Longplay of Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire

[@longplayarchive]

One of N64's most popular games. It was a blast to be able to play through this as it's one of the titles I never had a chance to play in my childhood. I'm also happy to announce this is not only the best gameplay footage of this game on KZbin, it's also the only high quality upload that uses actual hardware graphics rather than emulation upscaling. Whilst this game is nearly three decades old, the gameplay still holds up reasonably well -- but like with most games from this era.. you require a lot of patience and restarts to successfully make it through the game. Especially some of these bosses can be REALLY difficult. Fortunately there's also cheats (not used in this video) for the less skilled. This gameplay was recorded in Normal difficulty.

[@shadowhunter2846]

I played it as a kid (7 to 10 I guess) I'm now 24 and this game made Me somehow feel alone but today this game is epic 😂

[@Doomer2u]

The amount of times I only played the first 4 levels is in itself just a unlocked memory core. Easily one of my most replayed games when I was younger.

[@the77th]

You must be me because I DID THE SAME 😂😂😂 I lived in Nigeria and my mom got me an N64 From America but didn’t get me a memory card 😂

[@FOXZILLA5734]

The battle of hoth opening level really blew people's minds when this came out and for good reason it was probably the first star wars game that actually feels like you're playing the movie.

[@MetalOxy]

The sound of jumping and getting another life in this game are sounds I've never forgotten. Thanks for uploading this, good times!

[@thereasonableconsumer]

Great memories of playing this as a teen. The sewer level was absolute nightmare fuel with the shreaking monster.

[@Nortic111]

My first introduction to the Star Wars universe! Seeing this again genuinely puts a smile on my face!

[@GaryGoodJob_]

I remember as a kid my buddy and I were so stoked when we beat Boba Fett only to find out you had to fight the Slave 1 too. The way we finally beat the Slave 1 we accidentally found a glitch where if you stand in between the ships bottom two cannons it shoots around your body and won’t move. We cheesed it and it was glorious. Such fond memories of this game.

[@Ashguy733]

God I forgot how awesome some of these soundtracks were for this game.

[@RichardBarkman]

Ahh nostalgia. I haven’t played this SoE in nearly 30 years. Never finished on hard mode for secret ending.

[@coletroutman1060]

Bro I was stuck on the boba fett level for half my childhood😭 I’m so glad to see it wasn’t just me who was terrified of this game

[@Rokabur]

Absolutely loved using the debug/developer code for this game being able to change all kinds of settings

[@Wesley_C]

My childhood, I loved this game what i've played of my life.

[@dark___matter_]

Who else is here in their late 30s reliving their childhood? 😊

[@nintendorakyamato1859]

Classic on N64

[@jam2007]

Amazing game for it's time. Love playing it back in my senior year of high school. 😃

[@GamerFunOriginallyAarush]

This game is honestly pretty fun!

[@rickfowler273]

Back when Star Wars had a lot of mystery and imagination to it.

[@LightStreak567]

Oh, the nostalgia... Back in 1997, when my parents introduced me to Star Wars, when I played Shadows of the Empire for the first time, I used to think that this game, and the novel it is based on was Episode 7. For some reason I couldn't grasp the truth that the story is set in between Episode 5 and 6.

[@poleon2003]

well we did had a episode 7, 8 and 9 like nearly 2 decades before The Force Awakens which are the novels by Timothy Zahn called Heir to the Empire, Dark Force Rising and The Last Command which they're now considered non-canon by Disney

[@LightStreak567]

I'm not saying I predicted the future. I'm talking about the good old days when everything Star Wars related was respected, before the dark times, before the empire that is Disney took over and erased the Star Wars Expanded Universe, which I still don't forgive them for, especially with how lackluster Episodes 8 and 9 turned out to be, and everything they say is canon isn't really treated as such, only used as bait to get us eating up the trash they release.

[@poleon2003]

@@LightStreak567 yeah honestly the EU times from like the 1990s to 2010 were such a magical time I've only been reading them on wookiepedia and man I said to myself "Man I wish I'd known about these stories when I was a kid" but man they had a lot of interesting stories than what disney got us

[@LightStreak567]

@@poleon2003 I tried to give Disney and their new canon a chance, researching the new continuity and all, but when I learned Snoke was revealed in Episode 9 to be Palpatine's clone (destroying JJ Abrams' claim back in 2015 that Snoke and Kylo Ren are not Sith) that was the last straw, because in The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi Visual Dictionaries, they reveal that Snoke has seen the fall of the Republic and rise of the Galactic Empire from the uncharted areas of the Star Wars galaxy, and he led his own organization known as The Attendants, all of this points out he was always his own character, and Disney forgot their own established Star Wars lore, or maybe they assumed it wouldn't matter.

[@tigweldNY]

"For some reason I couldn't grasp the truth that the story is set between Episode 5 and 6." Holy fuck who gives a shit lol. Good lord. Get a grip.

[@marcusricks7366]

one of the best star wars games from the N64

[@jaygooese4242]

I remember playing this as a kid

[@chrisbridston3438]

This game is needed a remake and a wider release .. loved the book series of this.. this was as close to pre prequels as we got for awhile lol

[@kre8noys]

One of the games of my childhood. How many times have i played this? I really don't know.

[@lyrand6408]

The first stage in and of itself blew my little kid brain at the time, couldn't understand how it was 1) possible and 2) that I was actually playing it. And mind you, when I first saw and played this game I had just barely digested having seen Mario 64 and Pilotwings 64 not too long prior to it. Suffice to say that my 'early impressions' of the Nintendo 64 as a console were amazing, but I also understood then that gaming would "never be the same" starting from there. I did play a lot of the PS1 games before that and sure some of them were pretty nice (especially Metal Gear Solid) but man... the N64 was on a new level, and to me at the time it didn't seem that much of a "loss" that it wasn't on CD-Roms, it's not like CGIs and FMVs at the time really blew me away; in fact FMVs were of absurdly low compressed quality and never matched "a movie" on VHS, and CGIs were neat for game intros and in some rare cases they were thrown in during some story scenes but the _gameplay_ was always more important to me. Besides, the N64 was capable of CGIs, the Resident Evil 2 port proved it; it's just that most devs didn't bother with it. Loved the N64, probably my 2nd or 3rd favorite console of all time.

[@kitzibu]

I loved that game as a little kid. And I felt so sorry for those guards on the train level because of their agonized scream, that I always tried to just run past them 🙂

[@shayoko6]

i'm not sure how well it aged, but this was a great game during is time.

[@dazdavis7896]

It aged like a diamond. People were still playin it almost 10 years after it came out. I mean we’re all on here watching it here now over 25 years after its release.

[@RyanHaney55]

I had 3 Star Wars games on the N64: Rogue Squadron, Podracer, and Battle for Naboo. I wish I had this one.

[@christianwawrinovsky523]

This game have the essence of star wars. Let it flow into the created films cause it's not the CGI or the money, it's the spirit who makes star wars being real star wars. Spirit can mot get been in money but it can support the growing phase to be an star on star wars skies even in the galaxy far far from here or right beside under us.⬛🎇⬛

[@rgerber]

whoever playd this is a motherf*cckin legend

[@rgerber]

alright, i never knew the game could look this good, but this guy is blasing trough like a god damn coreelian battlecruiser

[@Itsnoahscott]

I have this game on my N64 & for a whole year I finally beat “Gall Spaceport.” I always died with the Boss Battle with Boba Fett. But I finally beat that level. Then the next level on the speeder is pretty easy.

[@CrowT]

You running right past challenge coins and NEVER using missiles is insane. God.

[@brendandoyle7508]

The graphics on third person this day and age is right where ive wanted since ive played this game, just imagine a remake on Unreal Engine 5 with xtra levels more potential objectives on top of what you can already do, secrets and super hard sectrets and customization. Have co-op and online play, if i would have been a programmer or 3d artist I would have worked on this game for a paycut just because I want Star Wars fans to really love and cherish it and im also a Star Wars fan. The cherry on top would be to be able to unlock the original game and all its glory with additional objectives and even more secrets to unlock cool stuff, like something you really want yo try for. One can dream huh.

[@rgerber]

if nightdive studios would remake this game, that would be AMAZING more than a dream

[@gabrielvieiraramos8530]

Currently I am reading the book, by Steve Perry.

[@mgrsdgfsdafsdgrsdgfsdg6980]

I remember getting this game for Christmas when it came out. My parents told me they paid $100 at Babbages for it. Can you believe a retail shop actually priced gouged back them. Unbelievable.

[@dracosamm]

A decent story between *The Empire strikes back* and *return of the Jedi* that involves *Black Sun* plotting to kill *Darth Vader* in secrecy but also *Nostalgic* *MAY THE FORCE BE WITH U @LPA*

[@rgerber]

that looks very good, watch in 240p for the real immersion

[@longplayarchive]

It’s already recorded in 240p but upscaled to 1440p so KZbin offers a higher bitrate. What you see here is what you’d get using a HDMI mod on a N64 :). Selecting 240p just makes the video more blurry due to lower bitrate and doesn’t accurately represent how the picture is supposed to look

[@isaacrodriguez4773]

Someday Shadows of the Empire Rogue Squadron and Battle for Naboo will be on the Expansion Pack Eventually.

[@Bammer2001]

How was Shigeru Miyamoto involved in this? And what about Eugene Jarvis?

[@miroslavzima8856]

Wasn´t this game in gaming TV show? From time to time I vividly remember in Germany it was played via phone dials (as Hugo). But maybe it was just my fever dream :)

[@SonicSpyroHeeler]

They should ad this to the N64 Switch Online collection one day.

[@v3teran75]

At the time of release the game was worth getting just for HOTH alone!

[@tonyyayo2115]

Since they brought back Golden Eye , Nintendo and MSFT needs to revive this game too

[@SuikodenClive]

I remember that Wompa Stompa code.

[@jaygooese4242]

The sewer monster is great

[@DestinyZX1]

Now the good stuff knowing that it will be demonetized outright.

[@RetroGameSpacko]

bummer isnt it?

[@DestinyZX1]

@@RetroGameSpacko yes. But its inevitable

[@longplayarchive]

Yeah Tarzan too. It's alright though as I really want to put these videos out!

[@Ashguy733]

@@longplayarchive That is commendable. I salute you!

[@longplayarchive]

@@Ashguy733 Appreciate your continued support

[@jaygooese4242]

The bosses are great

[@SeratosBeatz]

in space you have missiles. why don't you use them?

[@Princefrancispony15]

Nice

[@stefanotagliatesta456]

This 90's game feels more star warsy than the all disney crap

[@finalsigma2920]

buen juego se ve

[@average_ms-dos_enjoyer]

The gameplay really took a nosedive in part 4, straight down into an actual sewer level. The gladiator bossfight and having to shoot down all those fighters are also pretty questionable design choices, probably just meant to pad the length (particularly if you didn't have enough lives to just keep popping back up again).

[@BrunoMarquesMeneses]

This game is a classic! I'd love a remaster with better controls. It would make many fans happy. But, unfortunately, it'll never happen :(

[@Lifelesworm]

Play into the dead 2 please

[@Superpity07]

Lil TUNECHI

[@dazdavis7896]

Running right past easily gotten challenge points and special ammo makes me cringe so fuckin hard. GET that pulse ammo; pulse fire (the purple laser) is the best in the game, far better than regular red laser blaster fire; alternating between pulse fire and disruptor blasts is like the only assured way to beat the gladiator droids. And pulse fire helps a shit ton against the Slave One.

[@longplayarchive]

The challenge points don’t bother me as long as I’m not going to get all of them anyway. Felt like a waste of time to just halfass it, but I appreciate the info in your comment regarding the pulse ammo