Super Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back

Overview

Super Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back (known in Japan as Super Star Wars: Teikoku no Gyakushuu, the sub-title loosely translated to "Counterattack of the Empire") is a sci-fi side-scrolling action platformer (with vehicular combat levels) developed by Sculptured and published by JVC for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System in June 1993.

The sequel to the original Super Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back is based on the 1980 film of the same name. After Rebel Alliance hero Luke Skywalker scouts through the icy wastelands of Hoth, he (along with Han Solo and Chewbacca) must evade a full-scale assault from the Galactic Empire. Later levels are split between Luke's Jedi training on Dagobah and Han's search for his friend Lando Calrissian in the floating Bespin colony of Cloud City.

The game was later published by LucasArts in Europe and Victor Interactive in Japan, as well as re-released in North America years later by THQ. It was digitally re-released for the Wii (via Virtual Console) by LucasArts on October 2, 2009. The game received a direct sequel (that ties in with the movie's sequel).

Gameplay

Han Solo, Chewbacca, and Luke Skywalker all return as playable characters but each level has only one available character. Each character has a secondary weapon in addition to the upgradeable blaster: a lightsaber (Luke), a handful of grenades (Han) or a spin attack (Chewie). Also new to the game is the ability for Luke to block blasters with his lightsaber and the double jump. During the Dagobah missions, Luke can collect 8 different Force powers: elevation, mind control, slowdown, saber control, saber deflect, invisible, heal and freeze.

There are again three difficulty levels: Easy, Brave and Jedi. To compensate for the intense difficulty, a password system was introduced to prevent players from having to beat the game in one sitting.