In a recent report by io9, "Star Wars" fans that have been around since the late 1980's and early 1990's, are in for a real treat. Even when the franchise had all but disappeared from the pop culture stage during these years, it continued to live on in the form of books. During this time, there were no computers and videos were just starting to be put on VHS tapes. For those too young to know what those are, they were big black plastic bricks with magnetic tape onto which the movie was recorded.
During this time when there was little new "Star Wars" content, two of the most popular books were "Star Wars: The Role Playing Game" and "Star Wars: Sourcebook." Luckily for those fans who wish to revisit their childhood, these two books are coming back.
More than that, they are doing so in almost the exact way as they were first published in 1987. In celebration of their 30th anniversary, Fantasy Flight Games plans to release them sometime later this year. Being more than halfway through, fans can only hope it's during Force Friday, or shortly there after.
The books
Originally published by West End Games, these books not only gave fans a way to have new adventures within the "Star Wars" universe but also expanded on information seen in the films. In today's world, it would be like a shorter novelization of the films. Anything that was in those books was considered "canon"-that is to have taken place within this fictional universe. It was in the source book that many things, from the structure of the Empire to ship and planet names, to alien species were explained.
These books were also where a young Pablo Hidalgo got a lot of his "Star Wars" information from growing up. In the article by io9, it states that Hidalgo often credits these books being not just "highly influential" on him, but also on the language of the films that still exist today. As such, one of the few changes they are making to the new releases of these books is having a foreword written by him.
Fan reaction
In the comments under the article, fans cannot help but share their excitement and memories with both books growing up. One poster recalls that it had them "weeping with joy" and that they loved it for its simplicity. More than that, being as The Role playing game book was set between "A New Hope" and "The Empire Strikes Back," it said the most about this fictional universe.
It also allowed the player(s) to become three types of Jedi: "Old Jedi (a la Ben Kenobi), Young Jedi (a la like Phantom Menace Anakin) and Failed Jedi (Luke’s age but washed out of the Jedi temple before the purge)." In other words, the sky was the limit when it came to fans choosing the type of adventure they wanted to go on in this universe.
While the above poster could not stop recalling their fond memories with the game book, others could do no more than leaving emotional gifs that ranged from crying to speechless to the now classic, "Shut up and take my money." Until the books are released sometime later this year, fans can only sit back and anxiously await their arrival.
