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Use The Force, Luke! Yep, that is the only way to really play this game. By the wits of The Force! SW:TAG is a port of the famous and excellent arcade game released by Atari in 1983. Unfortunately, when Parker Brothers ported the game to the 5200, they really botched it. It is ironic that Atari had to license this game to them to port to their own system! The goal of SW:TAG is to survive waves of TIE fighters before heading to the Death Star and destroying it. You will face the TIE fighters in open space, skim the surface of the Death Star where you’ll face attack towers, and then you’ll enter the Death Star trench on your way to the exhaust port where you’ll launch the death blow to the space station. If you succeed, you’ll fly away and see the Death Star explode to then start all over again. The 5200 port of SW:TAG captures all the basic elements of the arcade and it is even beautifully rendered to emulate the vector graphics of the original. Unfortunately, beautiful graphics are all this game has. Controlling the game is disastrous and it has nothing to do with the 5200 controllers. In fact, the controllers would work perfectly for this game but the way in which Parker Brothers programmed the control mechanism makes controlling your X-wing fighter difficult while also trying to target your crosshairs at enemy ships. So, essentially all you are doing is crazily fire hoping to hit something and to not get hit by enemy fire. It is really unfortunate because this was a fun game in the arcades but it just did not translate well as a home port. I would steer clear of this one unless you are a very determined Star Wars fan!

You are General Lando Calrissian and you have one mission: destroy the Death Star. Guide the Millennium Falcon through gaps in the shield protecting the Death Star and get to its core to blow it to smithereens. Death Star Battle on the 5200 is almost a direct port of the 2600 version of the game. There are two main areas of play, one zone outside of the shield and one zone close to the Death Star. In the first area you must avoid various Imperial ships that come to attack you as you look for an opening in the shield that you can blast through. Unfortunately, these gaps appear randomly and there is a secondary barrier that blocks your way. Wait until that barrier is also down and run through to the Death Star. Keep an eye out for Vader’s shuttle as it will give you lots of points. A cool hyperspace scene is shown and then you end up at the Death Star where you must blast at it to erode the surface until you can fire at the central red core. You must avoid the Death Star’s super laser weapons, though, as it tries to strike you down. Death Star Battle looks very similar to its 2600 cousin, which is disappointing since we are talking about the 5200. The shield area looks almost identical to the 2600 but the Death Star area does look better. The station itself is more nicely rendered and it is clear you are looking at the Death Star. The hyperspace effect also looks pretty nice. Sound effects are rather basic also, which is disappointing. The game does suffer in terms of control; however. This really makes Death Star Battle not worth playing on the 5200.