Six years before Mace Windu appeared on screen, a character with a similar name had already shown up in licensed Star Wars tabletop game materials. However, he was neither a Jedi nor a human, but a Sullustan who sold used droids. The Jedi Master Windu, portrayed by Samuel L. Jackson, did not make his debut until the release of Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace on May 19, 1999.
This merchant appeared in Galaxy Guide 7: Mos Eisley, published in 1993. This 96-page tabletop reference book, written by Martin Wixted and published by West End Games, provided local characters and settings for those running Star Wars tabletop adventures. He had previously worked as a bartender on a salvage cruiser, and after ending up on Tatooine, he made a living selling old droids for owner Agilar at "Jawa Traders."
The manual spelled his name as "Mace Windy," slightly different from the movie character's "Mace Windu." This name was not a tribute to the film but originated from George Lucas's January 1973 story outline for The Journal of the Whills, which was later discarded. The approximately 13-page manuscript opened with an apprentice recounting his master's deeds, featuring a hero named "Mace Windy."
This name did not appear in the 1977 film or its two sequels but was reintroduced through tabletop game materials. Lucas only began writing the script for The Phantom Menace on November 1, 1994, and during the creative process, he applied the old name to a member of the Jedi Council. By this time, the furry droid merchant had already been introduced for over a year.
In November 1996, Issue 11 of the Star Wars Adventure Journal featured a short story titled "Spare Parts" by Pablo Hidalgo, which gave the Sullustan character the full name "Macemillian-winduarté," explaining "Mace Windu" as a nickname. The story revolved around an accounting droid: the information it held was leverage used by local criminals to blackmail Jabba the Hutt.
Hidalgo joined Lucasfilm in January 2000 and, in 2014, became a founding member of the Story Group alongside Leland Chee and Kiri Hart, tasked with maintaining continuity and canon status for Star Wars. In August 2026, a fan re-examined these timelines, bringing the evolution of the name back into discussion.
Subsequent works also added background context linking the names of the two characters. The 2005 New Essential Chronology recorded that Jedi Windu had helped defend the Sullustan homeworld of Sullust II during the Clone Wars, where the local king erected a statue in his honor and bestowed upon him an honorary title. On April 25, 2014, Lucasfilm reclassified the former Expanded Universe as "Legends," meaning this merchant and related settings were no longer part of the current canon.