STAR WARS™ Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II

Kyle Katarn looks like forsen

They game is weird, old, and janky. It kinda breaks sometimes like during the final fight. But I find it charming.

I had some compatibility issues getting this to run on Linux (Ubuntu 22.04). I was able to easily get Jedi Knight to work by installing OpenJKDF2 via flatpack and following the instructions on https://flathub.org/en/apps/org.openjkdf2.OpenJKDF2. Note that OpenJKDF2 isn't the full game by itself, you'll still need to purchase a copy. Works easily with a steam install. Great classic game. My favorite part of Jedi Knight is what it added to the Star Wars lore.

I love this game. This is the first game that really made me feel like I was actually in the Star Wars universe. I load it up and play a level nearly every week.

Coming straight here after my playthrough of Dark Forces, I can say this game is a pretty significant improvement, while yes there is still some weird level design, I really enjoyed the second game in the series! I know it says I only played for 6 minutes but I actually launched the game from the unofficial Jedi Knight Remaster, similarly to how I played Dark Forces. I appreciated the boss battles though most of them were won by just doing circles around them and swinging wildly with a lightsaber, if that's not the most Star Wars thing, I don't know what is haha. The live action cutscenes were really charming and really feels like classic Star Wars. I very much enjoyed my time with this game and am looking forward to Mysteries of the Sith!

6.5/10 This one is a mixed bag for me. It's super nostalgic, and just really reminds me of a better era for Star Wars. However, this game is riddled with small problems that really mount up after a while. It functions fine and runs well. But the archaic control-scheme, neglected controller support, strange map layouts, auto-aim, and terrible HUD really hinder this game's potential. It desperately needs a remaster with some quality of life improvements. Despite all this, it was fun, and a blast of pure nostalgia. If you're a massive Star Wars fan, or a fan of the 'Legends' material - I recommend giving it a shot. But this is definitely the "black sheep" of the Dark Forces / Jedi Knight series. It feels like they fixated more on the live action cutscenes rather than the gameplay. And it really seems like this was an experiment for the upcoming Prequel trilogy's visual effects. The live action cutscenes were very ambitious for the time, however now they seem extremely dated and pretty cheesy. The gameplay is fun and the graphics are great for the time this game was released. You can also swap between first & third person which is quite forward thinking for the time. The weapon selection is decent, and the bonus of having a lightsaber now makes things a lot more fun. However, it feels somewhat underpowered in the combat segments where opponents are further away. The only time the lightsaber really feels needed is to cut open a grate, or fight a dark Jedi. On top of that, the lightsaber fights are super clunky and unimpressive. For some bizarre reason the weapons lack crosshairs and there's no way to aim; instead there's a janky "lock on" system. I believe there's a way to turn this off in the settings, but what's the point if you can't actually aim the weapon. There's tons of explosive crates, but they're pretty useless, since your weapon locks onto enemies first, so the enemies are already dead by the time you are able to blow up the crates. The maps are designed interestingly, but are extremely unintuitive and overly convoluted. Some of the maps are like a giant maze, and I found myself wandering about them like an idiot. In many cases I had to pull up a guide to see where to go and what to do next. There's so many hidden rooms, compartments, cracks, buttons, etc. The controls and layout of this game are so archaic and desperately need a facelift. The controller support is really wonky, and there's no way to adjust sensitivity. So I was stuck playing this game with a mouse & keyboard. The keys are laid out in an atrocious manner (a relic of the mid-90s). So in order to play this game comfortably you must rebind most of the keys. And for some reason the "activation" key to open doors was left blank when I started the game, so I wasn't even able to simply open a door in the game without adding a key in the settings.

Classic/