More Classic Star Wars games on GOG

[Raider]

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As no one has made a thread about this. I guess I'll use one of my ten posts a year to make one. The 2nd wave of classic Star Wars games have landed on GOG! Six more come this Thursday and more next week. (Those might be non-Star Wars classic Lucasarts games)

"Raider," you my ask, "these games are pretty old. Are they still good?" Allow me to answer.

X-Wing: Alliance

• This was last title in what many consider the greatest series of Space Combat Sims. As to be expected the combat, missions, variety of flyable ships, multiplayer (you can still find active servers) is top notch. It begins with you helping haul freight for your families' shipping business when you get involved with the Rebels who are fleeing from their defeat on Hoth. It ends with you blowing the Death Star II up in the Millennium Falcon. Between the beginning and end it interlaces your missions with the Rebels with helping your take sweet sweet revenge. Buy it. Buy a flight stick for it and yell like Lando when you finally, finally escape the exploding Death Star.

X-Wing vs Tie Fighter

• While I do have this game I never actually played it. I understand on release it was purely an online multiplayer deathmatch style game. Expansion packs added in story campaigns for the Rebels and Imperials along with an 8 player coop. These are included with the GOG release. If you enjoy the other Star Wars space sims then buy it, but don't start with this one if you haven't played the others.

Star Wars: Battlegrounds Saga

• Did you enjoy Age of Empires 2? Yes? Buy this then. It's AOE2 in a Star Wars skin. If you don't like AOE2 or RTS games then pass on this.

Dark Forces

• You play as ultra badass Kyle Katarn in this Doom-style shooter that started the Jedi Knight video game series. No force powers or lightsabers. Good old fashion blasters and rocket launchers help you steal the Death Star plans and stop the dreaded Dark Trooper project. Play it if you enjoy the old throw back shooters or want see how the Darth Star plans were really stolen (Sorry Han Solo Trilogy)

Battlefront II

• The Star Wars Battlefield in 3rd person with hero units. The story campaign follows from the beginning of the Clone Wars to the Battle of Hoth with you playing as Republic and then Imperial Stormtroopers. While servers were suppose to go offline earlier this year I understand with some tinkering you can still get'em working and playing with others. They did seem rather barren the last time I was on, but hey if you enjoy Battlefield-style action with it is in a Star Wars skin. (The all hero map is unbalanced as a drunk, but some great fun)

Knights of the Old Republic 2: The Sith Lords

• Last, but far from least. What many consider the greatest story told in the Star Wars expanded universe (fight me KOTOR1 fans). It adds a better crafting system and the ability to sway your party members to the Dark or Light Side. Five years after the events of KOTOR1. Revan has vanished into unknown space for reasons no one knows (unless you played TOR). The Republic teeters on the knifes edge for though the Jedi Civil War was won. It now struggles under the cose to rebuild as threats both seen and unseen help push it closer to total collapse. Will you save it or push it into total abyss? I cannot stress enough that if you buy this to be sure to also get the The Sith Lords Restored Content Mod which patches back in a great deal of cut content (thanks for cutting 4 months of development time LA) that is critical to the story and fixes so many glitches.

Rogue Squadron 3D

• This was my favorite game on the N64. Where X-Wing: Alliance is a first-person Space Combat Sim. This is a third-person action arcade flyer. You play as Luke Skywalker during his time as Rogue Leader. It was a ton a fun on the N64 with a variety of missions and ships and unlockables. Unfortunately some people (myself included) are having trouble getting joysticks or 360 controllers working with it. Others are reporting the game recognizing their controllers upon launch and having no problems. So you're looking at getting a great game or a great game you can't play. GOG will hopefully have a fix for the problem.
• The fix for the mentioned controller problem has been found. It is due to the game running in compatibility mode. To fix this go into the game folder. Installed drive > GOG Games > Star Wars - Rogue Squadron 3D> ROGUE > Right click Rogue Squadron.EXE > select Properties > select compatibility tab > Change settings for all users > uncheck run this program in compatibility for. Boot the game and select Settings > Joystick > Defaults and you're good to go.

Empire at War

• This is a real time strategy game with space combat. I've never played Empire at War, but after reading numerous reviews of this game the consensus is that the ground combat in terrible and the space combat is wonderful. Buy if you enjoyed Battlegrounds or Rise of Nations.

Rebellion

• Don't buy this. It suffers from terrible AI and broken mechanics.

Jedi Knight: Dark Forces 2 bundled with Mysteries of the Sith

• The second game in the newly christened Jedi Knight series. Set after Return of the Jedi. Kyle Katarn's father is murdered by Dark Jedi looking for the legendary Valley of the Jedi. Kyle takes up the lightsaber of a Jedi and pursues his father's killers. The game has live action cut scenes that were in style at the time and allows different light side and dark side endings.
• The expansion has been bundled and as a separate download. Where you get to play as former Imperial Hand Mara Jade who is carrying out missions for the New Republic. When Kyle Katarn vanishes investigating a Sith Temple you head out to find him.
• I'd like to point out that the Steam release of these titles are near unworkable. The GOG releases have fixed everything (besides 3D acceleration on Windows 8/8.1. Which may or may not work for you.) and are actually playable.

Republic Commando

• A tactical FPS where you command Delta squad. The elite clone commando group. Think Halo, Metroid Prime, and Rainbow 6 all smashed together into a Star Wars game. It's pretty great. Buy it.

Starfighter

• Did you enjoy the Rogue Squadron trilogy? Well here's a game like it. (But is it good Raider?) I have never played it.

Edit 4: Added Dark Forces 2, Republic Commando, Starfighter.
Edit 3: Added fix for Rogue Squadron controller recognition.
Edit 2: Added Rogue Squadron, Empire at War, and Rebellion.
Edit: There's more words in this post than the combined last two years of posts from me lol.

 

[EnderM5]

Thanks, man. I already have played some of these, but not all. I'll check it out. You know that you can also get most, if not all of these, right off of Steam?

 

[Raider]

Thanks, man. I already have played some of these, but not all. I'll check it out. You know that you can also get most, if not all of these, right off of Steam?

XWA, XvT, and BGS are only available on GOG and have never been on Steam. Since KOTOR2, Dark Forces, and BF2 were also just released on GOG and are in the screenshot I took. I decided it was best to go over them too.

 

[Skyway]

Out of thes 6 I only play BF2 and SW:KOTOR2
BF2: I own on the old x-box and I was once a king of dogfights. Love game.
SW:KOTOR2: Not as good as 1 but still one of m top fav games. +1

 

[Brandon Rhea]

I loved Galactic Battlegrounds. I'm definitely getting this.

 

[Raider]

I added Rogue Squadron, Empire at War, and Rebellion to the first post.

In addition I've done some limited play testing on Windows 10 preview build 9226 and KOTOR (steam), KOTOR 2 (steam), X-Wing: Alliance (GOG), and Rogue Squadron (GOG; bar control issues) all launch and play smoothly. Tie Fighter and X-Wing should also have no problems as they received the same fixes as other GOG released games.

This website however is experiencing typing issues on the Windows 10 Preview. I'm unsure if it's a lack of support from the web page or the Windows build.*

*Problem seems to actually be with Internet Explorer. As it is not happening on Chrome or Firefox.

 

[TwoSidedHeart]

OMFG I was wondering where I could find Galactic Battlegrouds. Its not on steam. Also, Empire at War has an AMAZING full conversion Mod called Republic at War. Just for that its a must buy haha

 

[Raider]

I added the fix for Rogue Squadrons controller recognition problems. It's due to the game running in compatibility mode.

Installed drive > GOG Games > Star Wars - Rogue Squadron 3D> ROGUE > Right click Rogue Squadron.EXE > select Properties > select compatibility tab > Change settings for all users > uncheck run this program in compatibility for.

Boot the game and select Settings > Joystick > Defaults and you're good to go.

 

[Lavi]

GameRanger is a viable means to find servers for Battlefront II and Empire at War, since they both utilize the now-defunct GameSpy service. However, I never used the service myself for either games, so I'm not sure how popular they are. From what I recall, Empire at War's multiplayer was pretty barren though.

 

[Ping]

Getting as many of these as I can. Also, while it's not a Star Wars game, Grim Fandango is getting a re-release, too. One question, though: do you need a joystick for Rogue Squadron and the Flight Sims, or can you manage with a mouse and keyboard?

 

[Raider]

A Xbox controller is ideal for Rogue Squadron. My attempts to play it with a mouse and keyboard were jerky and resulted in crashing into the ground when trying to maneuver. I have not tried to play it with a flight stick, but it does support it.

The Space Sims cannot be played with a mouse and keyboard. It's either a flight stick or 360 controller. I'd recommend a flight stick.

 

[Ping]

A Xbox controller is ideal for Rogue Squadron. My attempts to play it with a mouse and keyboard were jerky and resulted in crashing into the ground when trying to maneuver. I have not tried to play it with a flight stick, but it does support it.

The Space Sims cannot be played with a mouse and keyboard. It's either a flight stick or 360 controller. I'd recommend a flight stick.

I'll see if I still have my old joystick somewhere. It worked with Rogue Squadron and X-wing Alliance, so I'll definitely have to dig it up.

 

[Raider]

Dark Forces 2 bundled with its expansion, Republic Commando, Starfighter were all released today with 20% launch discount. Unlike the Steam release Dark Forces 2 actually works. I may add a mod section to the first post, if the View attachment 1867 isn't to much.

 

[Ping]

Dark Forces 2 bundled with its expansion, Republic Commando, Starfighter were all released today with 20% launch discount. Unlike the Steam release Dark Forces 2 actually works. I may add a mod section to the first post, if the View attachment 4972 isn't to much.

Dark Forces 2 has generally worked for me with Steam. What seems to be the problem with running your copy?

 

[Raider]

Dark Forces 2 has generally worked for me with Steam. What seems to be the problem with running your copy?

Nothing as I never bought it on Steam, but the massive amount of posts on the GOG forum praising it for having videos at full screen, music working, and Hardware acceleration (bar Windows 8) was worth the mention.

 

[Ping]

Nothing as I never bought it on Steam, but the massive amount of posts on the GOG forum praising it for having videos at full screen, music working, and Hardware acceleration (bar Windows 8) was worth the mention.

Holy crap! Definitely buying this version, then. Do you know if this site's version of Dark Forces runs better than Steam's version?

 

[Phil]

Happy to see I am not the only one who thinks KOTOR 2 is better then the first one.

 

[Raider]

Holy crap! Definitely buying this version, then. Do you know if this site's version of Dark Forces runs better than Steam's version?

I did buy Dark Forces on GOG, but I can't make any comparison to Steam's. It was flawless though the first two missions.

 

[Raider]

Double posting to express what an idiot I am. I spent an hour trying to figure out why the retexture mods were making Dark Forces 2 look like a candy cane. The reason? I never turned the display ratio to 1920x1080 to match my monitor View attachment 1868

At least it's pretty now:

Spoiler: 1

Spoiler: 2

Spoiler: 3

Spoiler: 4

Edit: Images 1 and 2 were corrupted mods with crappy yellow water and walls. Seems I had to start a new playthough to have them load right.