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Star Wars-Escape from the Death Star Game




Hey Everyone!  I wanted to do a blog on another board game that I played many time during my childhood.  First of all, I can clearly remember getting this game for a gift on my birthday many ( and I mean many) moons ago.   It was 1978 and I was the tender age of 7.  Star Wars was a huge blockbuster the year before and the marketing of this now classic film was in full swing:  action figures, clothes, a motion picture soundtrack, and various other items that helped to push this film into the American consciousness at the time.  To capitalize on the board game craze, Kenner, the company that produced many of the action figures and other toys in the Star Wars line, produced a board game in October 1977: Star Wars-Escape from the Death Star game.



The game is set in the latter half of the Star Wars film.  The object was simple:  You had to move your Han Solo and Chewbacca token, along with your Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia Organa tokens out of the trash compactor,  collect the Death Star plans, and deactivate the tractor beam.  Then you had to maneuver your way past TIE fighters and reach the rebel base.  First person to have both his tokens reach the rebel base won the game.



The game board was the Death Star itself, with various colored circles:  the white circle were free spaces, yellow were coded as "DS-" and numbered one through eight.  Lastly, there were blue circles and if you landed on that space, you had to draw a card.  The cards, in my mind, made the game more interesting.  A majority of the cards read either "The Force is with you", in which case the player got to get an extra turn, moved ahead a few spaces or some other awesome thing.  Some of the cards read "The Force is against you" and in this instance, you lost a turn, had to go to the detention block, or my personal favorite: "The trash monster hauls you back to the trash compactor".  In addition to those cards, you had cards that told you where on the game board to move your tokens and other cards that read "Your blaster misfires.  Move back three" or "Win a light saber dual with Darth Vader.  Move ahead three."








You have your choice of color of tokens:  red, yellow, blue, or green.  You place your tokens on the space marked Trash Compactor.  Players take turns spinning.  You can spins a one, two or a three.  You move according to your spin.  You have to make your way to the tractor beam and then over to the computer room.  Once you have collected those cards, you move toward the Millennium Falcon on the board.  From there, you have to battle the Tie fighters.  If you token lands on one, you spin again.  If you spin a lose, you move back those spaces.  If you spin a win, you move forward those spaces.  Once again, the first player wins when both of their tokens land on the rebel base!




I was over the moon when I got this game all those years ago.  I would even take this game to school on special occasions and play with my friends.  Star Wars was all the rage at the time and its popularity is still going strong.  I searched online and you can even order this game from Etsy.  If you keep your eye out, you can score a game for a really good price.

It's games like this one that really stand out in my mind.  A detailed board game, colorful tokens and a story set in the Star Wars universe.  What more can a fan want?









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