Tatooine Manhunt (1988) was the first adventure modules for West End Games’ Star Wars RPG. It does a great job of setting expectations for what a WEGSW adventure should be and has a well-deserved reputation as a classic. It has a script and cinematic cuts and constantly refocuses the action in a series of episodes across two main settings — the city of Mos Eisley and the desert wilderness around it — while hand-waving the boring stuff in-between.

It’s action packed in a way that gestures broadly at the three original films, rearranging the familiar into a new configuration. It’s new, but also…cozy? There’s an important military figure in hiding on Tatooine, who has recently been outed to the Empire, who sends a team of bounty hunters to retrieve him before the Rebellion. They’re led by Jodo Kast, the famous try-hard Boba Fett knock-off, who is accompanied by IG-72, an off-brand IG-88. On the commander’s side are a couple of mercenaries who are very similar to Bossk and Zuckuss. While avoiding Jabba’s agents, the players use the cantina as a base of operations for forays into the desert, where they encounter a krayt dragon, Tusken Raiders and, memorably, a cult that worships Banthas. See? Old, but also new.

Art is still primarily production art from Lucasfilm. The cantina map is sharp, though, and by Jennell Jaquays!

Also noteworthy: I think because this was the first adventure, this was also the first place the Rule Upgrade appeared. It’s four pages of tweaks meant to enhance play that were settled on after the core rules went to press and, for the most part, they codify stuff that would probably be naturally house ruled; it is kind of nice that they were officially amended so fast. Copies were tucked into most adventures, until the second edition came out.

I also have to say about Jodo Kast: because he had (very rare, possibly knock-off) Mandalorian armor we always saw him as a loser who was copping Boba Fett’s rep. I think this is somewhat true across the fandom at the time (I feel like he died, maybe more than once, and badly, in the comics and novels?), and yet every player with a bounty hunter character wanted Mandalorian armor. And now it kind of amuses me that there are so many folks in Mandalorian armor running around the canon galaxy now…