Overall 8.2 Graphics 7.8 Sound 8 Addictive 7.2 Story 7.2 Depth 6.4 Difficulty 6.8
9
Super Star Wars: the Force is strong with this game janus
Ah, Star Wars: probably The best and most prolific science fiction franchise in history. While The prequels were... open for discussion, The original trilogy is definitely in many people's top movies. Like other successful franchises, The game spawned spinoff games. It first started on The NES (which I have never played) and then migrated to The SNES. This review is about The game based on A New Hope (which might contain spoilers from The movie.
Graphics: 9/10
The game was released in late 1992, so a little before The middle of The 16-bits era. It graphics are nice and clear, and there is abundant (and realistic) use of 3D effects.
You start off as Luke Skywalker, but can also incarnate Chewbacca and Han Solo later on. All three have their strengths and weaknesses, so you will have to use them wisely. Luke is The character you will use The most (before reaching The Mos Esley Cantina) and his character was given good attention. He is dressed like in The movie (including The haircut, which does move a little) and his movements are what you would expect from a character in an action game - he can do front flips. I personally thought that Han Solo was easier to control, especially inside The Death Star where all those walls try to crush you. Plus he starts off with The second level gun all The time, which is a big plus. Luke's lightsaber is stronger, no doubt, but since he is just an apprentice it tends to strike randomly.
Speaking of weapons you can get up to 5 different gun, all increasingly stronger. There is The classical blaster with its "realistic" red beam that can reflect on certain surface; there is an upgrade, which fires little blaze balls; there is The homing missile that tracks The enemy, and finally The plasma gun which fires larges shots at The enemy, albeit a little slower than previous guns. You will also have on (rare) occasions thermal detonators which will wipe out any enemy on screen. It though it was a little overdone (technological limitations I suppose) - it almost looked like a nuke - but is always welcomed when you face too many enemies.
The graphics are very faithful to The movie. You start on Tattoine, with all its sand (and quicksands); you also explore The canyon where The sand people live with all The rocks. You even get to explore The Jawa Sandcrawler! I thought that was an interesting addition. You also get to fly your landspeeder twice, where you must defeat enough Jawas so you can progress to The next level without running out of fuel (it never happened to me) or running into holes. On The Death Star The background is faithful to what The dreaded space station looked like. Towards The end of The game you get to experience 3D once more by destroyed TIE fighters and turrets on The top AND getting down The trench to destroy The Death Star while avoiding TIE fighters coming at you.
Finally, The game has a few cutscenes, most of which are pictures from The original movie where you are told The story. You will see R2-D2 first projecting Leia, then see her with Obi-Wan Kenobi (after which he gives you a lightsaber), onto Mos Eisley where you meet Han Solo, etc. You even see The scrolling text when you start The game!
Music: 9/10
While The soundtrack is not varied - there are about 6 tracks total in-game - The fact that it is based on John Williams' score more than makes up for it. I especially liked The remix of The Jawas' theme (when you are inside their Sandcrawler), which was The most realistic one; you can almost hear real violin staccato! There was also this excerpt from The Battle of Yavin (with The huge drums) that also sounded well. In short it made me appreciate The soundtrack once more.
The sound effects were also very-well done. All The guns sound different, The lightsaber sounds "realistic" and so do The Jawas and The Sandpeople. The vehicles you maneuver (or that chase you, like The TIE fighters) sound almost like they are from The movie too.
Addictiveness: 9/10
This is Star Wars; need I say more? Even though this game is not The kind I usually play, it got me hooked right away. The difficulty level is reasonable (see below), The faithfulness to The movie passioned me - although they skipped quite a few scenes - and The music was almost like listening to The soundtrack. I do not know how else I can put it!
Oh, and there are 3 distinct difficulty levels : easy. Brave and Jedi. Are you a true defendant of The Force?
Story: 8/10
You start The game as Luke Skywalker, a farm boy living on The remote and desert planet of Tattoine. He was just minding his business, walking around killing sandpeople and a quicksand monster when C-3PO, a droid, implores you to save his robotic friend, R2D2. So you jump on your landspeeder and go chase The Jawas to infiltrate their Sancrawler. After rescuing him he plays a mysterious message talking about Obi-Wan Kenobi. Could it be old Ben Kenobi, The hermit living far from his farm? He decides to talk to him and R2 plays The whole message, imploring for his help. Kenobi then gives Luke his father's lightsaber, a very strong and ancient weapon of The Jedis.
For more information about The story, just look for Star Wars: A New Hope. Seriously, it is almost The same thing
Depth: 7/10
That department was lacking a little. There are very few secret passages to explore and you can get your gun / life bar upgrades through regular gameplay. Speaking of regular gameplay, The levels themselves we not very deep; you can easily get through them in less than 5 minutes, even less for The 3D stages where you need to shoot a certain number of "things." Finally, except in The Sandcrawler and a few levels in The Death Star, you merely move left and right without any depth.
Difficulty: 4/10
As you know I am more of an RPG guy. So when I say a non-RPG is easy, it IS easy.
First, as I said above you can easily get all The upgrades (weapons and life bar) from regular gameplay; hell you just have to move left and right and The enemies respawn almost instantly so you have more change to kill get and get goodies (including hearts to regenerate your life bar).
The 3D stages are probably The easiest. On Tattoine, you merely need to move left and right to kill Jawas (make sure you avoid holes) and then dash forward to go to The next level (The Sandcrawler or Mos Eisley). On The Death Star with your X-Wing, you merely need auto-fire to shot everything in sight; you just need to avoid TIE fighters. Speaking of them, they are more easy than it seems to avoid in The Death Star trench; what you really need to do is shoot at their firing (their "fireballs) to stay healthy.
Finally, once you reach The Death Star playing with Han Solo, although his gun is weaker than a lightsaber, is almost a given since his rolling makes it easier to get passed crushing walls.
But I still recommend this game to everyone who likes action games, and even more so to Star Wars fans. The graphics are very good, The soundtrack is a good homage to John Williams and The difficulty level is more than tolerable (and adjustable too!)
May The Force be with you!
Graphics 9 Sound 9 Addictive 9 Story 8 Depth 7 Difficulty 4
Review Rating: 5/5
Submitted: 10-04-15
Review Replies: 0
7.2
A well made Movie Tie In... Phoenix2312
I love Star Wars... Plain and Simple, so anything tied in with that License normally has my interest...
Super Star Wars was one of those, and what a great tie in...
However, the term "Super" only refers to the system it was released on, as it has an INSANE difficulty curve!
While the first level is not too challenging, it quickly becomes intense!
Graphics vary between two viewpoints depending on the stage... Most of the stages are a horizontally scrolling shoot em up stage, and graphics are good for these - Well animated and colourful.
The other is an into the screen 3D Stage... Normally for the Space and Travelling Stages - Fast and furious, the ships in the space battles are well constructed and animated.
Story wise - It is just following the movie, so if you have seen the films (Which if you have not - You have either lived under a rock or just plain hate them in which case you will hate this game!) so there is no real point expanding on that.
There is a good
selection of levels to keep you going, but its not exactly the most "Deep game" you are ever going to play.
Despite being a very hard game - It is addictive... It will probably leave you wanting to throw your SNES at teh wall though! (I did! Numerous times!)
Beyond doubt far superior to its NES counterpart - But I have to make a VERY sad confession... I actually like the NES Game...
SUPER STAR WARS may not be an all time classic, but it is a good sign that a basic formula done well CAN give a damn fine Movie Tie-In...
Just a shame most fail to learn from what was achieved here.
Graphics 7 Sound 8 Addictive 6 Story 5 Depth 5 Difficulty 7
Review Rating: 3.7/5
Submitted: 11-14-14
Review Replies: 0
7.5
Super Star Wars G789
Super Star Wars was created by LucasArts, and released on SNES in 1992. The game is based on Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, and is mostly a platformer game in which your primary weapon is the blaster (with potential to use the lightsaber). The game is true to the movie, with minor exceptions. However, this does not detract from the story or the gameplay. Players can progress through the game as Luke Skywalker, Chewbacca, or Han Solo as they're introduced into the storyline. Each character has some differing attributes/abilities, but they can all utilize the blaster, which is really all that's required to get through the game.
Graphics: 8In terms of graphics, you have the layout in all playable levels, as well as cutscenes. Note that in this era of video games, "cutscenes" here are an image, with scrolling text. Within the playable levels, there's great attention to detail in the background, and the art for some of the boss characters look nice, too. Overall, a pretty good looking game for the earlier SNES days.
Sound: 9Did you like the soundtrack for Star Wars? If so, have another listen as you play through the game. The sound and music are well preserved in the translation from movie to video game. The music of each level doesn't repeat too often, either. What else is there to say- John Williams is amazing!
Addictiveness: 6Super Star Wars is not the kind of game I would describe as addictive. A little difficult, yes, but that's a different section of this review. This is the kind of game you play through entirely within about 45 minutes. As there is no password system yet (there are in the sequels), you either get through it all in one shot, or you don't. Still, the game is at least easy enough to pick up and put down at any time.
Story: 8Mostly true to the movie (basic spoilers here!): two droids escape with plans on how to destroy the Empire's Death Star. Luke Skywalker must relay this message to Obi Wan. They obtain a ship piloted by Han Solo and Chewbacca, get captured by the Death Star, escape, then return to the Death Star in an assault, and finally destroy it. This is an oversimplification of the story, I know. However, the game adheres to it; some exceptions include areas that you must fight through, which happen in the movie with little to no conflict (e.g. fighting your way through the sandcrawler, the monster in Mos Eisley, etc.). If you don't know the story of Star Wars yet, I highly suggest watching the movies!
Depth: 6While the game is mostly platformer, some levels break from the format and are more shooter in nature. Examples include the interlude levels where you must travel to the sandcrawler/Mos Eisley, plus some of the Death Star levels. Between just the platform levels, there is variation, as well. There are unique obstacles throughout each level with many different enemies. If anything, the only enemy that stays the same are essentially the stormtroopers. Players can play as Luke/Chewy/Han, but for the first half of the game, the story hasn't met Chewy or Han so the player must use Luke Skywalker. After a couple of levels in, you're then given the choice of switching between lightsaber and blaster. I was a little disappointed in the lightsaber; it's a powerful weapon, but against bosses you have to get dangerously close and they do more damage to you than your lightsaber does to them. Essentially, you're much better off using the blaster. In later levels, after Chewy and Han are unlocked, it's almost always better to just pick Chewy as he has higher base health than either of the other characters. Regardless, all characters play the same way shooting and jumping between obstacles. It's not until the next game where use of the lightsaber as a primary weapon becomes viable.
Difficulty: 8The first time I played this game, I found it pretty difficult. There was typically one specific part in the game I couldn't get past. In essence, the easiest way to get through the game is to not die (very original, yes). Let me elaborate: your gun has 5 levels of power, and these power up items are in specific locations in most levels. If your player dies, you start the level (maybe at a checkpoint) with the lowest level blaster. The reason I had difficulty in early play-throughs was mainly because I died on a certain boss. The level then started you at a checkpoint late in that level with little chance to upgrade your weapon. The result was an even lesser ability to fight said boss, leading to more dying. In other words, you have to be careful about dying to avoid getting stuck in these types of situations. In this way, momentum is the best weapon of the game. In terms of the actual level design, it wasn't insanely difficult. Some of the harder platform stages are within the first half of the game.
Overall: 7.5Super Star Wars is a decent platformer game that stays true to the storyline of its respective movie. Whether you're a Star Wars fan or not, it's a fun, good looking game with great music, that has to be played all in a single playthrough. While the game isn't insanely difficult, dying at certain areas can potentially set the player back a lot. For me, this is a great game to pick up every once in a while to keep it fresh, but not overplayed. In terms of replay value, there are the three basic difficulties (easy/normal/hard), and you can always add extra layers of difficulty/parameters by not using Chewy, or mostly using the lightsaber... assuming it's possible to advance in this fashion!
Pick it up and check it out, it's worth a play.
Graphics 8 Sound 9 Addictive 6 Story 8 Depth 6 Difficulty 8
Review Rating: 3/5
Submitted: 09-20-14
Review Replies: 2
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