Episode IV - Why Star Wars?

Who's or what is the most influential person/item in modern gaming? Out of a list of 17 possible entries, it's boiled down to writing about George Lucas and Star Wars. How does a space opera from the 70's lead to the development of contemporary games? It's a good question, I hope I can find the answer as I look into this cultural phenomena.
[I will be adding more to this as the days go by. This is a very rough bouncing board where thoughts don't connect yet.]

General Points about Star Wars:

• It is considered a cultural unifier


• Has had a significant impact on American pop culture


• Scenes, characters and quotes are part of popular lexicon (lingo)


• Early example of film pastiche (combination of genre)


• Introduced advances in computer generated special effects


• Generated model for movie trilogies and franchises


• Help establish big budget blockbuster industry

Star Wars is BIG business but sales figures and graphs don't give us a clear picture as to why it is such a cultural icon, much less how it's influenced modern gaming. Much of the information about Star Wars is either Star Wars trivia (facts from the fictional universe) or heavily opinionated discussion on a number of topics, cultural, religious, cinematic or economic.

What do we know about Star Wars and video gaming? During the creation and development of Space Invaders, creator Tomohiro Nishikado was having trouble coming up with a design that would work with the limitations of the technology.

Then I heard about a movie called Star Wars released in the U.S. which was coming to Japan next year, so I came up with a game based in space which had space aliens as targets.(Nishikado in Edge, 2005)

Fast forward some years and to some people, it is evident that the Force did have a role to play in the development of video games.

"`Star Wars' didn't create video games but it totally influenced them," says Peer Schneider, senior publisher of IGN.com, a Web site for video gamers. "The Death Star trench run in the original `Star Wars' is the archetypal video game climax: Fire a missile, hit a weak spot and everything gets destroyed."(Rickey, C, 2005)

Ironically this would later become the plot of a Star Wars arcade game, suggesting that there are some facets of pop culture do come full circle.

References:

Edge 2005,The Creation of Space Invaders, viewed 12th March 2010, http://www.edge-online.com/news/the-creation-space-invaders.

Edwards, B, n.d., Ten Things Everyone Should Know About Space Invaders Celebrating 30 Years of Shooting at Sushi., viewed 5th March 2010,
http://www.1up.com/do/feature?pager.offset=1&cId=3168373.

Ebert, R 1999, Great Movies: Star Wars, viewed 11th March 2010,
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/19990628/REVIEWS08/906280301/1023.

Rickey, C 2005, Debate brews about cultural impact of 'Star Wars', viewed 10th March 2010,
http://media.www.the-telescope.com/media/storage/paper749/news/2005/05/09/StarWars/Debate.Brews.About.Cultural.Impact.Of.star.Wars-953413.shtml.

'Space Invaders' 2010, Wikipedia, viewed 5th March 2010,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Invaders.

'Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, 2010, Wikipedia, viewed 10th March 2010,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Wars_Episode_IV:_A_New_Hope.


Stuff to be analysed:
- Edge Magazine 2006, A Short History of LucasArts
http://www.edge-online.com/features/a-short-history-lucasarts

- Jenkins, H 2005, Quentin Tarantino's Star Wars?:
Digital Cinema, Media Convergence, and Participatory Culture
http://web.mit.edu/cms/People/henry3/starwars.html