the world of interactive entertainment. Even though it was fucking hard. A release title on the Gamecube, Rogue Leader was more than just a great game – it was a stunning technical achievement, created in about three days from base materials like wool, ear wax and a kidnapped puppy. The third in the series, Rebel Strike, was pretty much more of the same but added a co-operative mode for the missions of Rogue Leader. Star Bar!

WORST

1. Masters of Teras Kasi


Ahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha hahahahaha haha hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha ha ha! Annnnnd breathe. What in the Salacious Crumb's name were they thinking? Probably: "I know lads, let's make a game like Tekken and Soul Blade, but let's comically make it as if we're all too monged up on spazz-o-drugs to actually, y'know, make it playable in any way, shape or form."

That has to be the reason. There can be no other justification for this utter abortion of a game being released – that's released as in 'actually released for the buying public to part with their cash on'. The mind searches for reason in many things in life – many – but Masters of Teras Kasi is one of those things that the human brain will surely never understand, like Paris Hilton's ability to keep being mentioned by real people or why said 'real' people insist on buying The Sun/Daily Mail/insert name of the rag you hate here. Awful, awful, awful and awful – not even worth tracking down for comedy value. THERE IS NONE.

2. All of the games directly based on Episodes I-III


Episode One had a good tie-in with the Racer game – honestly – but seemingly every other game based on the movies of Episode I, II and III were doggy dirt of the highest order. Specifically, those based directly on the movies, where you were in control of Obi Wan and the like.

How could they make such a generic, boring mess of being in control of jedi characters? Easy, by making Star Wars: The Phantom Menace on the PlayStation, Star Wars: Attack of the Clones on the Game Boy Advance and Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith on the PS2, Xbox and others. Broken, boring, rushed and derivative, the only pluses were the fact that you could imagine taking control of Mace Windu and killing the snot out of everything instead. Though really that's either none of these games or just a completely different game, thus nullifying the need to pick up any of these titles. Win!

3. Star Wars: Galaxies


A Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game (MMORPG to the cool kids), Galaxies started out as the idea that made Star Wars fans wet. You would live a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away and could live out all of your dirtiest Star Wars fantasies. If you fancied yourself as a Boba Fett wannabe, you could be a bounty hunter. If you wanted to follow the path of Luke and co. by becoming a Jedi then… well… you could, technically, but it took quite a long time.

We're talking days of real time in the game, dozens and dozens of hours of play to get there. In the end about two people got there, but then couldn't actually do anything as if they'd got themselves killed, which they likely would, their characters would be lost forever.

Then the game received some updates which totally changed everything, meaning more or less anyone could become a Jedi with the minimum of effort. The people that had made the effort in the first place were, shockingly enough, annoyed. It was something of a broken mess when it was released and they fixed it, but George Lucas must have got involved somewhere because then came the endless sodding tinkering that we all know and love Georgey boy for, and the game was left a broken husk, deserted by all and left to rot in the big online graveyard in the sky.

4. Rebel Assault I and II


Do you remember the days when full motion video was vogue? When every single CD-based game had to have some no-talent assclown 'acting' his or her way through some sets that looked like the local special school had knocked them up on a particularly haphazard Sunday afternoon? Well, all of this looked like Oscar-worthy material when you put it next to the 'games' of the Rebel Assault series.

Pre-videoed footage scrolled along as you slowly moved your crappy cursor around to try and shoot Tie Fighters/Stormtroopers and the like through numerous levels of mind-destroying garbage. You had no control, though in the sequel they added the illusion of control, and each mission was punctuated with some of the worst sub-amateur Star Wars spin off tosh the world has ever seen. We wholeheartedly blame the Mega CD for making these kind of 'games' fashionable. For about a week.

5. Star Wars: Obi Wan

What better way to celebrate the launch of a new console than by bringing out a Star Wars game to coincide with the release? Well, until Rogue Leader came out with the Gamecube we would have gone with: "anything is a better way to celebrate the launch of a new console than by bringing out a Star Wars game to coincide with the release, even cancer." This is how bad Obi Wan made our insides feel.

Like they were being ravaged by one of man's most fearsome enemies. It wasn't literally killing us though, so score one to Obi Wan. But that is the only one it will ever, ever get. As is the case with many awful Star Wars games it was rushed, buggy and controlled as if designed by an idiot savant with no hands, minus the 'savant' aspect. Then Rogue Leader came out as a launch title a couple of months later and we all promptly forgot about this turd that had been force-fed to the early Xbox adopters. Well, most of us did. Some can never forget.

It actually dawned on us when writing this that there are far more good Star Wars games than we remember. We tried lumping entire series into one entry, but that didn't create enough room, so instead we ruthlessly culled a number of titles from the list. Including Lego Star Wars, which still hurts (it can be secret entry number six on the best-o-list, hush down). And that's that – the 'spray has spoken.

[story by Ian Dransfield] 

Comments

  1. jason says

    because i know how much people like being corrected by random nOObs from the interwebs, wtf were you guys thinking – no battlefront ?

  2. David Scarborough says

    Revenge of The Sith for the PS2 wasn’t too bad. The combos were pretty cool and the duel mode was fun. It was just a bit repetitive thats all. Plus they did the usual thing of releasing the game about two weeks before the film opened thus ruining plenty of plot points and showing lots of clips. I also remember enjoying the phantom menace for the ps1, maybe it was just me being a crap child!

  3. Ben says

    The ROTS PS2 game had that part where obi-wan had to fight the robot spider. You have to hit the spider with the lightsaber and I’m wondering why the f*cking thing is indestructible to a lightsaber when according to the Star Wars database, Lightsabers can cut through anything save for another Lightsaber blade. And the Emperor in the game doesn’t look like the actual emperor. I know tons of people who can draw better textures for the emperor. In other words, it sucked because my nephew couldn’t finish a level and didn’t wanna play it anymore.

  4. Ian says

    Always loved the Dark Forces series, never owned the first one but played the demo to death. Had both the sequel and it’s add on though. Must have been only the second game I’d ever seen (after Wing Commander IV) to have live action cutscenes. I think it was the first game I ever played online too.

    Had hours of fun with X Wing vs Tie Fighter and all the add ons to that. Remember being driven crazy by the difficulty of Star Wars Rebellion.

    Actually enjoyed The Phantom Menace game, but quickly lost interest in the racer.

    I know there’s a lot of crap but I’ve always been surprised by the amount of good games set in the Star Wars universe. Always annoyed me that there wasn’t anywhere near as many good Star Trek games. Like to think though that if the Babylon 5 combat simulator game got released it would have been on a par with the likes of X Wing.

  5. revan says

    shut up you fucking n00bs star wars is the best franchise ever, i have to admit that some of its games werent that good, but george lucas has made a hell of an unioverse so shut the fuck up

  7. boe says

    I’d probably play the jedi knight games again if someone made one with a relatively recent game engine – e.g. lithtec, Halflife2, Doom3 etc.

    I think there are a few games that would be good with new engines.

    I’d probably buy a joystick if they let me do the deathstar run.

  8. Andrew says

    You forgot the lego star wars games(should be very close to the top). Battlefront and republic commando for honorable mentions.

  9. jamEs says

    I think the worst Star Wars game was Empire Strikes Back for the Atari. As was Death Star Assault. Picking on Atari games isn’t really fair when compared to modern gaming, but these were bad atari games. And one of the best was Star Wars Racer. The arcade one was badass and the N64 did it justice as well. Writing off all the prequel games in one shot is pretty weak. Just because they were based off of them didn’t make them entirely bad.

  11. Bride says

    BATTLEFRONT

    How could you miss that? I know I can’t be the only one that thinks those games were addicitive.

  12. Dave says

    How about Force Commander as an honourable mention? what a major letdown that was! Though a rockin imperial march mix for intro music at least :P

  13. baz says

    I respect your choice (kind of!), but battlefront *rules*. it just feels like star wars, you are there.

  14. ifedeli says

    I’ll readily admit all the episode 1-3 games were terrible (except pod racer). However, Masters of Teras Kasi was great! So were the Rebel Assault games! After TIE fighter (best game ever) and KOTOR, they were my favorites. I don’t have any justification to back that up, just the fond memories of countless childhood hours spent on those two games.

  16. r says

    seriously, battlefront is easily #4. Easily. Lego starwars, while annoying as the multiplayer camera is, is probably 5. but nice list.

  17. Iknoweverything says

    Jedi Knight 2 for xbox is the best action game so far
    KOTOR series is the best RPG

    DONE / NO BIG LONG ARTICLE NEEDED!

  18. andy says

    revan: You didn’t read the article, did you? You must be living in your own unioverse over there.

  19. pedobear says

    Oh come on! To say that Rebel Assault is one of the worst games is just plain dumb. You look at it from the wrong vantage point. Sure nowadays it seems shity, but back then it was state of the art entertainment that revolutionized the way CDs were used in gaming and brought many people to buy a CD-Drive in the first place.

  26. Flander says

    I’m sorry but Star Wars: Galaxies…when it was first released, was possibly one of the greatest MMORPG’s ever made, yes I know that’s disputable, but the crafting system alone was enough to make it good(ie:had to harvest your material, and your product that you made, depended on the quality of material it was made from, you would have to search on the 9 different planets for all the materials, and sometimes awesome quality would be available or shitty quality, making price fluctuations of certain products in the economy, making for a awesomely realistic economy). The original combat/PvP system was amazing, and implied a combay queue, making it so you could queue combinations and defenses. The list goes on, there were 32 professions in the game, and you could respec to another profession anytime you wanted to(unlike WoW, where your stuck with what you picked), this kept the game fun, because you could mix and match, and change your style anytime. You hade 225 spec points, and every profession took 80 points to master. The combat professions were all really fun to play, along with the healing professions, and you could do combos between the different professions to be very effective, not just a worthless healbot,(rifles/doc; carbineer, combat medic, etc). The flight expansion was pretty good, and the customization of your ship was very very cool, not to mention being able to reverse engineer looted parts. The downfall of the game was the devs wanting to make it more easier for entry-level players, making easier to get to jedi, and the bad lag problems, which could of been fixed with more servers, they introduced a combat upgrade which was mediocre, but was still fun. A little while after, they threw the deathblow(pun intended) to the game and made it a action-RPG where you had to aim with a crosshair. Wow, sorry for the huge rant, but I was crackheaded for that game for about 2 years, and met a lot of really cool people through it, and it was probably one my greatest gaming experiences I’ve ever had to this date.

  30. Ace Brickman says

    seriously… Battlefront.. Walking in an AT-AT… shooting shit up.. either going for the glory and blowing up the shield generator on Endor grenade by grenade (right next to the ammo robot of course), or tearing through infantry conquering hotspots.. Battling robots or rolling along with machine guns as arms. And who can forget the satellite imagery loading you in to battle..

  31. George says

    1. Lego Star Wars
    2. Lego Star Wars II
    3. Lego Star Wars Complete (Need to make more money, ya know)
    4. Battlefront
    5. Battlefront 2

  32. rdldr1 says

    Ok, for all you who think Battlefront should be on the “best list”;

    I have played all of the games on this list, except for Galaxies. Battlefront consists of arcade-style running and gunning. If you are not running and gunning, you are flying and gunning. Its purely a mindless shooter that lacks the depth and story telling other games have. Just because Battlefront is the best selling Star Wars game does not make it the highest rated.

    Also the gameplay of Battlefront is really dumbed down and arcade-like. If Battlefront had the depth of SW: Republic Commando, only then it would deserve to be on the list. Its quality, not quantity ladies and gentlemen.

  33. AtomF says

    It drives me nuts when kids write these articles. Of course, you don’t know the history of gaming enough to even bring up Jedi Power Battles. That’s right – you can go Google it now.

  35. just2stoned says

    I wasn’t even a fan of star wars that much but I played galaxies for a year or so before the dreaded update came. Even though it was star wars there was just so much you could do with your character. Everything was earned and I was still 1 month away from becoming a true jedi when we got the 1 week notice. The game sucked after that. I gave my account away and never looked back. I actually crafted in that game when crafting was fun and useful (armor wore down after too much use.)

  37. Trans says

    Actually you are wrong about Masters of Teras Kasi. The game takes a long time to truly appreciate, but once you get it down you find that there is a rather surreal fluidity to the controls.

    It’s not as flashy or as intricate as other fighting games, so I don’t expect most gamers would have ever spent enough time playing it to discovered this.

  38. jon says

    I think rebel assault was one of my favorite PC games back in the day. Star wars galaxies was also fun… it failed with MMO mechanics but I still loved it. No battlefront… lego star wars… ??? This article sucks.

  41. Everrett says

    I think that is a pretty well rounded out list, I am sad jedi academy wasn’t in your list as you could chop off arms and through your broken ragged enemies down gaping chasms, but its all good

  43. cbw says

    The first rogue squadron game was mediocre compared to Shadows of the Empire? What are you talking about? The first rogue squadron game was absolutely incredible. It took use of the 4 meg cart for the n64 and was stunning beautiful and had quite a bit of replay value. The best parts about SotE was the vehicle levels and Rogue Squadron enhanced those with video game steroids.

    And just to get on board: where is Lego Star Wars and Battlefront?

  44. gir says

    What about Lego Star Wars???? Toys for children and nerds combined with movies for children and nerds? Sounds like a champion!!!!

  45. gir says

    oh yeah and how could I forget: all in a VIDEO GAME, which are for children and nerds

  46. Darius March says

    Since BATTLEFRONT was not mentioned, I looked at the date to make sure this wasn’t some recycled list from three years. Sadly, it is dated today. The omission of Battlefront to me makes this revision-worthy.

    That, and I may just swear off Top Anything Lists on Digg, as they are frequently such hasty affairs.

  47. gir says

    You’re right, Darius, Battlefront was not mentioned, except in the 30 FUCKING COMMENTS ASKING WHERE BATTLEFRONT IS. Did you want to ask about Lego Star Wars as well? Just to confirm that you’re a retard?

    And I’m appalled by the testicular fortitude of accusing the article of being hasty, when you can’t bother even casting a cursory glance at the long list comments.

  48. euclid says

    OMG- What about Milton from Office Space?
    When he does that whole Jedi stapler bit? Right?
    I can’t believe you left him of this lame-o “list”.

    Haters.

  49. PJ says

    While not an official game the Galactic Conquest mod for BF1942 was the most fun I’ve had with a star wars game ever. How it wasn’t shut down by Lucasarts I’ll never understand.

  54. Glenn says

    What about Star Wars on the original Gameboy? Impossibly hard but atmospheric and great game.

  55. Jerry says

    rdldr1 are you kidding me? Typically I don’t comment on statements people make but honestly bashing Battlefront because it has no depth and only games that have depth should be on the list what about Masters of Teras Kasi where’s the depth in this game? Whether it’s bad or not which Trans was correct saying it takes a long time to truly appreciate the game and the controls work very well. Also rdldr 1 did you read the title Top 5 Best & Worst Star Wars Video games? Where does it say must have depth and story telling? In the future before posting comments “shhhh and just think about what you want to say”.

  56. MarioFanaticXV says

    I wanted to thank whoever made this list for using my video for the Rogue Squadron series; apparently, I’ve received over 6.5k hits from this site, which is nearly 10% of what that video has received in total.

  57. rdldr1 says

    Jerry OBVIOUSLY did not read the article. You actually think Masters of Teras Kasi is one of the best Star Wars video games? Also, you dont know what makes one game better than another game. You also probably have NEVER read a video game review.

    What makes a game like Call of Duty 4 or Bioshock a “game of the year?” While a game may not have a storyline and depth, having it SURE AS HELL MAKES THE GAME ALOT BETTER. You probably rather have a cheeseburger rather than a porterhouse steak.

  58. CoachBennett says

    Ok…. I know this will bring some grief: Jedi Power Battles, SW Bounty Hunter, SW Starfighter (& Jedi not as much)

  60. nparker says

    where is the lego star wars games?they where amazing!

    ps.i like battlefront too,but not as much.

  61. SilentXero says

    I loved BattleFront I and II, as well as Republic Commando…I think they’re awesome!! The Best of list is pretty good but is missing these 3 games ( I also loved Bounty Hunter and Clone Wars for the Gamecube). As far as worst games, where is Star Wars Demolition? That game could have been so great but instead it was total crap.

  62. Cal says

    It amazes me how furious 12 years olds get when a game they like isn’t on SOMEONE ELSE’S TOP FIVE LIST. If you were genius enough to make your own list, then make. Sheesh, stop ragging on other people’s opinions already. No need to get your panties in a twist.

  63. Brent says

    Ian Dransfield is a funny bastard. I’ve played most of these games and was laughing with tears at his comments. For mine jedi academy is the best.

  64. Ngoble says

    Nice list…although admittedly I love Rebel Assault 2.

    Frankly, I would have put (on a personal list) all the flight-sim games up at the top. I love fighters, and I’m not that much into the whole Jedi vs. Sith thing.

  65. ptblank22 says

    i spent a better part of a year trying to beat that episode one game… i gave up for about a month after i couldnt do that one double jump chasing jar jar around. fuck. that was lame.

    although i loved jedi academy, forces of corruption, KotOR and TSL. and force unleashed kicked ass.

  68. ? says

    Yeah uh, what is all this atuff on the best list (beside kotor)? You kinda forgot battlefront 1 and 2 (they should be #1) and you forgot to put lego star wars on the worst list!

  69. karf says

    Hey, where the HELL is battlefront? You a stupid retard? heh? What the hell is wrong with you? DON

  72. Annoyed customer says

    Star wars episode 1 the game for pc wasn’t bad , don’t be a douche . Rebel assault 1&2 are classics. Where the hell is X-wing alliance huh? Jedi knight academy? Alot of people with alot more diction than you have displayed here argue Kotor 2 is better. This is a poor poor article, I’m not even a star wars geek and to be fair you don’t have to be to write this article. All you need is freinds who have enjoyed star wars games, Access to the Internet and to research and find the general medium ground of popularity, not blindly say all games based between ep 1-3 are dross. Battlefront 1&2 have elements of those films woven into there storylines and are the best selling games in recent star wars sales. I just wanted an article that helps me find a decent game to play, not someone being a knob

  74. theo says

    NO WAY
    5 is lego star wars the complete saga wii.
    4 is obi wan.
    2 is star wars the video game PS2 and star wars battlefront 1.
    1 is star wars battlefront 2!