Star Wars has one prolific history in video games. Well over one hundred titles bear the series’ name, dating all the way back to ancient times (which, in video game terms, means the Apple II). This is no surprise, really. After all, the release of Episode IV: A New Hope came in the late seventies, around the time when gaming was just starting to become A Thing™.

To be precise, it’s been forty years since the original movie hit theaters. That’s a long history, right there, and for the most part, it’s been a successful one in terms of tie-ins. That’s a rare thing; just ask Uwe Boll and his ball-achingly bad movie adaptions of Alone in the Dark and House of the Dead.

Let’s give some credit where it’s due here. The Star Wars franchise has spawned some truly great games, such as GameCube launch title Rogue Squadron II: Rogue Leader and Super Stars Wars (well, I think so; fight me). This isn’t to say that the franchise has the Midas touch when it comes to games, though.

You’d don’t have a career that spans this long without faceplanting the shameful, muddy ground on occasion. Some games that rocked the Star Wars name were just plain bad, or underwhelming. Others sucked in more than a technical way, though. Faith to the source material is a crucial issue, and some totally dropped that ball. Let’s check out the 15 worst changes from the movies to the video games.

15 Remember That Time Luke Skywalker Flew Around In A Buick?

1- Remember That Buick
Via: scottcacioppo.com

I’ve always felt that the GameCube launch was an odd affair. By Nintendo’s standards, it arrived with a huge crop of games in tow, but there was no system-selling Mario in sight. It was up to Luigi and Luigi’s Mansion to sell the console in the main man’s stead. As far as day one killer apps went, what did the console have? I’m going to plump for Rogue Leader.

The sequel to the N64’s Rogue Squadron really was awe-inspiring for its time. The visuals were incredible, and it truly felt like you were playing through the biggest set pieces of the Star Wars series. One thing I can’t forgive, though, is that unlockable Buick. What in the name of all that is good and pure was that all about? I don’t like classic cars. Haven’t you read Stephen King’s Christine? There’s a time and a place for snarky easter eggs.

14 Darth Vader’s Voice In Star Wars: Masters Of Teräs Käsi

2- Darth Vader Masters of Teräs Käsi
Via: i.ytimg.com

The Star Wars franchise, as I say, has been darn busy in the video game world. In its time, it’s tried its hand at just about every genre possible. One of the more unusual examples would be Masters of Teräs Käsi, a 3D fighter that hit the PlayStation in 1997.

Now, sure, I get that hiring James Earl Jones himself might have been a little beyond LucasArts for their first ever PS1 title. But come on. Vader’s voice is his whole thing. It’s his USP. In Teräs Käsi, sadly, he sounds more like the lovechild of Batman’s Bane and Stephen Hawking. Recorded underwater. It’s a poor, poor show, and the script’s so shoddy he can’t even snark right. “The Force was not strong with this one,” he remarks on his victory screen, while nobody cares.

13 Just About All Of Teräs Käsi, Come To Think Of It

3- Masters of Teräs Käsi Generally
Via: mobygames.com

Now, I don’t see how everything went so wrong here. The concept was low key genius. A Street Fighter-style fighting game, featuring showdowns like Chewbacca vs. Darth Vader? Count me right the hell in. Who could turn an offer like that down? Who, more importantly, could screw it up?

Turns out, LucasArts sure could. Masters of Teräs Käsi was quite a sales success at first, on the strength of the name alone, but it all died on its ass when it came to actually playing it. The movies present lightsabre dueling as a sophisticated, graceful affair, but that didn’t translate too well here. It’s a simplistic, depth-free button masher, and the buttons you’re mashing don’t register half the time. The half-assed plot is as thin as finely-sliced mangetot, as well, in contrast to the often convoluted (in the best way) storytelling of the movies.

12 Jar Jar Binks Is Even More Infuriating In Disney Infinity 3.0

4- Jar Jar Binks Disney Infinity 3.0
Via: cdn.stevivor.com

Now, it’s easy to snark on Jar Jar Binks. Of course, it is. It’s like shooting stupid, prattling fish in a barrel. For some time now, the Gungan military commander and politician has been the butt of all sorts of jokes from the community. Those super-irritating speech patterns, the voice, his stupid eyestalk face… the movies brought us one of the douchiest, most irritating characters ever committed to celluloid.

With all of that in mind, what was the fatal mistake that Disney Infinity 3.0 made? Making him even freaking worse. Check out this clip of the jabbering fool in action in the game. If you can make it through ten seconds of it without punching your own damn ears in the face, you’re a better woman/man than I.

11 When Star Wars: Battlefront Left Its Plot At Home And Had To Do Gym Class In Its Underwear

5- Star Wars Battlefront No Story
Via: blogs-images.forbes.com

The Star Wars fans among us will know that the movies put the epic in epic space opera film. These are huge, sweeping tales, full of twists, turns, betrayals, double- and triple-agents, unexpected revelations about parenthood and all of that stuff. It’s like a damn live action Dan Brown novel with all the cliffhangers, sans Tom Hanks running around with that ridiculous hairpiece on.

There’s a great wealth of lore for the video games to make use of, is what I’m getting at here. Sadly, when the Battlefront reboot released, it completely dispensed with all of this. The Force AwakensFinn himself took to Twitter to ask EA why the game didn’t have a single player campaign. A universe as rich, deep and colourful as this one demands to tell a story.

10 Let’s Be Honest: Lightsabers Kind Of Suck

6- Lightsabers Nerfed
Via: pcgamesn.com

The iconic weapon of the Jedi has a kind of mythical quality in the movies. They beat us over the head with that fact. Remember all of the fuss that The Force Awakens made over Luke Skywalker’s saber? Alright already. We know it was Luke’s. Keep your pants on.

Further, in the movies, these blades (if that’s really the term for it) are shown to have the power to slice through just about anything. When it comes to video game adaptions, then, they usually have to take a disappointing nerf in the interests of balance. After all, your enemies aren’t going to put up much resistance if you can just cleave their Stormtrooper armor in twain with a single swing. Health bars and HP means taking multiple hits with a lightsaber, which shouldn’t really be a thing. At least opposing saber users can’t do the same to you, though.

9 That One Epic Boss Battle With Jabba The Hutt

7- Super Star Wars Jabba Boss
Via: gamefaqs.net

Ah, the infamous Jabba the Hutt. Crime boss, slug-freak, and gold bikini fetishist. This guy was hyped up quite a bit before we finally met him in the slimy flesh, and even Han ‘No Effs To Give’ Solo seemed to quite fear him.

In the movies, he was an intimidating figure indeed, with his long, freakish appearance and cruel, merciless ways. Sadly, when it came to video games, the Hutt wasn’t exactly the most menacing. In Super Star Wars: Return of the Jedi, Jabba is the boss of level seven, inside the sail barge. As with most of the game’s bosses, it’s a simple case of spamming Han’s gun, as Jabba feebly flails his freakish rat-tail at you. As a child, I had a bit of a fear of this guy, but seeing him in action in Super Star Wars soon cured that.

8 The Bird- And Pig-ification Of Angry Birds: Star Wars

8- Angry Birds Star Wars
Via: jabbersite.com

The whole dark side of the force thing took a literal turn with the Star Wars franchise. Good versus evil has been a staple element of stories since we were first able to tell and record them, but it was more figurative. In the Harry Potter style, Star Wars presents its characters with a very black-and-white morality, for the most part; you pick a side and that’s that. Granted, Darth Vader may have thrown Emperor Palpatine to his doom that one time, but he’s a special case.

This line was never made plainer than with Angry Birds: Star Wars. In this take on the mobile hit, the various birds were presented as the Rebels, and the pigs as the Empire. This one was a licensing too far in my book.

7 The Star Wars 1313 Story That Was Never Told

9- Star Wars 1313
Via: assets.vg247.com

Long-time gamers and Star Wars fans surely remember that enigmatic lost title, 1313. Like Silent Hills, it was a game that garnered considerable hype on its first reveal; a creative concept that fans were keen to dig into. The premise was that we’d play as an early-adult Boba Fett, fighting through the criminal underworld with an array of tools, a world away from the usual VZYOOM VZYOOM lightsabre fare.

Granted, we’ve played a fair amount of this sort of Star Wars title (Bounty Hunter cast us as Jango Fett, Boba’s ‘father’), but this is a story that deserved to be told. I’d loved to have cruised through Coruscant as Boba, gleaning a little backstory from one of the franchise’s most beloved sideline characters as I went. Sadly, Disney bought the company, and the project was canned in 2013.

6 Darth Malak Is One Of The Coolest Star Wars Villains Ever

10- Darth Malak
Via: i.pinimg.com

Let’s get this one out of the way right from the off: Darth Malak looks way too much like Von Bolt, the evil mastermind from the Advance Wars series. I hope I’m not the only one. I also hope that someone out there shares my fear of feeble old bald dudes, and knows how terrifying both of these guys are.

The Knights of the Old Republic video game series (and accompanying comic books) branched out into all new territory for Star Wars. Without the constraints of movie scenarios and characters, they were able to flesh out an all new cast. None of them had quite the same impression on me that primary antagonist Darth Malak, Dark Lord of the Sith, did. If he doesn’t deserve his own movie, nobody does.

5 Darth Maul’s ‘Dramatic’ Defeat In The Phantom Menace

via pinterest.com

Now, far be it for me to share eighteen-year-old spoilers, but I’ll have to break this to you: Darth Maul doesn’t win. You could probably guess that just from his super-red hedgehog face and general evilness (good prospers is the general life lesson that Star Wars wants to tell us, after all), but if those clues have passed you by, it’s not my fault. You did have almost two decades to find that out.

Now that we’ve come to terms with that revelation, let’s talk about how hilariously bad Maul’s defeat was in 2000 PlayStation title Jedi Power Battles. The final bout consists of a series of half-assed, button mashing duels, at the climax of which Maul falls backward and evaporates with a hilarious GAH! Take that, you spiky-faced bastard.

4 Stormtroopers Can Actually Hit You

12- Stormtroopers Can Hit You
Via: images6.fanpop.com

I know. I hear you. I was entirely unprepared for this turn of events too. Over Star Wars’ long career in the gaming arena, you can imagine how many hapless Stormtroopers players have wiped out. We’ve sabered them, blaster-ed them, Force-ed them to death in all kinds of brilliantly imaginative ways. The ragdoll physics have been something to behold at times. Good times were had by all.

The odd thing is, though, we’ve also been hit back by these gleaming white-clad goons as well. As we all know, they have a reputation for being a worse shot than Stevie Wonder, but I’ve been shot I every bodily orifice by these guys in my time. Just what the hell’s going on here? I don’t want to live in a world where Stormtroopers can actually hit the enemy they’re aiming at.

3 ‘Star Wars: Demolition,’ Because The Rebel Engineers Just Don’t Care

13- Star Wars Demolition
Via: mixnmojo.com

In the movies, you’ll have noticed the Rebels are super anal about their vehicles. The pilots take care to buff up everything, wire their droids in the back to repair any damage on the fly, all of that stuff. They’ve got to be careful, after all: they don’t have the expendable income (or lives) that the Empire does.

The Rebels of the video games take a much more laissez-faire approach. That’s laissez-faire in the nuts to it, let’s smash everything up sense. Star Wars: Demolition is a PS1/Dreamcast vehicular combat game, based on the likes of Twisted Metal. The sole plot is that the Empire has banned Jabba the Hutt’s podraces, so he devises a far deadlier sport for his amusement. I can’t quite imagine the movies ever showing an AT-ST and a Rancor charging each other at full speed, so there’s a big screen opportunity missed.

2 The Most Tedious And Clunky Battle Of Hoth You Ever Saw

14- Star Wars Force Commander
Via: theisozone.com

Over the years, a whole host of titles have seen us play through the movies’ key set pieces. The biggest space battles make for some intense cinematic spectacles, and that’s one of the key strengths that the series has to offer. Exploit it, devs.

When I first played through the Battle of Hoth stage in Rogue Leader, I was floored by the visuals. It was stunning and super fun to play, and that’s exactly what these movie adaptions should be aiming for. On the other side of the coin, we had the PC’s Force Commander. This RTS saw you strategizing and deploying troops for both the Rebels and the Empire (not at the same time, of course), in engagements like the battles of Hoth and Endor. It was really shonky looking and sluggish, sadly, and the controls were awkwardly clunky.

1 Kinect Star Wars: Worst. Force Powers. Ever

15- Kinect Star Wars
Via: i.ytimg.com

When motion controls were in their infancy, there was one title that captured our imaginations like none other: Kinect Star Wars. Us Regular Joes could use Force powers like telekinesis, moving objects in the game world just by moving our bodies. What could possibly go wrong with a concept like that?

The execution could be hideously craptacular, that’s what. Kinect Star Wars soon shattered all of those dreams, into a thousand tiny shards of betrayal and despair. The controls simply didn’t work half of the time, and the game was a half-baked minigame compilation at best when they did. When the technology is up to it, this concept has scope to be one of the best things a Star Wars fan could experience, but this Kinect disaster was not that game.