A long time ago, in an operating system far, far away, I emulated a handful of games through DOSBox with the aid of Boxer, for I was the kind of computer user who preferred the 'it just works' approach, which of course meant I gamed far more often on a console, and not on my Mac.
One of those emulated games was a demo for Star Wars: Dark Forces, a first-person shooter set somewhere in the Star Wars universe I knew and loved, which made an awful lot of sense, even if I found it to be a little cumbersome and old in places - I didn't admire the history of gaming as much as then as I do now.
I don't remember much of it, which is fine because it's the sequel, Star Wars Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II, that we care about today. A long time ago, in a little corner of the expanded universe that totally happened but not according to the House of Mouse, mercenary Kyle Katarn is about to face his destiny by confronting the Dark Jedi who killed his father.
I think. It doesn't sound like much of a plot, but we'll take what we can get.
Fun Times
The more Star Wars opening crawls I see, the more I hate every one of them, but once that scene-setting rubbish is out of the way, Jedi Knight gets going with intro cinematics that don't offer much to look at, and then acting that definitely does.
What you see up there are some strange looking villains seeking the whereabouts of 'The Valley of the Jedi', no doubt to defile it in some sinister way, and their method of information retrieval is very... to the point.
That's the first lightsaber to be filmed for a Star Wars product since Return of the Jedi wrapped up, and it doesn't look half bad at all. It's firmly in the fan-film territory, but it's clearly had time and effort put into it.
From our deadly villains, we meet a shady Kyle Katarn checking out holovids of his deceased father, before he's interrupted by a shadier droid known as 8t88, again after information at the cost of Kyle's life - but at the end of this cutscene, nobodies head gets lightsabered off.
Frustrations
In fact, I'm not too sure what happens at the end of the scene, because only my HUD appears to work.
There are a bunch of settings and display options, and I did find one that worked before then finding out that there are an awful lot of keyboard, mouse and controller configurations to fine tune to your liking. WASD was at the ready, but the mouse needed a little work - we're nearing those industry standards layouts, I'm sure of it.
Turns out we shot whoever was looking at us funny and were chasing down 8t88 through Nar Shaddaa. Most of the folks you encounter here will shoot you on sight, with the rest just waddling around as though everything is ok. I'd show you some screenshots but in the heat of the moment, it's a right bugger to take any.
Further Fun Times
So, blasters at the ready, off I galloped to explore Nar Shaddaa. The level was kinda corridor-like, perhaps to ease players into the game, and it wasn't much to look at, dark and dingy being the theme.
Every now and then you'd see something that screamed 'Star Wars' at you, which was nice, but I didn't necessarily feel like I was playing a great game. It felt good to control, looked fine, and there were hidden rooms and secrets to reward those players who sniff them out, but it didn't grab me.
Further Frustrations
It definitely didn't grab me when I kicked the bucket and had to start the level again, but I chalked that up to errors on my part, rather than AI bullshit. It nearly had me grumbling when I couldn't find a way out of a room and into the next, and then again when I literally fell into the next rather than gently descending into it, but I coped. I got through the level and my adventure began.
Or it would have, had I not felt a little bit sick, possibly because of camera sway or the speed of ol' Kyle when auto-run is enabled, I'm not yet sure. Either way, I called it a day.
Final Word
Now I know for sure that it's far too early for me to give a definitive word on Jedi Knight because there's an entire aspect of the game that I literally didn't touch, in part because the game is getting started, but also because doing well at the game makes this bit easier.
I'm talking about unlocking Force powers, and with them, the lightsaber. You can invest points earned through the game into Light or Dark Force powers, which of course push your play style one way or the other, resulting in different endings too, which turns this first-person shooter into not only a light RPG, but also a third-person shooter too, when you run around with a lightsaber. Third-person slasher, surely? Anyway, big part of the game, haven't touched it.
I don't know where the plot will go, I don't know if I should go back and try Dark Forces first, and I don't know when I'll next get back to finding this stuff out, suffice it to say that I will. 8t88 has escaped, damnit, and I need to have words with him.
Do yourself a favour and play Jedi Knight sometime soon.
Fun Facts
I've already blown the first filmed lightsabers since the early 1980s fact, so I have to fall back on Jedi Knight being one of the first titles to use Microsoft's Direct3D tech, and pushing more and more consumers towards upgrading their hardware for all this gaming goodness - so the 1001 entry says, more or less...
Star Wars Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II, developed by LucasArts, first released in 1997.
Version played: PC, 1997.