Star Wars video games


Over a hundred video games based on the Star Wars franchise have been released, dating back to some of the earliest home consoles. Some are based directly on films while others rely heavily on the Star Wars Expanded Universe.
Star Wars games have gone through three significant development eras: early licensed games, games developed after the creation of LucasArts, and games created after the closure of LucasArts, which are currently licensed to Electronic Arts, and include an EA Star Wars logo.
The first Star Wars games were developed by a variety of companies after Star Wars creator George Lucas licensed the rights to Star Wars video games; several of these games were released under the Lucasfilm Games banner. Early licensed games, released during the 8-bit and 16-bit eras of gaming, barely featured any kind of narrative, and many were action titles that either retold the stories of the original trilogy or focused on a single scene of a film.
Later on, Lucas took interest in the increasing success of the video game market, and decided to create his own video game development company, LucasArts, so he could have more creative control over the games and their narratives. During this era, graphics evolved enough for games to be able to tell complex narratives, leading to games that featured more advanced retellings of the stories of the films, with voice-overs and CGI cut scenes, as well as original titles with new narratives that were set in the same continuity as the films. After The Walt Disney Company's purchase of Lucasfilm in 2012 and the closure of LucasArts the following year, the games developed during the first two eras were discarded from the canon in 2014 and reassigned to the non-canonical Star Wars Legends label.
Following LucasArts' closure, the rights to produce Star Wars video games were reassigned solely to Electronic Arts. Games published during this era are considered canonical to the franchise, and have featured more influence from the Lucasfilm Story Group, responsible for managing aspects of Star Wars canon. The EA Star Wars license had been set to expire in 2023, but in 2021, Lucasarts announced new partnerships for others to produce Star Wars and other Lucasfilm games alongside Electronic Arts.
Although many hobbyists and independent game developers have created freeware games based on the Star Wars movie series and brand, this page lists only the games that have been developed or published by LucasArts, or officially licensed by Lucasfilm.
As of 2020, there have been over 90 million copies of Star Wars games sold.

Early licensed games (1979–1993)

In 1978, Apple Computer produced an unlicensed Star Wars game on cassette tape for its Apple II. As a "space pilot trainee", the player destroys TIE fighters using a first-person heads-up display. The first video game cartridge bearing the name Star Wars appeared that year on the RCA Studio II clones Sheen M1200 and Mustang Telespiel Computer.
The first official licensed Star Wars electronic game was Kenner's 1979 table-top Star Wars Electronic Battle Command. The game had three levels of play. Players took turns examining star systems with the aim of avoiding black holes, locating enemies, and searching for MAGNA, "the FORCE-giving star". The game was billed as "the most exciting computer game you will ever play".

The original trilogy

Licensed releases for the Atari 2600 began with The Empire Strikes Back in which the player piloted a snowspeeder during the Battle of Hoth, destroying AT-AT walkers. Several other games appeared, such as Return of the Jedi: Death Star Battle, where the player controlled the Millennium Falcon in a mission to destroy the second Death Star, and Jedi Arena, the first game to attempt to simulate a lightsaber battle. In 1983, the Star Wars arcade game was released by Atari based on the 1977 film. In this game the player enters the seat of Luke's Red Five X-Wing fighter, battles waves of TIE fighters led by Darth Vader, weaves through towers across the surface of the Death Star, and plummets through the battle station's trench in an attempt to destroy it. The sequel for the game, The Empire Strikes Back, used the same technology to re-create scenes from the second film, including battles with AT-AT walkers and an asteroid field.
In 1987, UK software publisher Domark released several 8-bit versions of the Star Wars vector arcade game, followed by similar conversions in 1988 of The Empire Strikes Back machine. In 1987, Namco developed a Star Wars game for the Nintendo Family Computer for the Japanese market exclusively, based on the 1977 film, but with several liberties taken with its storyline.
In 1991, the platform game Star Wars was released for the Nintendo Entertainment System, Master System, Game Boy and Game Gear, and one year later, Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back covered the plotline of the fifth episode of the saga. Also in 1992, Super Star Wars was released for the SNES, followed by the remaining games in the trilogy: Super Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back and Super Star Wars: Return of the Jedi, the latter also receiving conversions for the Game Boy and Game Gear in 1995.
The following is a list of Star Wars games that are based on the feature films, developed during this development era:

''Episode IV: A New Hope''

  • Star Wars – Arcade
  • * Re-released for: Atari 2600, Atari 5200, Commodore 64, Atari 8-bit computers, ColecoVision, BBC Micro, ZX Spectrum,
  • Star Wars Arcade – Arcade
  • * Re-released for: 32X

    ''Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back''

  • Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back – Atari 2600, Intellivision
  • Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back – Arcade
  • * Re-released for: BBC Micro, Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC, Amiga, Atari.
  • Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back – NES, Game Boy
  • Super Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back – SNES
  • * Re-released for: Wii Virtual Console

    ''Episode VI: Return of the Jedi''

  • Star Wars: Return of the Jedi – Death Star Battle – Atari 2600, Atari 8-bit computers, Atari 5200, ZX Spectrum
  • Star Wars: Return of the Jedi – Arcade, BBC Micro, Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC, Amiga, Atari ST, GameCube
  • Super Star Wars: Return of the Jedi – SNES, Game Boy, Game Gear
  • * Re-released for: Wii Virtual Console
  • Canceled: Star Wars: Return of the Jedi – Ewok Adventure – Atari 2600

    Stand-alone titles

1980s

  • Star Wars: Jedi Arena – Atari 2600
  • * Re-released for: Mobile
  • Star Wars: Droids – Amstrad CPC, ZX Spectrum – based on the Star Wars: Droids series

    LucasArts and modern self-published games (1993–2013)

In the early 1980s George Lucas decided to invest in videogames. So through Lucasfilm, Lucas started his own video game company, which he named LucasArts. However, since Lucas had already licensed the rights to develop Star Wars games, the company instead developed original adventure games and World War II flight combat games. LucasArts regained the rights to develop Star Wars games in 1993, at that point the videogame company put their previous experience in flight simulators to use, and released a Star Wars: X-Wing, the first self-published Star Wars video game and the first space flight simulation based on the franchise.

''The Phantom Menace''

After the release of Episode I in theaters in 1999, games from the prequel trilogy were released for most major platforms. The first releases were video game adaptation and Star Wars Episode I: Racer, based on the podracing sequence in movie. Others, including Battle for Naboo and Jedi Power Battles, were released, but with little success. The first strategic game in the Star Wars expanded universe was titled Star Wars: Rebellion and broke new ground in that it incorporated ships and planets not found in the original canon, such as the Rebel Assault Frigate and the Bulwark Cruiser. But for all its ground-breaking new looks, it was not as successful as would have been hoped. The second strategic title, Star Wars: Force Commander was also released, but failed to keep up with other RTS games, since it was more focused on battling and used a primitive 3D engine. About a decade later, resource gathering lost popularity in favor of faster-paced combat-centric RTS games.

''Attack of the Clones''

In 2002, Attack of the Clones premiered in theaters, and another wave of Star Wars based games, including The Clone Wars, Star Wars Racer Revenge, and Bounty Hunter were released, this time focusing on events and characters from Attack of the Clones such as bounty hunter Jango Fett and the Clone Wars.
Star Wars: Jedi Starfighter was released, allowing the player to be a Jedi Master flying a Jedi starfighter. A third RTS game with a much more conventional approach to the genre's norms and using the Age of Kings engine, Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds, offered a better alternative to those seeking strategy in the Star Wars universe.