32 BBY: Star Wars: Obi-Wan

 

I mostly enjoyed Yoshishide’s walkthrough of X-Box’s Star Wars: Obi-Wan.  You can find the first video here, and all the other videos are linked after it.  What I did play of this game was tremendously fun, despite Yoshishide’s continual exclamations to the contrary.  His comments on the controls of the game were spot-on.  Having the right toggle stick be the lightsaber attack was ridiculous.  It made control of the character difficult.  But for all of Yoshishie’s ballyhooing about how terrible the game was to play it sure did seem like he was having fun.  As it is, I think Star Wars: Obi-Wan is a game I’ll return to in the future to play my way through.

What I didn’t like of the walkthrough was the continual swearing, and after video 5 I watched the remainder of the walkthrough with the volume down.  With three little ones around the house profanity is something I’ve all but edited from my vocabulary.  The English language is old, deep, and descriptive, and there are other words I can use to express anger, frustration, or disgust. Don’t get me wrong though, it’s not like I’ve never sworn.  I grew up in an Irish household so I can swear with the best of them.  Like Ralphie’s dad from A Christmas Story, my father was a masterful curser, and I learned from the best.  He’s swearing would paint an artistic tapestry, my favorite occasions being when he would split a word to insert a curse.  It’s not just unbelievable, but un-@&%$#!&-believable.  I guess that’s why I enjoyed A Christmas Story so much.  The scene where Ralphie swore in front of his father was a scene taken straight from my own childhood.  Instead of blaming Schwartz however, poor Shawn Z. got the blame.

My desire to stop swearing comes from trying to set a good example for my children. Agree or disagree with the statement, I think for most people having kids makes them want to be better people.  Or perhaps that’s my naïve hope.  I’m reminded of St. Paul’s letter to the Corinthians when he wrote: “When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. But when I became an adult, I set aside childish ways” (1 Cor: 13:11).  My attempt to stop swearing is my attempt to set aside such childish things.  I’m no longer an adherent of the philosophy, ‘If it feels good I should do it’.  Though swearing may make me feel good for the moment, it does not mean I should do it.  It’s a bankrupt worldview.

Anyway, I’ve digressed.  As for the video game itself, I have a bunch to say, the first being the terrible voice acting of Obi-Wan Kenobi.  I’m not sure who the actor was but he sounded like a Ewan McGregor impersonator with a cold.  It was painful to listen to.

I enjoyed the part of the game where Obi-Wan got to square off with some of the Jedi Masters in the dueling ring.  An underutilized character form the EU is Sineese Tiin, and he was one of the Masters Obi-Wan dueled. Though I myself never got that far in to the game, he seemed to be an easy opponent for Yoshishide. 

There seemed to be a bit of a continuity error regarding the Coruscant guard, and the Wookieepedia page of this game makes mention of it.  As it is, the Coruscant guard an interesting element of the first chapter. Obi-Wan had to rescue a member of the guard who got caught while undercover.  When I went to Wookieepedia to investigate the history of the Coruscant guard it seems  there is a bit of an incongruity between how the organization is presented in the game – as an apparent arm of the Coruscant police force that welcomes aliens among its ranks – namely Quarren, and what Wookieepedia has to say about it.  According to Wookieepdia the Coruscant Guard: “…began as a Republic military unit comprised of clone shock troopers and were later a specialized branch of the Imperial stormtroopers”.  It seems the Coruscant Guard, at least according to this game, existed long before it was made up exclusively of clones. But like I said, the Wookieepedia page on the game tries to account for this inconsistency by suggesting that the Quarren who was undercover was not part of the Coruscant guard, rather, the Senate guard. 

Moving on, cortosis is a Jedi foil I always find intriguing.  The mention of cortosis was neat, along with the Jin’ha.  Taking a look at their Wookieepedia page the Jin’ha are not mentioned outside of this game, but apparently are a species who had cortosis ore readily available, and even sold it to the Trade Federation for the production of their own assassin droids.  The scene in part 7 where Obi-Wan was battling assassin droids in the throne room of Theed armed with cortisis blades was neat.  It had quite the cinematic feel to it.  I think there are two neat story elements here one could mine for their own Star Wars short stories.  Do these Cortosis laced assassin droids make a second appearance anywhere down the line in Star Wars history?  Why wasn’t the Trade Federation making more of these to battle the Jedi instead of those useless B1 droids?

What I enjoyed most about the game was the first half, since it was material not found in the film.  The first part of the game before Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon are on the Trade Federation ship reminded me of the Young Apprentice series, especially when Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon had to head  to the planet Obredaan to rescue Eath Koth and Plo Koon. The end of that level was particularly cool when the three Jedi Masters appear at the end of the level to help Obi-Wan with the Jin’ha.

There were also interesting bits of plot twists in the game, namely; when Amidala (really Sabe) was kidnapped by some tusken raiders and it was up to Obi-Wan to rescue her.

The final battle with Maul was somewhat anti-climactic, and its presentation was changed a little with Obi-Wan force-pushing Maul into the pit, and not slicing him in half. 

As it is, I’m glad to be done with this source.  It’s becoming increasingly more difficult to find time to write for my project.  For those of you still following my progress I thank you for your patience.  It’s my hope to get to Bounty Hunters: Aurra Sing before the end of the school year. 

For my next post I’m going to take a look at Obi-Wan Adventures, a game found on the Gameboy platform.  Until then my friends, may the Force be with you.