Developed by Lucas Arts
Published by Lucas Arts

3d Fighter
1-2 player(s)

Not too long ago in a developing house not that far away, an idea for a new game 
to take place in the Star Wars universe was forming.  Lucas Arts, producers of 
great Star Wars game series such as X-Wing and Dark Forces, had begun the 
development process of putting characters from the Star Wars universe into a 
fighting arena.  Star Wars and fighting game fans alike were excited by the 
premise.  The idea of taking part in the combat of Luke against Darth Vader or 
Han Solo against Boba Fett, as well as "what if" type scenarios such as Chewbaca 
against a Tusken Raider is awe inspiring to say the least.  We all had similar 
type scenarios going when we used to play with our Kenner action figures during 
our childhood, didn't we?  

Obvious movie storyline conflicts aside, the idea oddly enough remains an 
excellent premise for a fighting game.  Unfortunately the final product is 
anything but excellent.  It's fairly average, and without the Star Wars tie-in, 
it possibly would have been the worse fighting title put out this year.

Let's start off with the great.  A majority of the sound effects and background 
music are straight from the movies, and of high quality.  The instrumental 
soundtrack is just as powerful here as it was in the movies, and the selections 
are perfect for a fighting game.  The waving of light sabers, the sound of 
blaster fire, and the background sounds of flying air craft are incredible.  
This was expected, however, and has become a staple for Lucas Arts' Star Wars 
titles.

Graphically, it's a mixed bag.  Some elements look fantastic, while others look 
fairly mediocre, and yet others look undetailed and uninspired.  There are some 
light sourcing effects, the sabers inparticular cast off a colored glow on their 
weilder, and the carbonite chamber's floor glows an eerie orange.

The character roster ranges in quality.  Most are great(Boba Fett & Leia) or 
adequate(Han & Luke) representations of their movie counterparts, but a few, 
like the Gamorean Guard and Chewbacca for example, really could have used some 
more polygons.  The visual appearance of the cast overall is acceptable although 
not impressive.

The backgrounds seem to cover the same spectrum.  Some of them are excellent, 
while others are drab and poorly designed, and unfortunately, there's only 9 in 
all.  Background animation is essentially limited to two items maximum, usually 
consisting of a small environmental effect such as the dust effects caused by 
wind or a floating mist, and a large wandering item such as an AT-AT or flying 
craft.  Other inanimate objects in the background are either composed of 
polygons or bitmaps.  In some cases there is no background animation at all.  
Tatooine inparticular is an extremely boring arena.  It's all brown and the 
surrounding buildings(we assume this is Jabba the Hutt's palace) look disfigured 
and unrecognizable.  The Emperor's throne room has no animation either, but at 
least it's familiar.  The Hoth arena, on the other hand, is quite refreshing as 
it has falling snow and a periodical swooping snow speeder.

Now for the not so good, the gameplay.  The game certainly isn't newbie 
friendly.  Canned combos which are obvious in games like Soul Blade and Tekken 
are scarce here, and the normal combo system is difficult to figure out, and 
when you do, you find that the timing of it is sluggish.  Some characters are 
useless without their weapons drawn, and you begin to wonder if it just wouldn't 
have been more efficient to merge the weapon and nonweapon modes together.

On the plus side there is a large variety of special moves, although some of 
them are difficult to discover.  Getting used to the sluggish timing also makes 
them initially hard to pull off consistently.  Oddly enough, some of them should 
have been normal moves, as they have no flash to them.

The preprogrammed 10-hit style combos are a nightmare to pull off.  You have to 
be lightning quick to hit the appropriate buttons in sequence as the allowed 
pause between button presses is extremely short, to the point of being absurd.  
You're best off not bothering, especially with the standard controller.  The 
same could be said of the throwing system.  To throw, you hit Triangle + X or 
Square + Circle, so in order to hit both buttons simultaneously, you'll have to 
let go of the pad and reposition your fingers somehow.

If you stick with the game, you'll eventually learn how it works, but initial 
impressions are likely to turn off Jedi wanna-be's, and you'll probably find it 
difficult wanting to try.  Even when you do figure out how the whole game is 
supposed to work, the gameplay is still below current standards.  At times you 
get the feeling that this game was rushed to market, and never finished it's 
fine tuning process.  Had the control been tightened up so the game wasn't so 
sluggish, combos would have been much easier to pull off and string together, 
and the title would have been much more up to par.

Which leads to some more items of dissappointment which support the "unfinished" 
feeling the game has.  The character roster is extremely basic.  With such a 
huge universe of characters to pick from, we're given 8, plus 4 secret ones.  
What's worse is the so-called secret extra characters are blatant clones of 
existing ones.  Jodo Kast is Boba Fett with different colors, the stormtrooper's 
control is identical to Han's, and Slave Leia is Princess Leia in her bare 
essentials.  Granted, it's nice to see Leia in her slave outfit, and the 
stormtroopers alternate outfit is that of an Endor biker scout, but one can't 
help but feeling cheated.  At least Darth Vader is a variant of Luke, but still, 
where's Lando, IG-88, The Emperor, Yoda, The Emperor's Royal Guard, Bib Fortuna, 
Bossk, Greedo, Lobot, Admiral Ackbar, Hammerhead, Walrusman, any ewok, a jawa, 
any of the droids and all those other oodles of characters which took up space 
in my Darth Vader action figure case?

Mara Jade makes an appearance here, a character introduced in the Zahn trilogy 
of books, and Jodo Kast is from the Dark Horse comic book series as I understand 
it, but the point is that both of these characters are totally unfamiliar to 
general Star Wars fans.  As is Arden Lyn, the character the storyline here is 
supposed to revolve around(I'll get to this complaint in a moment).  The only 
question I have is why?  Noone knows who these characters are, as they never 
appeared or were mentioned in any of the movies.  Why put in general unknowns 
when you have such a large pool of instantly recognizable characters to pull 
from?  Lando and IG-88 were expected, and sadly they're nowhere to be found.

Arden Lyn was created for this game, as I understand it, so as to have a 
storyline to have as a reason for these battles to occur.  Honestly, this is a 
pretty weak premise.  Not only is Arden taking up space and development time 
that could have been used towards one of the aforementioned recognizable 
characters, a dozen or more other storylines could have been used as a basis.  
Have Yoda and the Emperor arrange a series of fantasy battles in a quest to see 
how strong their respective sides of the force are.   At least that would 
explain Luke vs. Han matchups.

There's just too much missing that was expected of this title, and as is, it 
barely scratches the surface of an amazing universe.  Where's a cantina stage, 
or a stage where you're on a skiff hovering over the Sarlaac pit?  Why is The 
FMV ending for each character extremely short and pointless?  I guess all these 
elements will be addressed when the sequel's put into development.  I'm sure 
there will be a sequel, there's always a sequel.  It's just sort of annoying 
that with this title it's so obvious what's missing, what needs tweaking, and 
what shouldn't be included.  I guess Lucas Arts was more concerned with getting 
this title out in time for the holiday season than giving the fans what they 
really wanted.  

Star Wars: MOTK will always be known as a title that could have been great, but 
came up far too short when it delivered.  It's still an excellent premise, and I 
pray Lucas Arts is reading and will remember all of the complaints about MOTK 
and address them should they ever decide to do a sequel.  As is, is it worth 
checking out?  If you aren't a fan of Star Wars, stay away, stay far far away...  
If you are a fan, rent first or buy it from a store with a return policy.  
Although the game is painful to play the first few times, there is average 
fighting fun to be found if you have the endurance to stick it out, and learn 
how.  May the force be with you if you decide to start down that path.


Peter Bott
faethor@ptd.net

*** Overall - 6.0 ***


*** Graphics - 6 ***

 +  Some lightsourcing effects.
 +  Polygonal background vehicles in some stages.

+/- Character designs are adequate, but not impressive.

 -  Slight FPS drop during heavy animation.


*** Sound - 9 ***

 +  Perfect movie instrumental selections for background music.
 +  Sound effects are direct from the movie, and of high quality.


*** Gameplay - 4 ***

 +  Large amount of special moves.

 -  The game engine feels too much like a "beta", needs tweaking.
 -  Sluggish response.
 -  Some of the special moves lack any flash or reason for use.
 -  Throw system is too difficult.
 -  Preprogrammed 10-hit style combos' timing is absurd, making them useless.
 -  Some super moves take off entirely too much energy.


*** Replayability - 5 ***

 +  Star Wars characters.
 +  Team, survival, and practice modes.

+/- Very average fighting engine.

 -  Not enough Star Wars movie characters.
 -  FMV Endings are painfully short and pointless.