Why Super Star Wars is a brilliant 16-bit throwback to classic cinema
Super Star Wars (1993)
Super Star Wars (1993)
It’s strange for me to admit, as a man who loves movies, but I don’t really bother with the cinema anymore. I’ve only been to the flicks a handful of times in the last ten years, and three of those visits were to see Star Wars films, Episodes 7, 8 and 9. That’s the God’s honest.
It’s not even the cost of going that puts me off, either – yes, I’m a tightwad. I’m forever falling for the old glue-a-coin-to-the-ground trick. They even get me with penny coins. But ten or fifteen quid for a cinema ticket is fine. I don’t usually get the standard truck container full of popcorn or the vat of Coca-Cola either, which helps with more cost-saving.
No, what stops me from going to the cinema these days is that sitting in a darkened room watching a screen for a couple of hours will just send me to sleep. Also, the last time I burst open a can of beer during the film, some of the parents looked at me funny. That happened to me while going to see Toy Story 3, so I wasn’t going to repeat that for Toy Story 4.
But here’s the thing, in my opinion: the spectacle of the cinema is mostly gone. There’s nothing that grabs your face and blows your face’s socks off anymore, because everything can be faked via computer trickery, or perhaps we’ve seen it all before by now.
Who remembers anything about Avatar? Apart from its role in heralding the start of yet another gimmicky 3D fad, there was nothing to savour after those lengthy three hours. Avatar 2, and the other twenty upcoming sequels, won’t leave any footprint in modern culture, either.
Before that, what were the last films that properly stunned us with their visual effects? Jurassic Park and Terminator 2, I suppose, which brings us back to the 90s. Perhaps it was earlier than that, but it certainly wasn’t the likes of Flash Gordon. No, for cinema that wowed us all, the great debt here belongs to Star Wars.
Sorry, must give it the proper title these days. That’s Episode IV, A New Hope, blah blah blah. And we can’t forget the numerous Special Editions and Neckbeard Editions either. It’s not even about who shot first anymore, it’s how many stupid bells and whistles they can cram into the Han and Greedo scene, before one of them finally gets CGIed out of the scene altogether.
Back to my laboured point – getting wowed by the cinema. If there’s one thing we can envy the baby boomers for, apart from their ability to buy and maintain a single-income house, it’s that they were the very first to witness the Star Wars franchise. I’m specifically talking about that overhead Star Destroyer scene from the intro to A New Hope, a sequence so mesmerising that you could have mistaken it for real life.
The enormous ship just keeps going and going, like your jaw’s journey to the floor, and if that doesn’t grab your attention then I don’t know what will. Sometimes people ask the question of TV shows, books or games: “how long does it take to get into it?” And in some cases the answer you get is ludicrous, “oh. it doesn’t get good until season 3,” as if you had 25 hours to spare.
But I can confidently say that, if the iconic title crawl, with its blaring fanfare, followed by that Star Destroyer shot filling the room, if that doesn’t get you enthused about Star Wars and what might lie ahead, then you may as well stop the video and forget about it. You’ll save yourself the effort of getting through nine films, and a whole lot more spin-offs, comic books, cartoons, games, novelisations and fanfics besides.
Star Wars IV as a cinematic experience… it really does seem a long, long time ago and all that, from a former life even. A life before you could airbrush out some of the rougher parts of your 3D modelwork with CGI. It was a point in the series way before dramatic lightsaber clashes were interspersed with dreadful special effects, and high grounds.
The Empire Strikes Back is probably an objectively better film. But A New Hope has always been my favourite of the saga. It’s the one that walks the line most finely between campiness and drama, between cringey lines and funny dialogue. It introduces the major characters, including Darth Vader, plus Peter Cushing as the delectably evil Tarkin. And it’s got some proper 70s hair.
Of course, being that it’s one of the most iconic sci-fi films ever, it was almost obliged to lend itself to video games. And for my money, the best of those is Super Star Wars, a game released – would you believe it – on the Super Nintendo. You’d better be a super player as well, because you’d probably have a better chance at flying an X-wing and making that Death Star photon torpedo shot yourself than you’d have at beating this game.
It wouldn’t be so bad if you had a save file, or even a password system, but I’m afraid there’s none of those in this star system, young padawan. Suffer too many deaths to blind jumps, insta-kill lava, or formidable bosses, and the Cantina Band shall be playing your funeral march. This game is a bloody tough cookie, even though it seems to be Super Empire Strikes Back that’s generally considered the toughest of the SNES trilogy.
You may be tempted, after suffering a Game Over, to whine “what a piece of junk!” at your SNES controller. But you don’t need to dig up that old fossil to play - bizarrely, the game was adapted for PS4, with leaderboards don’t you know, so you can have a shot at it with some hi-tech machinery.
Some of the levels give you a character select option, which is nice, and since Luke quickly acquires the lightsaber you’d imagine he’d be the best character. And indeed, as you jump and spin your lightsaber in a fashion all too reminiscent of Yoda’s ridiculous acrobatics in the prequels, you’ll think you’ve backed the right man.
In reality though, the lightsaber has deceptively small range, probably because Luke’s sprite just swings wildly, inches away from his face, so he ends up getting battered by the millions of enemies onscreen. A lack of Jedi training, I suppose. But I won’t judge him, because wouldn’t we all be like that with a lightsaber? I’m sure having one would be great fun, for 10 seconds. Then I’d slice my arm clean off, like that tough guy in the Cantina.
No, this is a game where the blaster reigns supreme, and you can upgrade it four separate times for maximum laser destruction, but if you die once then you lose all your powerups. This can absolutely happen at a boss where you really need that extra firepower, and if the lightsaber can’t compensate, you could well be up the creek.
In terms of characters, you can pick Luke, for an alternate weapon; Han, for his coolness; and Chewie, who has more health, although he presents a bigger target. And you’ve also got to endure his annoying growl sound effect, over and over.
But oh, the sound effects and music are on point here as well. Sometimes you play a licensed game, and the composers and sound designers just do what they want. The producers might not have even paid to use the movie scores.
But it all sounds great here, particularly the blasters and the TIE fighters, which is ideal for the battles that take place in space, an excellent early showcase of the Super Nintendo’s potential. There aren’t a massive amount of music scores in the game, but hearing John Williams in 16-bit is the business, believe me. Play it loud in stereo if you can.
And actually, if you happen to know a projectionist, and you don’t mind things becoming pixellated beyond all recognition, why not try playing Super Star Wars on a cinema screen? This game may take a few creative liberties, and it’s balls-hard. But it’ll still be a far better watch than some of the Disney sequels and spin-offs.
6 February 2024