Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire

Video Game
1996
T

IMDb RATING

8.0/10

YOUR RATING

Play trailer1:10

1 Video

10 Photos

Action Adventure Sci-Fi

You are the protector of Luke Skywalker.You are the protector of Luke Skywalker.You are the protector of Luke Skywalker.

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

8.0/10

YOUR RATING

See production info at IMDbPro

Trivia
The piece of music played at the title screen/select file screen was not composed for the game, it was unused music composed for Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980).

Crazy credits
"Never Actively Tried to Sabotage the Project, Tim Schafer, the Raccoon King"

Alternate versions
The N64 and PC version differ greatly. The PC version has sharper and smoother gameplay graphics (using a 3D card) than the N64 version. The PC version and N64 version have slightly different cutscenes, that being the PC version has full-motion cinematic cutscenes with sound effects and voices, while the N64 version just has drawn sketches with text at the bottom of the screen. Plus, during gameplay, where in the N64 version you had to read what the characters were saying to you, the PC version has voices.

Connections
Featured in Gamesmaster: Episode #5.11 (1995)

Soundtracks
Main Title/The Ice Planet Of Hoth
(from Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980))
Written by John Williams
Used in opening cinematic and main title screen

As Star Wars games go, this one proves to be the most ambitious with its genre-mixing.

Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire is probably the most ambitious and overly-stretched game of the franchise in terms of gameplay styles, but it actually adds to the sense of gaming variety; at least its non-conventionality worked in favor of it as opposed to something like Superman 64 did (which was the opposite of innovative or well-done), and Nintendo was still testing the waters of 3D video-gaming in general. So historically speaking, Shadows of the Empire was probably too far ahead of its time and not meant for the right system technically speaking (the N64 cartridges could only manage mere 12MBs) but kudos to Lucasfilm for pushing the boundaries of a young technology and medium in 1996.

Shadows gets 4/5 stars.