Lucasarts games are fairly famous for the “point and click” genre, putting out titles like The Secret of Monkey Island and Manic Mansion, but alongside them and the mountain of Star Wars titles released, they have also tried their hand at the first person shooter genre in the past, first off with Star Wars: Dark Forces, and then followed it up with today’s cult favourite Outlaws. And with it, the remaster masters over at Nightdive have got Outlaws + Handful of Missions Remaster  hog tied up and ready to be re-released onto the world: is it an upstanding citizen or just another pesky outlaw out in the wild? Giddy up and find out. 

Good? Bad? I’m just the guy with the gun.

Outlaws + Handful of Missions Remaster sees our protagonist retired U.S Marshall James Anderson returning home from the store to find his wife dying and his daughter kidnapped, all of that over a railroad dispute and James while retired certainly hasn’t forgotten how to dish out bullets like an all you can eat buffet of justice, saddles up and starts to track down the outlaws who have kidnapped his daughter, slowly unravelling a tale of intrigue and good ol’ spaghetti western action. 

Do I look evil enough?

While little story is told within the gameplay through environment, files or voice clips, the game is full of brilliantly drawn cutscenes that just smack of pure 90s quality animation, doubled with some absolutely outstanding voice acting that draws you into the story, it really is one of the few classic FPS games where the story 100% adds to the overall experience but I guess that was to be expected when you call in the boys and girls at LucasArts! 

Gonna need a bigger shovel.

As previously mentioned Outlaws + Handful of Missions Remaster is a first person shooter and one that released around the golden years for the genre, releasing alongside titles such as Doom 2, Duke Nukem 3D, Blood & Shadow Warrior though in a strange move, it doesn’t use the Doom Engine nor the Build Engine, instead it uses a modified version of the Jedi Engine from Star Wars: Dark Forces which while was primitive in some aspects, certainly by this game pulled some absolute witchcraft which I’ll go over soon.  

This town ain’t big enough.

The first indication that Outlaws + Handful of Missions Remaster is slightly different from its kin is the reloading; not only was it one of if not the first game to have manual reloading animations, but it also has such as tactical edge to it.  You’ll be acting like John Wayne by the end of the first level, as each bullet is loaded separately with a touch of the reload button, so you need to decide if you need all six bullets to get out of dodge or can you get away with loading one or two to mitigate the amount of time you are vulnerable. It’s an absolutely chef’s kiss moment, and us boomer shooter fans will instantly fall in love with the rhythm of it all. 

Secondly it is one of the earliest FPS games I can think of where there isn’t a traditional level end area, instead you have to track down the outlaw for the level and while they are often found in a specific room, they can and will move out of it after a while and you can just stumble across them, especially in level 2 which is set in a traditional western town and you’ll need to pass me some lip balm because it is again absolute chefs kiss. 

Pimp my ride.

Finally in a list of impressive achievements I’m going for a twofer, first off despite running on the Jedi Engine, the game feels so ridiculously close to a Build Engine game like Duke Nukem 3D  in the level design actually resembling real life locations but also there is a decent amount of interactivity throughout, both things market leader Doom 2 didn’t manage to deal with at all, secondly Outlaws + Fistfull of Missions Remaster was the first game to have a Sniper Zoom in it, so you can thank James Anderson for all those pesky sniper missions you’ve had to deal with since.

Behold FPS’ first ever sniper zoom!

The level designs are great and varied enough to cover all of your Western urges, the story is gripping, the voice acting is tight and the gunfights are engaging enough even on lower levels that you never feel like your steamrolling your way through the Wild West like some kind of Master Chief, from a gameplay perspective it absolutely nails the Boomer Shooter moniker with the greatest of ease. 

A foreboding sight!

Of course being a Nightdive jam, you have the inclusion of “The Vault”, featuring stuff like storyboards, concept art and enemy designs from the game. It doesn’t include any beta or demo content unlike previous titles, making it feel a little anaemic compared to previous re-releases but it is still a treasure trove for fans of the game, there is also cross play multiplayer but I couldn’t find any matches when I went to try which makes me feel that there isn’t quite a roaring online community for Outlaws + Handful of Missions Remaster.

Choo Choo Choose Your Weapon!

Visually speaking, Outlaws + Handful of Missions Remaster had quite a unique and barren look even with its original release, here running on Nightdive’s KEX Engine it looks sharper and animates smoother but it still has a rather distinct art style that you’ll either learn to love or absolutely detest, it was a bold choice and I personally found it quite charming in motion but will be the first to admit that it looked hideous on screenshots. 

Outlaws + Handful of Missions Remaster is yet again another fine Nightdive re-release with all the bells and whistles you would come to expect from them, another diamond in the rough put out for fans of the boomiest and shootiest to get to grips with and this is why we love them. The game wasn’t really on my radar up until release and I can honestly say I fell in love almost instantly with it.

Outlaws + Handful of Missions Remaster is available now on PC, Playstation 4/5, X Box Series, Nintendo Switch 1 & 2 

Reviewed on Nintendo Switch 2 

A copy of Outlaws + Handful of Missions Remaster was provided by the publisher.