Star Wars Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy
www.lucasarts.com/products/jediacademy/
Activision www.activision.com
Last edition we went boldly where no man had gone before.

This time we enter a galaxy far, far away. Like that other franchise, Star Wars games have been a bit of a mixed bag.

Some of the early X-Wing Vs Tie Fighter games were great, and Dark Forces wasn't too bad.

More recently, however, they've been a bit ... well, plain to be honest.

The massive amount of Episode 1 games has left a sour taste among most gamers.

That is all about to change. There isn't a person my age who watched the original trilogy as a kid and didn't run around making lightsabre noises (I guess there is probably a new generation of them now).

Star Wars Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy lets gamers enjoy the great sound effects with the amazing moves and actions last year's Episode 2 is now famous for.

Star Wars Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy puts the player in the shoes of a Jedi trainee under the tutelage of Luke himself as the good guys attempt to fight off the new scourge of the republic.

For those in the know it is set after Episode 6 and closely follows some of the stories I've read in the Star Wars novels.

Players pick their character's race, gender, dress and even get to build their own lightsabre before embarking on increasingly difficult missions.

The missions aren't all just walking around either. I found myself duelling foes on speeder bikes, tearing across the ice on one of those kangaroos crossed with a goat and supporting an X-wing attack on an Imperial station.

On the PC it plays very well.

A combination of the normal FPS control keys and mouse movements to control the sabre's strike combine to give a player great control.

The only time it gets difficult is when a player attempts to combine a couple of force powers with an acrobatic attacking move ... I found I just didn't have enough fingers at times.

As you read this the XBox version of the game should be hitting the shelves.

I'm surprised that I'm saying this but I think the console controller will make it a bit simpler to control Yoda when the enemies start in thick and fast and I think the Microsoft console will offer a better Jedi experience.

Unreal II: The Awakening
http://www.unreal2.com/
Apparently if you jump 300 years into the future the world looks pretty bleak.

Set after the award-winning (and some would say Quake-slaying) Unreal, The Awakening puts the player in the shoes of a crusty old marine set on saving the free world as we know it.

This game is a FPS with a storyline and absolutely amazing graphics making it an immersive experience.

It also has a bit of length to it, something that is becoming rarer these days.

Its standard FPS fare but done extremely well.

This is probably becasue of the fact it is a single-player game, not a multi-player system with a couple of scripts thrown together for those without decent connections.

If it has a downside it is that all of this beauty comes at a price. A cutting edge system is really needed to enjoy it.

Battlefield 1942: Secret Weapons
of WWII
www.eagames.
com/official/battlefield/
1942/us/home.jsp
Secret Weapons of WWII is the second expansion pack of the phenomenally successful Battlefield 1942. It adds 16 new vehicles, seven new weapons.

Eight new maps/campaigns and a new objective-based mode in which players must achieve objectives in a certain order. More importantly it adds two new teams to the game.

Players can now leap from the sky as the Fallschirmjager or storm the beaches as a British commando.

The addition of the expansion pack makes BF1942 one of the most comprehensive online games available. It has also kept the game's popularity high with Aussie servers routinely full on weekends.

If you own the original this pack is definitely worth the extra cash.

Ghostly Recon with Tom Clancy.
Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Island Thunder
Ubi Soft www.ubisoft.com
I was recently lucky enough to attend a screening of Ubi Soft's coming Australian releases.

For me the show was stolen by the XBox version of the developers' seminal Counter Terrorism game, Rainbow Six. We'll look at this game next edition.

In the meantime I've been perfecting my XBox aiming with green-role Tom Clancy games. Ghost Recon has become an outstanding XBox hit, so it is little wonder that Island Thunder is also flying off the shelves.

Unlike the PC version, this XBox title is a stand-alone game, you don't need Ghost Recon to play it. Island Thunder includes eight single-player missions set in Cuba after the big fella succumbs to all those years of chewing on stogies.

The strife on the island has the US insert small SF teams with specific missions to ensure anarchy doesn't spread.

Island Thunder, like its PC cousin, introduces helo insertions and generally expands on what is already a capable franchise.

After playing the PC version to death, all Island Thunder on XBox does is highlight my lack of right thumb control; I'm like Wyatt Earp with a mouse and keyboard but give me a thumb stick as an aiming device and I shoot like my brother.

The game includes a selection of auto-aim sensitivity settings to make things easier but, of course, being a male I refuse to use them.

Controlling the rest of your team is also quite complicated. I suggest replaying the first mission a few times to get manoeuvring your team-mates down pat before heading into the more difficult missions.

With XBox Live now up and running and the large number of multi-player options included in Island Thunder I'm sure it will become standard fare on the Aussie XBox servers very shortly.

Star Wars: Knights of the Old
Republic
www.lucasarts.com/products/swkotor/index.html
Like Jedi Academy, Star Wars: KOTOR is a game worthy of George's big franchise.

Set 4000 years before Episode 1 in a time when Jedi were plentiful, the player begins a quest to uncover the evil of the Sith.

Yes you read it right, a quest as in D&D geeky-type quest. Star Wars: KOTOR is essentially a role-playing game with all of the background nerdy stuff hidden.

There are hours of gameplay here just exploring worlds.

At the time of writing I'm four hours in and still on my first world.

It is an enthralling game for anyone into the Star Wars thing as this early history goes into an amazing amount of detail explaining the lead up to the more familiar movies.

It is a single-player game but those with XBox Live will be able to download new content.

We have copies of the reviewed games up for grabs this edition. We'll also have a trolley load more next edition so get those entries in.

Entries should be emailed to ADFgamesmen@telstra.com with the name of the game you would like to win in the subject line.

Only one entry a person. Subsequent entries will be discarded.

Include your full name and mailing address in the email or your entry won't be accepted.

.