Shortly after the first episode of DOOM appeared as shareware, it took over college campuses. By the time the full game was made available for sale, so many college students were clearing the sublimely designed levels that some universities attempted to ban the game. In the years following its release, DOOM‘s genre defining mechanics inspired many “DOOMlike” games. Arguably the best of these was Dark Forces from LucasArts. The game toned down the extreme violence, turned up the environmental storytelling, added a hefty dose of Imperial antagonists, and ended up with a true classic. If you don’t believe that a game almost 30 years old and built on the lore of an exhausted franchise can be great, have a look at this excellent video essay from Noah Caldwell-Gervais.
Now Dark Forces has been given a remaster that may show a whole new generation why DOOM and Star Wars are a match made in nerd heaven.
Is the remaster worth it? Here’s more from Rock Paper Shotgun:
The newer graphics are a serviceable update on its older pixel visuals, giving enemies greater definition and your guns a bit more punch and contrast. They just about avoid falling into that all-too-common modern trap of smoothing everything out with a big dollop of Vaseline, and personally, I played half of the game with the enhanced graphics, and the other half without. Both look great blown up at 4K, and everything is perfectly clear and visible, regardless of which style you go for. Nothing is lost by opting for one or the other. The music is still, blissfully, the brilliant old MIDI trumpet parps, too – Clint Bajakian’s original score doing a very admirable John Williams impression here – and together with the retro voice barks and pew pew lasers of your blaster gun, appropriated Stormtrooper rifle and other assorted weapons, it still looks and sounds distinctly Star Wars.