As far as I recall, I saw Star Wars for the first time at about this time of the year, 30 years ago in 1995. Star Wars has been my favorite thing in fiction ever since.
But the last Star Wars work that I was invested in was the Knights of the Old Republic comic series that ran from 2006 to 2010. Which ended 15 years ago. Before that, the last two Star Wars works that engaged me were KotOR and Jedi Academy in 2003. That’s 22 years ago.
I have been a fan of old Star Wars stories almost three times longer than I was a fan of current Star Wars stories.
And I still am a huge fan of the three movies and many of the great works from the 90s and the early 2000s. But I also feel that the old setting might have been played out, and its potential for additional stories sufficiently explored and exhausted. As a gamemaster, I always felt like the classic Star Wars setting is a great world for endless adventures. You can always have more stories with new heroes, and new villains, and new planets. But in practice, it feels to me like mostly just more of the same. Things get renamed and reshuffled, but it’s mostly the same old pieces with the same old plots. And they are great and exciting pieces and plots. But they have already been done.
There is of course always the option to come up with new kinds of heroes and new kinds of villains who are dealing with different issues and conflicts. But in that case, why set those stories in Star Wars? For movie, TV, and videogame productions, the answer is simple. Brand recognition. Millions of people will throw a lot of money at almost everything because it is branded as Star Wars. But as a hobbyist who has no means to commercialize something with the Star Wars brand, that point is moot.
Star Wars does still endlessly inspire me to do and make new things. New ideas for new cultures, new factions, and new conflicts that can produce new stories. But in this creative space, tying everything to the framework of Star Wars does not support and enhance the new ideas, but rather restricts and limits them. With Iridium Moons, I do have the full freedom to just do my own things, and execute all my own new ideas as a coherent world that does not have to struggle against its foundations.
The Star Wars d6 RPG is such a great and exciting game, and even the d20 Saga Edition is very evocative in its own way. But I feel to me, as a GM, the setting has been played out. I still love the idea of running Star Wars campaigns, but when I sit down to sketch out a draft for adventures, I do find this world quite lacking in hooks for new stories to tell in it.
Star Wars has stopped expanding on its original form a long, long time ago. And all the new forms people have come up with to extend the profits that can be extracted from the brand have been doing nothing for me. And I don’t have any ideas for how to do more with that classic world either. So perhaps it has become time to reframe my relationship with Star Wars as a deep love for three movies and a few books and comics that I can take from the shelf every year to enjoy them for what they are, rather than as this endless playground that should be expanded into perpetuity. And I think I can keep that love going for another 50 years.
