Adrick's Rating:   2 out of 4

You are an Imperial soldier. A revolt has begun on Boonda the Hutt’s moon. The leader of the revolution is the devious droid Wuntoo Forcee Forwun. His army is made up of hundreds of droids…and they are all prepared to kill on sight. Your mission: to stop the battle droids before they take on the Empire. Good luck.

Adrick:

    At the same time I was reading Last of the Jedi #9, I also happened to stumble across Star Wars Missions #9, a game-and-story book published by Scholastic ten years ago. I thought I’d celebrate that peculiar coincidence by writing a double #9 review.

This is a short little book, and Ryder Windham’s narrative before and after the gameplay is even shorter, so there isn’t much to review. One of the reasons I got this book was because a few of my favorite obscure characters show up. There’s Boonda, a rare Hutt who (as readers of the Droids comic books will remember) had severed his criminal ties completely in order to run a completely legitimate droid manufacturing business. Windham later incorporated the character into his Episode I Adventures and Star Wars Adventures books, which was where I first became familiar with the character. Boonda was a hoot in those books, but he still seems to be finding his place in this one.

Wuntoo Forcee Forwun first appeared in Tales of Jabba’s Palace, and was the droid who finally brought justice to the droid murderer EV-9D9. I always admired this determined droid dude, so it’s nice to see him in another story. His murderous actions and personality here are quite confusing, but I think that will be explained in the next few books in the series. One other nice detail: most of the “Mission Briefing” sections preceding the game play in Star Wars Missions end with “May the Force be with you.” Because this book features an Imperial mission, we get “May the dark side be with you.” Ah, for simpler days…

I’ve always liked the Star Wars Missions/Episode I/Adventures books, as they revisited some forgotten parts of the EU and introduced some interesting new characters. It’s a shame they aren’t around any more.

Adrick:

    The game that goes with these books requires a lot of materials in order to play that are hard to track down nowadays. Since the last gamebook using this format came out in 2003, it’s doubtful that any kids who manage to find these books will actually be able to play the game anymore. That’s kind of sad.

Adrick:

    What are really sad are the names of the Imperial officers. Windham seems determined to make up the most silly sounding names possible. In previous books we got Termo, Skeezer, and Tix, here we have Groot and Dylak. I suppose they’re only following in the footsteps of Ozzel, but really now…