Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire

 PC
User Score
7.7

Generally favorable reviews- based on 39 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 26 out of 39
  2. Mixed: 9 out of 39
  3. Negative: 4 out of 39

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  1. suneater
    May 31, 2017
    1
    Shadows of the Empire is a genuinely bad, clunky mess of fanfiction that is at times barely playable. Sliding around with early 5th-gen single joystick tank controls, you control Not-Han Solo, Dash Rendar, through 10 levels of miserable auto-aiming (except during the extremely disappointing flight sequences) on a mission to escape death at the hands of frequent bugs & broken physics. OfShadows of the Empire is a genuinely bad, clunky mess of fanfiction that is at times barely playable. Sliding around with early 5th-gen single joystick tank controls, you control Not-Han Solo, Dash Rendar, through 10 levels of miserable auto-aiming (except during the extremely disappointing flight sequences) on a mission to escape death at the hands of frequent bugs & broken physics. Of course, calling this auto-aim is generous; even the original DOOM's auto-aim pales in comparison to the "aim in their general direction to snipe your enemies" you'll encounter in this game. Most alt ammos are useless because they either don't ahere to the default blaster's auto-aim or are too close range to be used outside of a specific boss. Don't even bother trying to use the Not-BFG since you'll end up killing yourself half the time from self damage. The only two levels I didn't hate were the Hoth mission and surprisingly the obligatory sewer level. I thought the sewer map had surprisingly good level design which reminded me of a Quake map but otherwise most levels are either boring or too frustrating to enjoy because of the aformentioned issues.

    I wholeheartedly admit I bought this just for the nostalgia rush of getting to play the initial Hoth map again. While it was a much more miserable experience that I remembered as a child, there is still a glimmer of that diamond of fun in this abandoned coal mine of a game. I would only recommend purchasing this if you enjoyed it on the N64 as a youngling and want to experience a working version of it again on Windows.    … Expand
  2. mr123
    May 21, 2018
    2
    I think this game is the worst game I have ever played on my n64 machine. The controls SUCK big time. The graphics are ugly to look at, AND it just was not that fun. For example to duck you press down C. WHAAAAAT! And to press buttons you press R. Also the flying stages are crap you almost have no control on on-rail segments which just is like. STARFOX 64 WAS AN ON-RAIL SHOOTER AND YOU HADI think this game is the worst game I have ever played on my n64 machine. The controls SUCK big time. The graphics are ugly to look at, AND it just was not that fun. For example to duck you press down C. WHAAAAAT! And to press buttons you press R. Also the flying stages are crap you almost have no control on on-rail segments which just is like. STARFOX 64 WAS AN ON-RAIL SHOOTER AND YOU HAD CONTROL OF THE SHIP!! DO YOU SEE WHAT I MEAN! AND THE CONTROLS MAKE A SIMPLE TASK AS WALKING OUT A DOOR HARD! But are the levels fun? NO! they are weird doom like stages that make no sence at all. And the bosses are also crap. OVERALL IT JUST SUCKS. And does not deserve praise. 2/10!!!… Expand
  3. Baltifru
    Apr 19, 2020
    4
    My review is for the Steam version released a few years ago. It has nothing to do with the N64 from 1997 which is a masterpiece.

    This game is a real catastrophe. Let me start by saying I played the N64 version when I was young and I loved it. Star Wars universe, great music, side adventure to the episodes 4-5-6... Was great. But this "remake" is a joke. No effort whatsoever was made    My review is for the Steam version released a few years ago. It has nothing to do with the N64 from 1997 which is a masterpiece.

    This game is a real catastrophe.

    Let me start by saying I played the N64 version when I was young and I loved it. Star Wars universe, great music, side adventure to the episodes 4-5-6... Was great. But this "remake" is a joke. No effort whatsoever was made to adapt the game. It is basically the exact same game with a few lines of code to adapt it to support keyboard and controller play. The gameplay is completely outdated: you will spend most of your time dancing around the corner of a wall to maximize your killing potential on the enemies behind the corner and minimize the damage they can deal to you. You have one laser weapon which you will basically use all the time because the missiles and their fake live control are useless and never hit anything.

    All this, I could accept (since it was already the core of the gameplay on N64) if nothign of the following was true...

    The controls are awful. Nobody should look for excuses like "with a controller it's much better than with the keyboard !": how the hell can you not set the "Move" control ?? You can rebind any other key, but not the "Move" one. Consequently, you have to accept that a very small move of your mouse will potentially throw you into the ravine. Seriously, a mouse move should only control the aim, not the movements... The result of this is that you will constantly fall off cliffs accidently. To make things even worse, the handling of the terrain is terrible and will drastically increase the probability you fall off every single cliff there is in the game. To tell you how this works concretely: sometimes when you make a step (in any direction) on a non-horizontal surface, the character starts inexplicably drifing into that direction with nothing you can do but try to keep your calm while losing a precious life. More generally, all platform phases are a real pain and induce useless frustration.

    Don't buy this game. Even less so if you have loved the N64 version: it will completely waste your good memories of the game.    … Expand