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Star Wars: Dark Forces

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"Dark Forces" redirects here. For other uses, see Dark Forces (disambiguation).
Star Wars: Dark Forces
Box cover for Dark Forces
Developer(s)LucasArts
Publisher(s)LucasArts
Designer(s)Daron Stinnett,
Ray Gresko,
Justin Chin
SeriesStar Wars: Jedi Knight
EngineJedi (engine), iMuse
Platform(s)MS-DOS, Apple Macintosh, PlayStation
ReleaseFebruary 15, 1995
June, 1995
November 1996
Genre(s)First-person shooter
Mode(s)Single player

Star Wars: Dark Forces is a first-person shooter video game developed and published by LucasArts. It was released in 1995 for DOS and Apple Macintosh, and in 1996 for the Sony PlayStation. The storyline within the Dark Forces is set in the Star Wars fictional universe and follows the character Kyle Katarn. Katarn is a mercenary working on behalf of the Rebel Alliance. He discovers the Empire's "Darktrooper Project", which involves the building of powerful robot soldiers.

Dark Forces uses the Jedi game engine, which was developed especially for the game. The engine adds gameplay features to the first-person shooter genre which where uncommon at the time of release. These features include level designs with multiple floors and being able to turn the weapon independent of the view within the game.

Critics gave mixed reviews of Dark Forces. The DOS and Macintosh versions were received well with critics praising the level design and technological advances. The PlayStation version was criticized for having poor graphics and slow frame rates, reducing the playability of the game. A sequel to Dark Forces, Star Wars Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II followed in 1997.

Gameplay

The player engaging a darktrooper

Dark Forces is a first-person shooter. The player fights with non-player characters (NPCs) that attack him with either projectile weapons or in melee combat. There are a variety of weapons available to the player to use, ranging from blasters to explosives.[1] The darktroopers act in the game as powerful enemy NPCs, they appear infrequently and provide a boss component.[2] The player has a health and shield level. When hit by an enemy NPC, the shield or health decreases. These can be boosted by power-ups distributed through-out the level.[1]

Dark Forces consists of levels with puzzles, obstacles and hostile NPCs. To be able to proceed through the levels the player must solve the puzzles which may involve unlocking doors or locating switches. The environment provides physical obstacles for the character in the game also. These include jumping from ledges or traversing across flowing rivers.[3][4]

Plot

The storyline in Dark Forces follows Kyle Katarn, a mercenary employed by the Rebel Alliance. Before the events in Dark Forces, Katarn was a student learning the skills required to follow in his father's career of agricultural mechanics. While he was studying at an academy, he was told by officials that rebels had killed his parents. The pain from this caused him to enlist in the Imperial army. Katarn met Jan Ors while, who was undercover as a double agent and they got to know each other. Ors uncovered the real information about Katarn's parents which detailed that it was really the Empire that was behind their death. Ors' cover was eventually blown and she was taken prisoner. Katarn helped her escape, thus ending his career with the Empire. Katarn soon became a mercenary and due to his hatred for the Empire for killing his parents he takes on jobs from the Rebel Alliance.[1]

Katarn is recruited by the Rebel Alliance to recover the plans to the Death Star, a heavily armed space station capable of destroying planets. The Rebel Alliance use the plans to find a weakness in and then destroy the Death Star. The story resumes a year later. Katarn aids the Rebels in investigating and stopping the threat of the Imperial dark trooper project. Despite the successful missions on behalf of the Rebel Allience, Katarn still does not join their cause.[5]

Development

Development of Dark Forces was lead by Daron Stinnett. The programming was lead by Ray Gresko and the graphics and storyline by Justin Chin.[1] Production began in September 1993,[2] at a time when the first-person shooter genre was very popular. The developers of Dark Forces wanted to adapt the format into an adventure game. To do this they introduced puzzles and strategy, along with a Star Wars plot.[2] Originally Luke Skywalker was intended to be the main character in the game, however the developers realized that this would add constraints to gameplay and storyline. Instead a new character was created, Kyle Katarn.[5]

the Jedi game engine used in Dark Forces allows atmospheric effects such as red haze.

The dark troopers in Dark Forces were created specially for the game by Justin Chin and Paul Mica. Chin notes that they were designed as a more advanced enemy when compared to standard stormtroopers: "Instead of just beefing up the stormtroopers, I designed them to be more efficient. I wanted something more terrifying and more omnipotent." Three designs for the dark troopers were produced for Dark Forces. Lucasfilm licensing department initially rejected two of the designs for looking too much out of character, so Chin produced new designs which where ultimately approved.[2]

Dark Forces utilizes the Jedi engine, which can create gameplay and graphical elements such as fully 3D objects, atmospheric effects such as fog and haze, animated textures and shading.[3] Dark Forces also includes new gameplay mechanisms that were not common at the time of release. These include the ability to look in all directions, duck, jump, run and swim.[4] The usage of multiple floor levels is another technical advance in the first-person shooter genre.[6] Stinett indicated that the developers wanted these elements to be part of an "active environment", and features were included to create this: "ships come and go at the flight decks, rivers sweep along, platforms and conveyor belts move and much of the machinery functions."[2] Dark Forces utilizes the iMuse system to create an interactive music using the soundtrack to the Star Wars films composed by John Williams.[2]' There is also full speech and sound effects in stereo.[3]

Dark Forces was ported from DOS to Apple Macintosh. This presented several challenges for the developers. LucasArts requested the game to be produced for both DOS and Macintosh with the same system requirements, specifically the random-access memory (RAM). The Mac OS runs a graphical user interface which uses up RAM while DOS does not, meaning the Macintosh version has less RAM available for Dark Forces to use. Aaron Giles, who was the Macintosh programmer for Dark Forces explained that to resolve this problem the memory had to be managed more efficiently.[7]

Reaction

Dark Forces became LucasArts' highest sell-in with more than 300,000 copies accounted for at launch.[13] The game went on to sell 952,000 copies over the next five years to become the eleventh highest selling game from 1993 to 1999.[14] Dark Forces achieved a following on the world wide web, and custom levels and maps were created for the game.[4]

The popularity of characters from Dark Forces has resulted in LucasArts licensing toys based on the game. Hasbro has produced both Kyle Katarn and dark trooper toys, which are among the few Expanded Universe items to be turned into action figures.[15] The darktroopers were also included in books and comics.[2] The Dark Forces storyline has been novelized by science fiction author William C. Dietz. Later the books were adapted to full-cast audio dramatizations.[5]

Critical reception

The DOS and Macintosh versions of Star Wars: Dark Forces were received well.[8][11] Publications compared Dark Forces to Doom (1993), a significant video game in the first-person shooter genre, but also indicated that Dark Forces improved upon the Doom features.[12][4] The game has been criticized for being too short, as well as lacking a multiplayer feature.[12]

Steven Kent of The Seattle Times believes that the general aspects of the game appeal to most computer gamers, not just Star Wars fans. The Star Wars setting is a high point to the game, saying that the level designs recreate recreate the Star Wars style well: "Though most of the Dark Forces sets are original to the game, they were created in the "Star Wars" spirit."[16]

Dark Forces' gameplay has been described as "challenging" and has generally received praise.[4] Ron Dulin, reviewing the game for GameSpot highlights the implementation of puzzles within levels: "The levels are diverse and ingenious, with plenty of creative obstacles standing between you and your goal. While they can be occasionally frustrating, Dark Forces' diverse gameplay requirements make this title more mentally challenging than your average key hunt."[12] The graphics and sound within Dark Forces were both praised as helping to immerse the player in the environment.[4]

The Sony PlayStation version of Dark Forces received lower reviews than the DOS and Macintosh version. IGN indicates in its review that this is because the graphics and frame rate are significantly worse on the PlayStation.[11] Alex Constantides of Computer and Video Games offers the same view, saying that the game is "visually dated."[17]

References

  1. ^ a b c d Ashburn, Jo; Mark Cartwright (1995), Star Wars: Dark Forces Manual, LucasArts{{citation}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  2. ^ a b c d e f g Mizell, Leslie (October 1994). "Star Wars: Dark Forces preview". PC Gamer. Future Publishing: 34–37.
  3. ^ a b c "Video game of the week: 'Star Wars: Dark Forces'". Knight-Ridder. 1995-03-21. Retrieved 2008-12-15.
  4. ^ a b c d e f Staten, James (1995-12-04). "Dark Forces". MacWEEK. Retrieved 2008-12-15.
  5. ^ a b c "Katarn, Kyle". starwars.com. Lucasfilm. Retrieved 2008-12-17. Cite error: The named reference "Kyle" was defined multiple times with different content (see the help page).
  6. ^ Turner, Benjamin & Bowen, Kevin (December 11, 2003). Bringin' in the DOOM Clones (page 2). GameSpy.
  7. ^ Baldazo, Rex (December 1995). "Today's hot first-person 3-D shoot-'em-ups". Byte.com. Retrieved 2008-12-19.
  8. ^ a b c d e "Star Wars: Dark Forces". Moby Games. Retrieved 2008-12-15.
  9. ^ "Star Wars Dark Forces - PC". Game Rankings. Retrieved 2008-12-30.
  10. ^ "Star Wars: Dark Forces - PS". Game Rankings. Retrieved 2008-12-30.
  11. ^ a b c "Dark Forces - Playstation review". IGN. 1996-12-13. Retrieved 2008-12-16.
  12. ^ a b c d Dulin, Ron (1996-05-01). "Star Wars Dark Forces Review". GameSpot. Retrieved 2008-12-15.
  13. ^ "LucasArts Milestones". LucasArts. Retrieved 2008-12-18.
  14. ^ Dunnigan, James F. (2000-01-03). The Wargames Handbook (Third ed.). Writers Club Press. ISBN 978-0595155460.
  15. ^ "Dark troopers". Star Wars Databank. Lucasfilm. Retrieved 2007-12-09.
  16. ^ Kent, Steven L. (1995-05-19). "Tech Reviews CD-Rom -- Dark Forces". The Seattle Times. Retrieved 2008-12-15.
  17. ^ Constantides, Alex (2001-08-15). "Star Wars: Dark Forces PlayStation Review". Computer and Video Games. Retrieved 2008-12-15.
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