I decided to download the current build R2 of the Xl engine and checked out Dark Forces. Keep in mind that I'm 100% not a fan of Star Wars/Star Trek/Battlestar/etc. I was never into that, I grew up on Horror films (hence my excitement over Blood XL) but I do enjoy the Red Letter Media reviews of the prequel trilogy .

But a shooter is a shooter. First time playing this it kept crashing whenever I started and set my name to 'ass' when I changed it to just 'a' I was able to start the mission. I guess the game doesn't like mild cursing. Started it and wow. For a Beta this seems 100% playable. I detect no graphical errors, no clipping bugs, nothing. I'm up to Level 3 and I'm not noticing anything at all that would indicate it's unfinished aside from Alt Fire being bound to R. Congrats to Lucious.

As for the game, it's pretty good. Pretty tedious with the Storm Troopers posing no real threat except in numbers. Question: How do I use the Medkit? I was wandering in the dark for a while until I realized I could hit F3 or F4 to bring up a headlight and F1 would bring up my stats and state my objectives (a very useful feature for a '95 shooter). Good FPS, doesn't feel like a Doom Clone at all unlike Heretic (I Love Hexen, but Heretic is really just a TC of Doom).

Really looking forward to Blood XL. Even though I never played Outlaws I'm sure it'll be good. The mods and the graphic enhancement are the big things I'm looking forward to... and correcting the auto-aim and Mouse Control in Blood.

Thanks for the comments and praise Alex.

There are still issues with DarkXL to be worked out but, for the most part, they only show up in later levels and cutscenes. However these issues will be dealt with in the first Beta build following merger release - the build that you played is one of the last Alpha builds of the game.

Beta should be a complete replacement for DosBox - DarkXL is very close but not quite there yet.

Looking forward to it, especially Blood as you know. Seriously if that game was a person I would dry hump it raw.

I just donated $10, never give up and never surrender.

Awesome, thanks.

To use medkits you just need to bump into them and your character automatically picks them up and uses them.

You should be aware though that the player has both health and shields. Shields are the green number and can go up to 200. Health is the red number and can go up to 100. Most enemies do damage to the shields, with health being damaged only when the shields run low or are completely depleted. A few enemies can bypass shields and do damage directly to health.

To replenish shields, there are shield packs all over the place. They have a bright green light on them. Health is replenished by med packs, but since the player's health isn't damaged nearly as often as shields are, it's pretty common to be unable to pickup and use med packs due to being at max health already.

Yeah, I realized that later on. I was taking so little damage and I'm so used to Medkits being an item that can be used at any time in other shooters that that's why I asked.

Got to level 5 and the game is very tedious. The level design is quite good but the constant wave of the same enemies with the same weapons over and over and over again can get on your nerves pretty quickly. I swear if I hear "You're not authorized for this area!" again I'm going to go insane.

In short, it's a game that's best enjoyed in bits and pieces.

That's a bit of a running gag with me. I like to use those lines whenever I can justify them. I think Stormtroopers hold the record for the most lines of "Halt!" dialogue spoken by a videogame enemy.

How do you use Cheat Codes? I've typed them in and nothing happens.

They are not all supported and can only be entered through the console. If you bring down the console (~ key) and type cmdlist la you'll get the list of working cheat codes. The rest will be added with the Beta, as well as the ability to enter them like you would in the original game.

Other things that will be in the Beta:

- Configure keys for secondary fire, console, menus, etc.
- Music playback during cutscenes.
- Fix various little cutscene issues.
- Making mouse look optional (though default to on).
- Adding optional keys for turning and looking up and down.
- Auto-aim slider, currently auto-aim is off for most weapons.
- Fix final battle and ending.
- Finish Dark Trooper / Boba Fett AI.
- Add the perspective rendering back, with an option to choose between that and the more old-school "shearing."
- Fix VUE issues on some levels (the ship leaves and then comes right back on level 4, for example).
- Fix a few minor INF issues on some of the later levels.
- Fix a few rendering issues when dealing with some moving/rotating sub-sectors (late in the game).
- You should start each level with a minimum number of lives and shields, though you'll retain what you had if you have more.
- Various other smaller bugs and issues.

Later:
- (all projects) Software rendering option using the original palette and colormap. This will support 320x200 as well as higher resolutions.
- Proper dynamic music with iMuse (currently disabled due to issues).

Damn, no level skip or unlock all cheat codes. I got stuck on the 6th level or so. I've gone through it about 5 times now and just want to skip it.