Star Wars: Dark Forces

The Good
I'll kick this review off by saying that I'm a huge Star Wars fan. I've seen all six movies (and enjoyed them all, even the prequels) and I also yearly visit the FACTS comic, horror and sci-fi convention (a huge chunk of the fair is exclusively dedicated to all things Star Wars). So yeah, I'm quite a Star Wars nerd! Last Monday was also official Star Wars Day and to celebrate this event, I decided to replay one of the first great Star Wars games!

Star Wars Dark Forces takes place between episodes IV and V and focuses on Kyle Katarn, a former Imperial officer who now works as a mercenary for the Rebels. After successfully aiding in the destruction of the first Death Star, he embarks on his most dangerous mission yet, as he faces off against the Empire's newest and deadliest weapon: the Dark Troopers! These super-powered Stormtroopers, capable of destroying an entire Rebel base in mere minutes, are being massively produced in an unknown Imperial base and it's up to Kyle to find out where that is and thwart the Empire's plans.

Dark Forces is a first-person shooter, playing very similar to DOOM and other FPS games at the time. So you can expect huge, varied levels, filled with tons of enemies and secret areas. Locations you'll visit include the city-planet Coruscant, a Star Destroyer and Jabba the Hutt's personal spacecraft. Every level feels unique in many aspects. Some levels are very industrial, with lots of machinery, conveyor belts and computer terminals. Other levels feel more like caves and caverns, filled with carnivorous critters. In every level of the game you have a set of objectives to complete such as obtaining documents, planting explosives or rescuing a certain character. After all objectives are completed, you can move on to the next level.

The levels themselves not only feel very different from one another but they are also very nicely detailed. The detention center level (mission 6) for example, starts off at the outskirts of the prison and then goes on through various floors, every floor hosting a specific department (entrance, prison cells, command center, even the garbage compactor). Most of Dark Forces' levels are very fun to walk and shoot through and as I already mentioned, they're full of secret areas so that really encourages some deep exploration.

As for the graphics, since the game was released in 1995, you can expect a lot of sprites but you can see some 3D models (the ships in Couruscant, for instance are fully animated and in full 3D). The game's house-made Jedi engine also features floors-over-floors (a neat, new feature back in those days) and can show huge environments without hurting the frame rate. All these bells and whistles sometimes make me believe that the game uses an early version of the famous Build engine (the engine used in Duke Nukem 3D). And since that engine is so awesome, that definitely is a good sign!

Your weapons include a blaster, stormtrooper machine gun, grenades, mines and even a Mortar cannon. You also get a few gadgets such as night vision goggles, ice skates and a gas mask. Every weapon and item serves its own purpose. Some weapons are useful up close, while others are more effective from a distance. All weapons feel very satisfying to use and the blaster weapons gunshot sound effects are identical to those in the films! Ammo is plentifully available throughout the levels and trust me, you'll need everything you can find if you want to even the odds against what the Empire will be throwing at you in this game. You'll encounter regular Stormtroopers, Imperial officers, various types of droids and of course the aforementioned Dark Troopers! Some enemies are mere cannon fodder, but others will put your skills to the test!

Music and sound effects are virtually all borrowed from the original trilogy. The music tracks are MIDI remakes from John Williams' soundtrack and the musical score changes depending on the situation you find yourself into. During quiet moments, the music will be slow and brooding, while during firefights the music gets very epic and orchestra like. The sound effects include the aforementioned famous blaster sounds and the Imperial forces shouting things like "halt" or "you're not authorized in this area" in their typical stormtrooper voices. The authentic music and sound effects, added with the weapons, enemies and well-designed levels all help in giving the game a true Star Wars atmosphere.

The Bad
You can't save while playing through a level. So if you start a level, you better damn sure finish it if you don't want to start all over again. You have a limited number of lives (more can be found in secret areas) and if you die, you respawn at a checkpoint close to where you went out for the count. But if you lose all lives, you have to start the mission all over again. For me, it isn't a real issue since it adds to the challenge and thrill, but just remember this when you're going into this game.

Some levels have tenacious platform sections. The game's first person perspective makes it quite difficult to make certain jumps without falling to your death on the first try. I wished that the developers added an optional third person mode, that would have made these jumps significantly easier.

The Bottom Line
Overall, Star Wars Dark Forces is a very enjoyable and engaging shooter that I can warmly recommend to Star Wars and FPS fans alike. Hell, I would even say that non Star Wars fans should also play this game, as its gameplay is good enough without the Star Wars setting added to it. Anyway, thank you for reading this review and I'll see you all again in a galaxy far, far away!

The Good
Dark Forces was the first fps that made sense to me. I wondered why demons would just hang around in dark corners and why Nazi’s let their castles get so run down, but Dark Forces had a pretty strong internal logic. Dark Forces fit pretty well into the Star Wars universe. Touches of back story, such as finding the Death Star plans (and cool hologram) were fun, and the game’s story seemed plausible. Some major characters from Star Wars were here and only Boba Fett seemed forced into the story.

There was also a nice selection of weapons ranging from the trusty Bryar Pistol, to the fast but wildly inaccurate Stormtrooper rifle, to the Trandoshan ion cannon (I recognize that some of the names are wrong- sheesh!). Levels were mostly good. I hated the look of the sewage level but really liked the Ice planet. AI was non-existent (just like in the movies) but enemies covered a wide variety of Aliens and Imperials.

Sound and music were great. I recognize the music was midi, but it was good midi and fit the tone of the levels. Sound effects were great! I loved shooting the weapons and listening to their unique “zaps” and it rocked hearing Imps shout “Stop Rebel scum!”

The Bad
No in-game save and poor graphics. Now a note about the graphics, they were decent when I originally played the game, but upon replaying the game recently, I had great trouble suspending my disbelief. It was hard to identify a small cluster of gray pixels as being a turret, except when said turret lit me up.

Other than that (I'm yadda yadda yaddaing my usual rant about cliches in first person shooters), Dark Forces was and is a great game.

The Bottom Line
Duh, it's the classic Star Wars first person shooter. No big surprises here.

The Good
This is a First-Person Shooter of the oldest age, yet it was solid enough to spawn the trilogy that was just getting better and better. I remember first time I played this game, I merely enjoyed first couple of levels and then tossed the game away when it came to those swamp stuff and such, guess I was under impression of games like Doom and such, didn't even stop to consider that LucasArts is smarter than to make that sort of crappish deja-vu with monsters and such. They just added various creatures from Star Wars universe to break away a bit from all the vast Stormtroopers you get to meet across the game.

The story itself isn't that bad, and it especially sounds good if you read the prologue in the manuals, and get to know the infamous Kyle Kattarn we all know from numerous sequels to this game which started it all. The only thing this game missed from its universe was the Jedi powers, but adding those would be too much, since Kyle was just a mercenary at the time. Jedi Knight takes good care of continuation to that matter. It was also the first such game where enemy actually communicated with you, even through the insults. There was no just yiking and groaning like in Id's games, but some cool Stormtrooper's yells like "Stop Rebel scum!", or "Surrender immediately!". None which had any meaning, 'cos they'd shoot you on sight anyway, but it was a neat boost for the atmosphere.

Levels are very rich and vary constantly so you can admire the scenery all the time, and occasional cinematics are just as cool, especially with Darth Vader in them. It's a great miss he wasn't in Jedi Knight though, when cinematics were made with live-actors and were really dazzling.

The Bad
I was quite unfair first time I played this game, but hey, I was only fifteen back then. It wasn't until 21st century that I bought this game, and played it fully around the time second Star Wars movie was in the theaters. Amazing as it may seem, I enjoyed it at that time as much as I would some recently released game with cutting-edge technology.

The Bottom Line
Star Wars universe is rich. The reason we like it's movies because they are rare (what, 5-6 altogether thus far) and hence they are done with utmost level of details, there are no SW series of all kinds like there are ST ones. However, on games' account, Star Wars franchise is rich and prosper and it entangled almost every genre it could, except the pure adventure (real pity, though), and these games amass almost all the time. Why do people like them? Sometimes they just create a feeling of being in the movies facing Lord Vader himself, sometimes it's just a part of the franchise, so why not getting it, and sometimes, just sometimes, the game becomes something else than the big whoop and actually presents itself two steps ahead of the others. Star Wars: Dark Forces is on of those SW titles, that breaks the mold of just being a part of the well known franchise, and becomes something more.