Shadows of the empire
Company : Lucas Arts
Reviewed By : Lonelines


This game is rated as a doom clone even though it also has many non-doom parts in it but 80% of the games is to go through corridors and shoot the enemies (and finding buttons etc). Well the first 2 points are going down for the lack of proper beta testing. I'm not talking about the game itself, only
the video sequences and the audio. At first I installed the game using my SCSI CD-ROM drive (a 12X CD-ROM from Sony) the game installed great and launched with Audio and everything, however every single 3D cut-scene would get garbled up after 5 seconds and lock up my computer.So since I have another CD-ROM (IDE interface) I installed through it. This time the cut-scenes ran just great without locking up or freezing or garbling, BUT, I couldn't hear the audio music anymore. It seemed like the music will play only from the first letter CD and not the second. SO, I swapped the drive letters (and reinstalled the game). AND FINALLY I was able to play the game with both Audio music and 3d cut scenes.
So I played the first level, which was fun, but the CD Audio music was to loud, I switched to the sound mixer (both windows' and my creative SB64 AWE mixer)and lowered the volume. But each and every time I returned to the game the volume would jump back up again, making all
the other effects sound weak. (if anyone has a good FREEZE volume program, please Email me). A second later I remembered that by pressing ESC I get an option menu, and behold, there was a music volume tab which actually lowered and raised the audio music. but when I returned to playing the game, the music jumped back to its high volume ignoring my new settings (however, the volume in the options menu was lowered when I returned to it). Finally I managed to force the game into using lower volume, by adjusting the CD audio music before playing the game.
2 points for the pain I had to go through with that.
The game itself consists of 10 levels in which the objective changes for each one. You will have to shoot down AT-AT's and mechs in the first part, you will have a doom style shootemup in the second, a fly through an asteroid field in the third and so forth.
At first I played the game in EASY mode.
When finishing the last level however I was given a message that I would have to play in medium mode to see if Dash (the hero) survived the final chapter.
Annoyed as I was for wasting my time on EASY mode, I started playing medium.
I finished medium saw the cut-scenes, and was then given the following message:

"Congratulations, now try playing HARD".

At this point I uninstalled the game.
Difficulty levels were made not so I would play one then go to a harder one and etc. Difficult levels were made cause I am not a doom expert who knows every doom survival trick in the book, I do not strafe nor roll or jump to evade shots. Most of the shots DO hit me and I mange to make it through with the health packs around, so I would like to think that I am playing the game in easy, and getting the same game someone on HARD (or JEDI) is getting only with less enemies and easier gunfights. I DO NOT like it when after finishing the game once in EASY I have to replay it all over again in MEDIUM to know more about the endgame. I also do not like the idea of me playing HARD or JEDI to see what other dumb little bonuses I would get for finishing the game at this ultra hard level. 2 points for that.
Another weird part of the game is the challenge points, I got them all in my MEDIUM difficulty settings and after I finished the game with all of them I got an inside secret about the game (which you can also acquire by just looking for cheats on the net), however the dumb part is that if you play Jedi, and go to the options screen the first 3 game secrets will be revealed one after the other if you wait for it. Which leaves you to finding all points in Jedi
only (according to my knowledge, get all points and a Wampus will follow you throughout the game killing your enemies).

The final 2 points to this game go down for being yet another annoying game without a normal SAVE game feature (which adds to many games like Oddworld, atlantis, lba). Yet again, a save game feature is most needed (especially when you die almost repeatedly in certain parts till you find a trick). And usually the amount of LIVES you have just isn't enough to make it through. So from now on - 2 points for each game with no SAVEGAME option. If I want to leave the game in the middle, I would like to save first, no save, no points.


I really didn't enjoy this game, I encountered to many bugs in my first game, and I hated the way the creators made the ending. (I would have given the game a 6 if I didn't encounter any problems in it). But the ending messages really got me ticked off. If you are not making it the same for all difficulty levels, just DON'T make difficulty levels. I also hate games without a savegame option. This is one of them.


Most people don't own SCSI devices and multiple CD-ROM's so you probably won't encounter any problems in the game, however the game would only be worth it's while if you intend to play it on JEDI mode I guess (since I assume after playing HARD you'll get another one of those dumb messages), and that would probably take you a millennia (unless you are one of those expert doom players and even then there are a few non-doom scenarios you will have to cope with).