Shadows of the Empire (1996) is a weird chapter in Star Wars history and probably the height of the Expanded Universe in ambition if not quality. The idea was simple. What if Lucasfilm did all the stuff they would do in terms of merchandising for a film, just, without the film?

Shadows consisted of: a novel, an N64 videogame, a comic book series, a surprisingly good soundtrack that didn’t just rehash the film themes, a small line of toys and, of course, a sourcebook for the West End Games Star Wars RPG, all detailing a fairly ridiculous story set between the events of Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. Taken as a whole it is…merely OK.

There is cool stuff, to be sure. The new villain, Prince Xizor – a seducer, master manipulator, rival of Vader’s for the favor of the Emperor and the head of the very cool criminal syndicate Black Sun – had no shortage of potential (though two decades later, he does seem to be an unfortunate play on the Fu Manchu stereotype)(also, is it me, or does he look a little bit like Abe Vigoda on the cover?). There are also swoop gangs and bounty hunters and lots of new gizmos. The problem was, with Han Solo in carbonite, the gang of heroes lacked a scoundrel’s heart. The creative team solved this by introducing a minor league Han Solo impersonator named (cringe) Dash Rendar. Dash will always be a jobber to me.

The Shadows of the Empire sourcebook details everything in the same not-quite-useful way as all the tie-in WEG sourcebooks.