There’s a Star Wars sport on the market that’s arduous 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 help. That sport is Star Wars: Obi-Wan.
Final week, Lucasfilm Video games and Aspyr introduced a remastered model of 2002’s Star Wars: Bounty Hunter, a sport that first launched on PlayStation 2 and GameCube. The brand new remaster is ready to replace among the textures, enhance the lighting, and even add a brand new flashlight choice, too. That every one sounds good, and I’m excited to see yet one more outdated Star Wars sport delivered to extra fashionable platforms. Nonetheless, seeing Bounty Hunter get the remaster therapy made me take into consideration Obi-Wan on Xbox, a sport that launched only a yr 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 sport for the Xbox. This third-person motion sport starred, you guessed it, Obi-Wan Kenobi and was each a prequel to and retelling of the Phantom Menace movie.
It’s not an ideal sport, to be clear. But it surely featured some fascinating concepts—like utilizing the correct stick for lightsaber fight—and supplied a enjoyable technique to expertise the primary Star Wars prequel earlier than Assault of the Clones hit theaters in 2002. Apart from, 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 basic already), whereas Obi-Wan on Xbox is left behind.
The way to 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 help backward compatibility on Xbox One or Sequence X/S. If you wish to play Obi-Wan you’ve one good choice and one unhealthy choice.
The nice choice: 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. Properly, that’s assuming the Xbox you got 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 important to purchase two of them it gained’t break the financial institution.)
The unhealthy choice is emulation. I really like emulating video games! I’m not in opposition to it in any respect and I believe fan-developed emulators are an essential a part of sport preservation. So after I say emulating Obi-Wan is unhealthy, I wish to be clear that it’s not as a result of I’m in opposition to enjoying outdated video games utilizing third-party software program. No, enjoying Obi-Wan on an Xbox emulator is unhealthy as a result of it sucks and is (as of this writing) not an ideal expertise.
When you play on CXBX-Reloaded, a fan-made Xbox emulator, you may have the ability to make it by means of 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 unique Xbox emulator, and had even worse luck—I couldn’t get previous the second stage. Whereas some gamers have been in a position to tinker sufficient to get Obi-Wan working effectively on CXBX, it’s nonetheless not a super technique 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 outdated video games and pay them the cash to deliver Star Wars: Obi-Wan to extra platforms.
Cleaned up and working at 60FPS, Obi-Wan can be a strong hit on consoles just like the Change. Plus the Star Wars prequels are at the moment 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 might be good to get the sport ported to PC so followers can preserve updating it and modding it simply for years to return. Or somebody at Xbox flip the change and make this factor backwards suitable on Xbox One and Sequence X/S consoles. I’d take that at this level!
However what I really need is a pleasant remaster. It might save part of online game historical past and rescue a Star Wars sport from being forgotten. It’s actually a win-win state of affairs and it’s about time Obi-Wan will get the remaster he deserves.
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