There’s a Star Wars recreation on the market that’s onerous to play in 2024 as a result of, for no matter motive, it stays trapped on the hard-to-emulate OG Xbox with none official remakes, remasters, or backward compatibility assist. That recreation is Star Wars: Obi-Wan.
Final week, Lucasfilm Video games and Aspyr introduced a remastered model of 2002’s Star Wars: Bounty Hunter, a recreation that first launched on PlayStation 2 and GameCube. The brand new remaster is about to replace among the textures, enhance the lighting, and even add a brand new flashlight possibility, too. That every one sounds good, and I’m excited to see yet one more previous Star Wars recreation delivered to extra trendy platforms. Nevertheless, seeing Bounty Hunter get the remaster therapy made me take into consideration Obi-Wan on Xbox, a recreation that launched only a 12 months earlier than Bounty Hunter that’s nonetheless trapped on the unique Xbox console over 20 years after its launch.
In 2001, two years after the discharge of Star Wars: The Phantom Menace, Lucasarts launched Star Wars: Obi-Wan as an unique recreation for the Xbox. This third-person motion recreation starred, you guessed it, Obi-Wan Kenobi and was each a prequel to and retelling of the Phantom Menace movie.
It’s not an incredible recreation, to be clear. Nevertheless it featured some attention-grabbing concepts—like utilizing the appropriate stick for lightsaber fight—and provided a enjoyable strategy to expertise the primary Star Wars prequel earlier than Assault of the Clones hit theaters in 2002. In addition to, it’s not like Bounty Hunter is an unimaginable online game, both. But it’s getting a brand new remaster (after being launched on PS4 as a PS2 traditional already), whereas Obi-Wan on Xbox is left behind.
How one can play Star Wars: Obi-Wan in 2024
Star Wars: Obi-Wan by no means acquired a PC port, was by no means launched on PS2, and has by no means been up to date to assist backward compatibility on Xbox One or Collection X/S. If you wish to play Obi-Wan you’ve one good possibility and one dangerous possibility.
The nice possibility: You go purchase an OG Xbox and a duplicate of Obi-Wan. Set it up and there you go, you’re enjoying Star Wars: Obi-Wan. Effectively, that’s assuming the Xbox you obtain works correctly and the copy of the sport you bought isn’t too broken. (Fortunately pre-owned copies of the sport aren’t very costly, so if it’s a must to purchase two of them it gained’t break the financial institution.)
The dangerous possibility is emulation. I like emulating video games! I’m not towards it in any respect and I believe fan-developed emulators are an essential a part of recreation preservation. So once I say emulating Obi-Wan is dangerous, I need to be clear that it’s not as a result of I’m towards enjoying previous video games utilizing third-party software program. No, enjoying Obi-Wan on an Xbox emulator is dangerous as a result of it sucks and is (as of this writing) not an incredible expertise.
In case you play on CXBX-Reloaded, a fan-made Xbox emulator, you would possibly be capable to make it by the sport, however many gamers have reported crashes, graphical bugs, and different issues that spoil the expertise. I’ve additionally tried to play Obi-Wan on XEMU, a distinct Xbox emulator, and had even worse luck—I couldn’t get previous the second stage. Whereas some gamers have been capable of tinker sufficient to get Obi-Wan operating properly on CXBX, it’s nonetheless not a great strategy to play the sport.
Assist me Lucasfilm Video games, you’re my solely hope
So now, right here’s my plea: Somebody at Lucasfilm Video games, please contact Nightdive Studios, Aspyr, or one other developer that’s good at reviving previous video games and pay them the cash to convey Star Wars: Obi-Wan to extra platforms.
Cleaned up and operating at 60FPS, Obi-Wan can be a strong hit on consoles just like the Change. Plus the Star Wars prequels are at present experiencing a renaissance amongst followers who grew up watching the movies. Pleasure for prequel-era content material is at an all-time excessive in 2024 and I believe a well-done Obi-Wan port or remaster can be a slam dunk.
And if that’s not doable, on the very least it will be good to get the sport ported to PC so followers can maintain updating it and modding it simply for years to return. Or somebody at Xbox flip the change and make this factor backwards appropriate on Xbox One and Collection X/S consoles. I’d take that at this level!
However what I really need is a pleasant remaster. It could save part of online game historical past and rescue a Star Wars recreation from being forgotten. It’s actually a win-win scenario and it’s about time Obi-Wan will get the remaster he deserves.
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