The Darkness may be a long-dormant IP in gaming, but that doesn’t mean its many fans have stopped wishing for a comeback. Interestingly, Nightdive Studios CEO Stephen Kick has now teased that a remaster is on his list, reigniting hope across the community.
Nightdive, of course, specializes in remasters. As Kick told Wccftech in an interview about the System Shock remake, he founded the company specifically to ensure that classics like System Shock 2 were playable on modern systems. After that, they’ve released a string of acclaimed remasters, including Strife: Veteran Edition, Noctropolis, System Shock: Enhanced Edition, Turok: Dinosaur Hunter, Turok 2: Seeds of Evil, Forsaken Remastered, Blood: Fresh Supply, Doom 64, Shadow Man Remastered, Quake, PowerSlave Exhumed, Blade Runner: Enhanced Edition, Rise of the Triad: Ludicrous Edition, and Quake II. Turok 3: Shadow of Oblivion was recently announced to be scheduled for November 14th, while SiN Reloaded, System Shock 2: Enhanced Edition, and Star Wars: Dark Forces don’t have a release date yet.
The Darkness is certainly more recent than most of those titles, having been released in 2007. The original game was developed by Starbreeze and published by 2K. Based on the comic book series by Top Cow Productions, it tells the story of Jackie Estacado, who discovers two terrific news on his 21st birthday: his uncle wants him killed, and he is the conduit for an ancient demonic force called The Darkness, which helps Jackie survive the assassination thanks to its various powers.
The Darkness received solid review scores (around 80% on average) and sold enough to warrant a sequel that launched five years later. However, The Darkness 2 was developed by Digital Extremes (now renowned as the maker of Warframe). Although the game’s critical acclaim was similar to the original, no third game was ever greenlit.
