Chris InglisIt has been nearly 30 years since Marshal James Anderson first set out on a quest for vengeance and now thanks to Nightdive Studios, we get to experience a classic 90’s era western FPS on modern machines. For those of us who grew up during the LucasArts Golden Age, Outlaws was always the cool, cinematic cousin to Star Wars: Dark Forces. While I am an absolute Star Wars fiend, I did enjoy when LucasArts occasionally delivered a game that was in anoher genre and a chance to play something different. When Nightdive Studios launched Outlaws + Handful of Missions: Remaster on November 20, 2025, it felt like a call to strap on the spurs one last time.
Developed originally by Ray Gresko for Star Wars: Dark Forces in 1995, the Jedi Engine was LucasArts’ answer to the Doom and Build engines, the latter used for Duke Nukem 3D. By the time Outlaws arrived in 1997, the team had pushed the engine further to include sloped surfaces, advanced environmental scripting, and a zoomable sniper scope that was pretty revolutionary at the time. This remaster preserves that unique pseudo-3D look while allowing it to run at super smooth framerates.
Nightdive has done a stellar job with the visual overhaul. The character sprites and first-person weapon models have been redrawn in high resolution, but they’ve kept the hand-crafted, comic-book aesthetic that made the original so iconic. You can swap back to the original pixel-perfect grit by tapping F2 on the keyboard. It’s a feature I actually needed as I had found a secret area but it was pitch black. I was shooting to try and light my way along the walls, however that quickly consumed bullets. Switching to the old graphics mode allowed me to see where I was going and get back on track.
The gunplay remains the star of the show. The tension of having to manually reload while a band of outlaws pins you down in a canyon is a jarring at first but adds an element of urgency and risk to every group fight. However, be warned: the level design is a product of its era. If you thought the Sawmill or the Canyons were a maze in 1997, they haven’t changed. You will still find yourself hunting for secret rooms, metal keys that will open doors if you can remember where they were, and getting turned around in the sprawling, non-linear environments. It took me an hour to learn you can press TAB for a wireframe map which I found helpful to look for doors. For a newcomer to the game, this could be the most frustrating part but for me, it’s all part of the nostalgia.
Outlaws + Handful of Missions: Remaster also offers Cross-Play Multiplayer with game modes including Deathmatch, Team Play, Capture the Flag, and Kill The Fool With The Chicken! The inclusion of cross-play is a nice touch. Getting into a match of Kill the Fool with the Chicken brought back memories of laggy 56k modem sessions, but now with no latency issues at all.
Overall, Outlaws + Handful of Missions: Remaster is a fantastic nostalgia trip that is well worth experiencing. If you’re looking for a modern fast-paced shooter, the slower pace and maze-like levels might frustrate you. But if you’re here for the dusty western atmosphere, the story of Marshal Anderson, and some incredible music, this is the definitive version of a classic 90’s game. It’s a love letter to the era when we looked forward to every new game release from LucasArts and delighted when they made something a little different.
This review utilised a Steam key provided by Uberstrategist and Outlaws + Handful of Missions: Remaster is out now on Steam, GOG, Xbox, PlayStation, and Nintendo Switch.
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