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- Video Game Digital Download. Physical Copy; Digital Download; ESRB Rating. Star Wars Yoda Stories PC Game. ESRB Rating: Everyone by LucasArts. Controller, Noise Cancelling Over Ear Headphones with Mic, LED Light, Bass Surround, Soft Memory Earmuffs for Laptop Mac Nintendo Switch Games. 4.1 out of 5 stars 13,307.
Imagine a new Star Wars video game that looks nothing like Battlefront. Quite the opposite. Imagine cute, 16-bit sprites of your favorite heroes from a long time ago. Imagine a top-down action RPG that takes place between The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, but it has nothing to do with whatever was going on in Shadows of the Empire. Imagine a story-rich adventure that takes place during Luke Skywalker’s training on Dagobah with Jedi Master Yoda.
If you haven't played Star Wars: Yoda Stories or want to try this action video game, download it now for free! Published in 1997 by LucasArts Entertainment Company LLC, Star Wars: Yoda Stories was an above-average puzzle elements title in its time.
Imagine the game isn’t really about Luke, but rather, as the name would imply, focuses on Yoda. Think of the Luke segments as tutorials where Yoda introduces new powers or techniques to young Skywalker (and the player) and the real game takes place in the past. Yoda shares stories of his adventures with his Padawan and how he overcame obstacles similar to those which Luke must soon face in an exciting, expansive role playing game, rich with action and exploration, harkening back to 2D Zelda games.
Imagine all you want. I did, and that’s not at all what Yoda Stories is.
I first discovered Star Wars: Yoda Stories in a video game magazine. I imagine it was GamePro because that’s the one I was subscribed to, but despite all my digging I couldn’t find an article or advertisement. I didn’t have a lot of money for games growing up, so it’s not like I could have rushed out and bought it. But I remembered it. Time, however, didn’t seem to reserve much memory for the game as I did. After a while, I thought I had simply imagined it. But the visuals were so clear in my head; it looked like Earthbound or Legend of Zelda: A Link To The Past but Star Wars. It became a mysterious thing, and where I couldn’t know what it was, I could imagine what it could be.
Before Yoda Stories, LucasArts released Indiana Jones and his Desktop Adventures. What a title. LucasArts had a very good reputation as a game developer, particularly for adventure games like Monkey Island, Day of the Tentacle, and Dig. (I don’t know how well Dig specifically was received, but I loved it.) Released for Windows and Mac in 1996, Desktop Adventures takes place in 1930s Mexico, where Indy must overcome thieves and spiders and jaguars (oh my) in order to protect valuable treasures and artifacts. The player navigates procedurally-generated levels using a keyboard or mouse, collecting items while fending off enemies. The colorful, top-down adventure game was, according to reviews, shallow but addictive. That, apparently, was kind of the point. Desktop Adventures was unlike the games they were most well known for, instead serving as a time-filler, something to occupy the same space as a solitaire or Minesweeper. Kotaku’s Luke Plunkett wrote in 2011, “The games had the right idea, then. They just came out too early … if these games came out on something like Facebook (and were improved just a little) they’d be massive hits.”
In 1997, LucasArts brought us Star Wars: Yoda Stories, the second (and final) entry in the Desktop Adventures series. The game plays just like its predecessor: explore randomly generated maps while fighting off enemies to collect items to trade for other items until you finally acquire the item you need to clear the stage. The game was not received terribly well but it did manage to get a port on the Game Boy Color in 1999. I found a copy last year and decided to play it. I knew it would be bad and that it wouldn’t bear any resemblance to what I had imagined years ago. But I was ready. And in terms of badness, Yoda Stories does not disappoint.
The Game Boy Color port looks very similar to screenshots I’d seen of its PC counterpart, but with the quality knob turned way down. It was developed by Torus and published by THQ. The GBC obviously has its limitations but I’ve been thoroughly impressed with what it’s capable of in the right hands. Such care was not taken with this one, but for a game that is backwards compatible with the classic DMG, I suppose it doesn’t look all that bad.
Looks aside, this game doesn’t feel good. Moving Luke around the map is jarring. It feels less like movement than rapidly teleporting from one square to the next and the screen follows in a similarly jerky manner. Pressing the D-Pad points Luke in a direction, while holding or pressing that direction again will move him. This can be useful when examining items but it’s dreadful when maneuvering around enemies. I found myself wildly mashing the A button to swing my lightsaber … swing is a strong word, it’s more of a wiggle. I would wiggle wildly at a snake as it flashed around me. It’s like fighting under an 8-bit strobe light. Oh, and if you’re into hearing the Star Wars Theme over and over again, this game is for you! 15 stages, 1 song.
The first stage begins with Yoda sending Luke to rescue the Millennium Falcon from the clutches of the Empire. You get your first item, a power coupling, and you’re off to Tatooine. The first time I played, I accomplished nothing. I wandered around, I fought some snakes and eventually some stormtroopers, I died and I shut off the game. More recently, I decided to give it another go. I discovered that I could move certain objects by holding the B button and moving around. This revelation meant I could access new areas. I was finding items like blasters, med kits, and keycards to unlock doors. I found Obi Wan Kenobi who gave me the Force. (It’s an item you equip.)
Yoda Stories Walkthrough
I was darting around the planet, collecting key items to trade to various NPCs for other key items to trade for other key items to trade for Han Solo – wait, Han Solo is an item?
I brought Han Solo to the secret base where the Millennium Falcon was hidden and while the smuggler extraordinaire fired up the old hunk of junk, I fought off wave after wave of stormtroopers. I was feeling the rhythm of the strobing pixels, dodging oncoming attacks, alternating blasters and my lightsaber until the final Imperial soldier had fallen. The Falcon took off and I had completed my mission. And I had … fun? Yeah, I actually had fun. Once I had a handle on the clunky controls and figured out that there were objectives, I started sort-of enjoying this stupid game.
Unlike the version for Windows, the maps in Yoda Stories for GBC are not randomly generated. There are 15 unique stages and a password system to pick up where you left off. I haven’t managed to finish all 15. I may never. Just like I may never know why this game was made. It barely has a place in the Star Wars (Legends) canon. It’s a very simple game but manages to be too clunky to say it’s easy enough for casual gamers. It was not especially well liked when it was initially released but managed to get a port over two years later.
It’s not even all that fun to hate on. I just kind of feel sad that it’s not a good game, and that it wasn’t really designed to be a good game. I won’t dwell on it though. I’ll just go and make my own game and if I need to kill a little time, I’ll pop in Dr. Mario. And if I find I’m a little burnt out on Dr. Mario, I’ll play some Tetris. But if I need a good time killer with a little more action, there’s always Solar Striker. And if I crash and burn one too many times in Solar Striker, I’ll always be able to consider playing Star Wars: Yoda Stories.
| Star Wars: Yoda Stories | |
|---|---|
| Developer(s) | LucasArts |
| Publisher(s) | LucasArts |
| Director(s) | Hal Barwood |
| Designer(s) | Hal Barwood Mark Crowley |
| Programmer(s) | Mark Crowley |
| Writer(s) | Hal Barwood |
| Platform(s) | Game Boy Color, Microsoft Windows |
| Release | March 12, 1997 (Windows)[1][2] December 1999 (Game Boy)[3] |
| Genre(s) | Adventure |
| Mode(s) | Single-player |
Star Wars: Yoda Stories is a 1997 adventurevideo game based on the Star Wars franchise developed by LucasArts. It was preceded by Indiana Jones and His Desktop Adventures. In the Star Wars timeline, Yoda Stories is placed between The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, and follows Luke Skywalker as he is completing his training with Jedi Master Yoda.
Gameplay[edit]
Levels in the game are procedurally generated. Yoda Stories has no central plot or definitive goal—it is a collection of games where the player, controlling Luke Skywalker, has to complete an objective like rescuing someone, obtaining an object, etc. Each game starts with Luke arriving at Dagobah in an X-wing. If the player is still a rookie, R2-D2 can be picked up, and dropped anytime for hints. After being found, Yoda gives Luke an assignment and an objective that Luke will be required to complete. Each game world is composed of 100 screens, but the number of active screens can be set in the options menu. To progress in the game, the player must make errands, such as finding a key or an object, until they reach the final puzzle.
The Game Boy Color version was released in 1999. Like the computer version, the gameplay is a number of simple quests, and the game contains fifteen levels. The graphics are not as detailed or colorful compared to the computer game due to the limitations of the Game Boy Color hardware, and controlling the main character is more difficult and less fluid in this version due to the lack of a mouse. With a score of 2.0/10, Yoda Stories holds IGN's lowest-ever review rating for a Game Boy Color game, alongside Tarantula Studios' Evel Knievel (1999).[4]Computer Gaming World gave the Windows version of the game a 1-star score[5].
References[edit]
- ^LucasArts Entertainment Company | 20th Anniversary
- ^'News for March 12, 1997'. Online Gaming Review. March 12, 1997. Archived from the original on December 4, 2000. Retrieved May 4, 2020.
'March 12, 1997: 'Lucasarts' Yoda Stories [... is now available in stores].' - ^'dmg_games.pdf'(PDF). Nintendo. Archived from the original on April 2, 2016. Retrieved August 6, 2016.CS1 maint: BOT: original-url status unknown (link)
- ^http://www.ign.com/articles/2008/10/31/worst-reviewed-nintendo-console-games
- ^Coffey, Robert (July 1997). 'The Empire Strikes Out'. Computer Gaming World (156): 190.
External links[edit]
| Wikiquote has quotations related to: Star Wars: Yoda Stories |
- Star Wars: Yoda Stories at MobyGames