Star Wars: Dark Forces is a first-person shooter video game developed and published by LucasArts. It was released in 1995 for MS-DOS and Macintosh, and in 1996 for the PlayStation. The story is set in the Star Wars expanded universe and begins shortly before the original Star Wars film, before flashing forward to a year after the film's events. The game's protagonist and playable character is Kyle Katarn, a mercenary working on behalf of the Rebel Alliance who discovers the Galactic Empire's secret Dark Trooper Project, which involves the development of a series of powerful new battle droids and power-armored stormtroopers.
Dark Forces uses the Jedi game engine, which was developed specifically for the game. The engine adds gameplay features that were uncommon to the first-person shooter genre at the time of release, including level designs with multiple floors, and the ability to look up and down.
Upon release, the PC and Macintosh versions of the game received generally favorable reviews from critics, who praised its level design and technological advances, though the PlayStation version was criticized for having poor graphics and slow frame rates. The game also did well financially, selling almost 1 million copies in the United States by 1999. The game's success launched the Star Wars: Jedi Knight series, beginning with the direct sequel Star Wars Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II in 1997.
A continually developed community made port entitled The Force Engine reached 1.0 on December 20, 2022. A remastered version of the game developed by Nightdive Studios was released on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Windows, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S on February 28, 2024.
Gameplay
thumb|left|The player engaging a Dark Trooper
Dark Forces is a first-person shooter (FPS). The player controls Kyle Katarn from a first-person perspective, with a focus on combat against various creatures and characters from the Star Wars universe, although the game also includes environmental puzzles and hazards. Dark Forces follows a central storyline outlined in mission briefings and cutscenes. All player weapons except the fist require ammunition, which can be collected in power-ups. All weapons, again with the exception of the fist, have a secondary mode which makes it have a different effect than in primary mode.
Dark Forces begins with Kyle and Jan being hired by the Alliance to recover the plans to the Death Star, the Empire's space station outfitted with a superlaser capable of destroying an entire planet. The Rebels use the plans to find a weakness in the station and eventually destroy it.
1 year later, the Alliance hires the pair again, this time to investigate an assault on one of their bases by a new type of Imperial soldiers. Kyle's investigation unveils the Dark Trooper Project, headed by General Rom Mohc. His mission to stop the project takes him to the sewers of Anoat City, where he captures Moff Rebus, an Imperial weapons specialist who developed the weapons used by Dark Troopers. Rebus' interrogation leads him to a weapons research facility in the mountains of Fest and the Gromas mines, where minerals are extracted for the Dark Troopers.
Kyle and Jan later learn that Crix Madine, a former Imperial Commander who defected to the Alliance, has been captured by the Empire, and the former infiltrates a high-security detention center on Orinackra to rescue him. After Kyle saves him from execution, Madine informs the Alliance of an operation to smuggle Dark Trooper materials, leading Kyle and Jan to investigate the Ramsees Hed docking port on Cal-Seti. Afterward, Kyle also destroys a robotics facility on the icy planet Anteevy, the second stage of the Dark Trooper production line. Kyle and Jan's mission is temporarily halted when they are captured by the crime lord Jabba the Hutt, one of the main financiers of the Dark Trooper Project. After escaping from Jabba's clutches and an encounter with the bounty hunter Boba Fett, hired by General Mohc to kill Kyle, the pair travel to Coruscant, where Kyle infiltrates a computer vault which reveals the location of the Ergo fuel station, the final stage of the smuggling route.
Masquerading as a smuggler, Kyle infiltrates the Super Star Destroyer Executor and then the Arc Hammer starship, General Mohc's headquarters, and the location of the Dark Trooper Project's final stage. After killing Mohc (wearing Dark Trooper armor), Kyle destroys the ship and escapes. At the same time, Darth Vader watches from the Executor, commenting that the Dark Trooper Project's destruction is an unfortunate setback and that the Force is strong with Katarn. For his bravery and heroic actions, Kyle is awarded the Star of Alderaan by the Alliance.
Development
Development of Dark Forces was led by Daron Stinnett. The programming was led by Ray Gresko, and the graphics and storyline by Justin Chin. The idea of creating a first-person shooter in the Star Wars universe was inspired by fan mods of Doom which had levels set on the Death Star. The developers of Dark Forces wanted to adapt the FPS format into an adventure game. To do this they introduced puzzles and strategy, along with a Star Wars plot. To produce these new features, the developers wrote a game engine from scratch. Stinnett 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."
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.
Music
Music for Star Wars: Dark Forces was mostly original works composed by Clint Bajakian, though they are based on cues from John Williams' original Star Wars works through the utilization of the iMUSE system to create interactive music. The Dark Troopers were also included in books and comics,
In September 2009, Dark Forces was re-released as a downloadable version on Valve's Steam network for Windows XP, 2000 and Vista, and OS X Mavericks. The game is available to purchase individually or as part of a package including all of the games in the Jedi Knight series.
Reception
Critical reviews
The PC and Macintosh versions of Star Wars: Dark Forces were well received. Publications compared Dark Forces to Doom, a significant video game in the first-person shooter genre at the time, but also indicated that Dark Forces improved upon Dooms features. Criticisms tended to focus on the game being too short, as well as lacking a multiplayer feature.
Dark Forces gameplay has been described as "challenging" and has generally received praise. GamePros Major Mike praised the action, depth of gameplay, weapons, sound effects, music, and graphic effects, but said the choppy frame rate and slowdown "plague most of the game", and compared the game unfavorably to Doom and PowerSlave. Next Generation noted that "Dark Forces fails on some technical levels as a port", but commented positively on the variety of level designs, challenge level, and use of audio, and concluded more favorably, "Not quite as intense as Doom or Disruptor, but surely better than crap like Kileak, Dark Forces will certainly satisfy Star Wars fans looking for their own little touch of the force." Next Generation reviewed the Macintosh version of the game, and stated that "Purposeful mission objectives [...] and various neato features [...] lift Dark Forces out of the faceless swamp of first-person crawlers and into a place of honor. A very classy job." MacUser named Dark Forces one of the top 50 CD-ROMs of 1995.
PC Gamer gave Dark Forces the award in the best sound effects of 1995. It was also a runner-up in the best action game category.
Sales
Dark Forces shipped more than 300,000 copies in preparation for its launch, a record for LucasArts at that time. It debuted at #1 on PC Data's monthly computer game sales chart for March 1995. In 1998, it was the third-highest-selling game for Mac OS.
According to PC Data, which tracked sales in the United States, Dark Forces had sold 928,469 units and earned $37.1 million in revenue in the United States. This led PC Data to declare it the country's ninth-best-selling computer game for the period between January 1993 and April 1998. Sales in the region rose to 952,033 copies by September 1999; by that time, it was the country's 11th-best-selling computer game since January 1993.