When people think of LucasArts' original IPs from the 90s, games like Grim Fandango and Secret of Monkey Island probably spring to mind. It's less likely that people remember a little game called Big Sky Trooper. Described by its creator, Hal Barwood, as a "silly, space-faring RPG," BST didn't exactly set the world on fire, and chances are you won't find it on Virtual Console any time soon.

But maybe, just maybe, you'll come across it one day. And when you do, hopefully you'll remember that it's worth playing, because it's this month's Reset Button!

An Accidental Career Path

Hal Barwood always had a knack for game design, starting with his love for tabletop games back in high school. Unfortunately, though, computers hadn't become mainstream yet (it was the 1950s, after all), and so any sort of design in the digital sense was impossible. Hal had a second love, however, and soon found himself at USC Film School, where he became a close friends with a guy named George Lucas.

A couple years later, while visiting his childhood home in New Hampshire, Hal discovered a room full of Teletype machines (electromagnetic typewriters that could handle extremely simple code), and through the magic of BASIC, created a Rock, Paper, Scissors game. Hal would return to film school in California, but the feeling stuck, and when the Apple II became popular, he realized that, though still primitive, computers had advanced enough to design real games on, and programmed a full RPG.

Even so, Hal continued to work in film (on movies like Dragonslayer and Warning Sign) until hearing through some old friends that LucasArts was looking for someone to come in and work on a new Indiana Jones project, later subtitled Fate of Atlantis. Having old ties to George Lucas, and since he only lived a few miles away from the office, Hal took interest, and after proving that he wasn't just some Hollywood know-nothing, he got the job and got to work.

After finishing up Jones, though, it was time to get started on Big Sky Trooper…

A Few Long Nights

Once Fate of Atlantis wrapped up, Hal found himself growing a bit tired of the adventure genre, and decided that his next project would feature more action. Also wanting to get involved in the console world, he found himself putting ideas together for what would eventually become Big Sky Trooper on the Super Nintendo in 1991.

That's right. 1991. Even though BST was released in 1995, its original concept was devised a full four years earlier. The blame for its constant false starts and delays laid mostly at the feet of the shaky management at LucasArts at the time. With roles consistently switching hands and the general relationship between the corporate and creative staff being out of sync, combined with programmers often coming onto the project, only to fail at producing content and then leave, it took years before Big Sky Trooper actually got off the ground (no pun intended).

The problems didn't stop there, either. LucasArts didn't self-publish its console efforts at the time, and so Hal and his team had major issues with funding, eventually signing a contract with JVC. Though they did end up publishing the game eventually, there was a real problem with getting BST to fit on the cheapest (and most common) SNES cartridge available from Nintendo at the time, coming in at a whopping 8 megabits. Backgrounds were in a constant state of simplification, and even getting the save system to function was a major hassle. To put things in perspective, around the same time, Nintendo would launch Donkey Kong Country, which shipped on a cart four times as large.

True to form, though, Hal eventually wrapped up development, which brings us to the game itself.

Big Sky Trooper 101

While flying through the Solar System, a race of alien slugs happen upon the LucasArts logo. Realizing that our society must be based around, "bones and advertising," two things that they absolutely despise, our race is deemed unworthy, and must be eradicated. You're Earth's only hope - after being recruited by a supremely shady gentlemen, you're brought in as a 21-Star General (a completely last-minute decision - you earn stars throughout the game - 79 to be exact, so you had to start with a number that would allow you to end the game at 100). With only a dog-themed spaceship and trooper suit at your disposal, the game begins.

Sporting a cartoony art style, the game was derided at the time for seeming too kiddy, but it's actually aged very well. Switching from space battles inside your ship to on-foot missions in your trooper shoots on a bunch of different planets, the environments are surprisingly varied, though ultimately every level has the same goal: zap as many damn dirty slugs as you can.

If there's anything to criticize about BST, it's that it perhaps lasts a bit too long. Back in the early 90s, Hal thought the game needed to clock in at a certain mark to stand up to its contemporaries, and though the game doesn't necessarily feel padded, cutting off some of the fat near the end likely would've ended up making the product a bit tighter.

Post-Game

Though personally satisfied with the game, Hal found LucasArts to be pretty indifferent with it, as they were much more concerned with pushing its licenses, treating original properties as more of an afterthought. As for JVC, they saw Big Sky Trooper as little more than a loose end that needed to be tied up, and only ordered a small shipment of cartridges.

Moving on, Hal began work on what he refers to as "very early casual games," starting with Indiana Jones and His Desktop Adventures (a game that originally had nothing to do with Jones, only adopting the namesake after pressure from LucasArts brass) and Yoda Stories, both of which were completed in around a year altogether. Critically, the games never did terribly well, but Hal still has a lot of affection for them.

These days, Hal's separated himself from LucasArts, instead focusing on freelance consulting at his company, Finite Arts. Most recently, he's worked on social media-focused games, as well as his own personal projects.

As for Big Sky Trooper, it was just one of those games that sort of came and went, a victim of a lack of enthusiasm by its publisher and development management. But, as Hal is quick to say, "the ROM is floating around," and it looks great on handheld devices. Give it a shot, folks. You won't be disappointed.

That wraps up this month's Reset Button! Be sure to stop by the Talkback thread, and absolutely make sure you come back tomorrow night to listen to my full, uncut interview with Hal Barwood, not only about Big Sky Trooper, but also about the management style at LucasArts, indie development, and why the internet is one of the only original additions to the gaming industry.