Monday 27 May 2013

The Vault - Top Ten Lucasarts Games

Back at the start of April, the gaming community was rocked by the news that LucasArts – one of the most well-known and respected names in the video game industry (historically speaking) – was to be closed down by their parent company Disney. Of course, LucasArts had been a sleeping giant for many years now, struggling to reach the heights of their early days as LucasFilm Games, and their subsequent domination of PC gaming in the early nineteen-nineties.
Many modern or casual gamers won’t blink an eye now that LucasArts is gone, but for those who grew up with the games that the company produced, the games have left many, many lifelong memories. Whether you love the point and click graphic adventures made using the SCUMM engine, or you enjoyed becoming a Jedi in their Star Wars titles, there was quite a selection of different genres that LucasArts worked on across their back catalogue.
Click here to read the full article, and reminisce and look back at ten of the best gaming titles from the house that Lucas built.
 

Friday 3 May 2013

Retro Corner: Star Wars Jedi Knight - Dark Forces II

The closure of LucasArts Games has left many gamers around the world somewhat shell-shocked and saddened. And for good reason. LucasArts certainly created many of the greatest and most memorable video gaming titles when I was growing up. They produced a massive stable of top-class games – both original ones and movie tie-ins – that captured the imagination of a generation of players.
Personally, being an adventure game fanatic, I love the graphic adventures produced by LucasArts in the late nineteen-eighties and early nineties, with The Secret of Monkey Island, Day of the Tentacle and Grim Fandango – and many more – all ranking high in my list of the top games of all time. However, if adventure games is the first thing that fans think of when they hear the name LucasArts, the second thing would definitely be Star Wars. For better or worse, LucasArts produced a wide array of titles based on the Star Wars universe that George Lucas created with the first film in 1977. Strategy games, racing games, desktop utilities – nothing was safe from the merchandising of the Star Wars brand. And today we are going to take a look back at one of the most successful uses of the Star Wars license in gaming, the first/third-person shooter Star Wars Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II.