I remember playing the SOTE demo on my PC and thinking it was pretty fun (this was the first time I'd ever played the "battle of hoth" in any game in 3D, even though technically they had the vector arcade game out first). Then I later played the full version and thought it was pretty boring. Turns out I agreed with my roommate, who thought the best part of the game was featured in the demo!
At the time I was heavily into the JK series (Dark Forces II: Jedi Knight and Mysteries of the Sith expansion), and though that SOTE's gameplay just felt really shallow, by comparison, even if the graphics were slightly better in places.
So I never bothered to finish it. I only knew one friend who owned an N64, and I played Starfox with him one time. To this day I have played hardly any N64 stuff, period. It's just one of those consoles I never got into.
I have Empire at War, but honestly, it's still in the wrapping (a freebie I got through a site I worked for, but sadly my review copy came far too late for me to do any worthwhile "exclusive" and strategy sites already existed). I did play the hell out of the demo though (and cheated and hacked up a storm in order to use all the different units that were in the full version, which were simply "hidden" in the demo).
The thing about EaW, is I remember that this one mission seemed impossible to complete. I spent hours trying to figure out how to destroy this one space station. It turned out I hadn't adjusted the camera to the EXACT PERFECT ANGLE to destroy the last few targets. It's like, if Star Wars were real, you could just keep pounding a structure with turbolasers and it'll be destroyed eventually. But no, you have to hit it in this PRECISE SPOT, or it's invincible, even if you have an entire fleet shooting it. I thought that the targets should just have been weak points, which let you destroy it faster or something. That's how the ships were handled, if I remember correctly. Even if the goal were merely to disable and "capture" the station, it would have long surrendered by then.
Anyway, EaW wasn't a bad PC game. I think at the time I was so used to Star Wars games being disappointing and lackluster (even crappy) that I just didn't give it much of a chance.
But there hasn't been a Star Wars PC game that's been worth playing for more than an hour, in a long, long time, sadly (and yes, I'm including "Lego Star Wars II" in that).
I was rather pissed that "Force Unleashed" was a console-exclusive. I didn't buy any of the BS excuses for not porting it, since they even put it on the DS and PS2, for crying out loud. Since I haven't forked over for any of the "current gen" consoles, I guess I won't know whether that game rivals Jedi Outcast/Academy, or if it was just another hyped disappointment like "Revenge of the Sith: the game" apparently was.
This post has been edited by KurganX: 12 April 2009 - 11:23 PM