Star Wars Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II

"One of Lucas Art's Greatest Games"

Before I start my review of this game, I think I should go over a little history about Dark Forces. The first game, as most of us old-school gamers know, was obviously a doom clone. It had a good storyline but horrid graphics. Well, Jedi Knight takes every aspect that made Dark Forces a failure.

Story:7
It's a lot more interesting this time around, but not that interesting. You play as Kyle Katurn again. There's this dark Jerec guy who wants the field of Jedi. Kyle's dad knew the whearabouts of it and put the coordinates on a data disk. As the story progresses, you'll see cutscenes with real actors. REAL actors. Most of the scripting is sub-par, Kyle is the only one who makes me chuckle with his sarcastic remarks.

Graphics:9
Yes, if you are playing this in 2007, you may have the need to leave this review for the graphics score. Well, listen up. This game wasn't made in 2007, it was made in 1997. Heck, talk about an improvement from the original. Finally, no plain static images. Real in-game movements! I love how when you stand near a force field, you can see the field slowly borning and disintegrating your body. It's pretty damn realistic.

Gameplay:10
Here's the best aspect of the game. The artificial intelligence is back again, but this time, the enemies think. You use force pull and take there weapons, they do want anyone would do while unarmed and staring down the barrel of a concussion rifle, run like hell. There's nothing that I enjoy more than activating Persuasion (invisibility) and slicing of body parts of a Greedo. Yes, now there are more enemies than just troopers. Dark Jedi's to Tusken Raiders. There's a whole variety of them. Oh, and weapons, you get a crapload of weapons. From the little Bryer pistol to the widely feared concussion rifle. My personal favorite is the rail gun, which fires of about 50 shells of explosives with one shot. I know, kick ass. Oh, and a huge amount of force powers. My personal favorite, being the violent type, is destruction. It's a huge, red ball of energy that annihilates any thing in front of it, causing complete pandemonium. Depending on the way you play, you'll become a Sith Lord or a Jedi. Killing innocent people won't get you any Jedi stars, mind you. But protecting them will. Oh, there's also an online mode, but it's not that great because not that many people have this game.

Sound:6
This game was supposed to have a great soundtrack, which I bet it did, I just always had the music turned all the way down. It's just to loud. It also interfered with the really cool sound effects through-ought the game. Voices and weapons sound good, though.

Replay Value:10
You'll enjoy trying to find all the secrets while trying a new force style every time.

Overall:9
This is a great game. Period. If it wasn't for the lack of enjoyable multiplayer, or a more interesting plot, I would have given this game a ten. You should buy it, since PC games aren't usually rentable anyways.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 04/05/07