Star Wars: TIE Fighter (video game)

The game's narrative commences shortly after the Battle of Hoth, with the expansions progressing towards the Battle of Endor. Players assume the character of a novice TIE pilot, identified as Maarek Stele in the player's guide. Given its status as the first game to portray events from the perspective of the Galactic Empire, the choice of an Imperial protagonist might initially alienate some players; however, the pilot's character gains sympathy through his fear of Darth Vader and other superiors, and later, the player is tasked with overcoming various challenges.

The game depicts the Empire as a force dedicated to maintaining peace and order, contrasting with the Rebel Alliance, portrayed as agents of anarchy and disorder. While the Rebels present a substantial threat during the game's initial stages, many missions involve eliminating pirates, criminals, and disloyal Imperials to uphold peace throughout the galaxy.

Echoing X-Wing, the game features a concourse providing players with several options. They have the ability to inspect spacecraft in the tech room, utilize the combat simulation chamber for training missions or to replay successful engagements, review gun camera footage in the film room (with the option to "enter" the mission at any point), transfer to another sector or campaign, review successful campaign cutscenes, switch pilots, and embark on the next mission.

Although an Imperial Star Destroyer is often shown as a sector or star system's headquarters, the circular atrium of the concourse likely represents the interior of an XQ Platform. According to The Stele Chronicles, the concourse is located on the Imperial Star Destroyer Vengeance.

As previously stated, this marked the first instance of a Star Wars game presenting the Galactic Empire's viewpoint; notably, it remains the sole game that progresses entirely from the Empire's perspective, whereas subsequent games offering control of the Empire provide it merely as an optional selection. Furthermore, it stands alone as the only game whose opening crawl eschews the Star Wars Main Title, opting instead for a modified rendition of the Imperial March.

A clear advancement was the rendering engine, which incorporated Gouraud shading to smooth the appearance of low-polygon objects.

The game engine saw significant enhancement to accommodate a greater number of spacecraft, rendered with more intricate detail than in X-Wing.

AI and scripting were greatly improved, allowing for more intricate mission designs alongside more skilled opponents and allies.

Among the numerous gameplay enhancements were difficulty settings and options, such as unlimited ammunition and invincibility (though using these cheats drastically reduced the player's score.)

Several flight options were introduced, including flight dialogue and messages, a message log, a list of objectives, ships' status and behavior, a three-dimensional map, and HUD, a sub-target system and other additions such as an option to choose armaments before flying.

The HUD or targeting computer, (showing a 3-D rendering of the targeted vessel), was well received by players since it allows the player to see the target's relative orientation in real time. This allowed players to avoid dangerous head-on confrontations, and to specifically target individual components such as weapons batteries. Numerous new hot keys afforded players myriad targeting options.

The ability to match speed with a target lets the player tail an enemy with less risk of collision.

Another notable improvement is the expanded roster of craft like variants of capital ships, utility craft, and others. There are also space stations, including the XQ Platform series and X7 Factory Station (replacing X-Wing's makeshift use of containers and bulk freighters to represent "bases"). Some were never further adopted in the Expanded Universe like the Mon Calamari Light Cruiser (the regular MC80 Mon Calamari Star Cruiser is found in the combat simulation chamber but not the storyline missions), R-41 Starchasers, and T-wings. Darth Vader's TIE Fighter (TIE Advanced x1) is not included; in its place is the much faster and more powerful TIE Avenger.

Available craft to fly are seven starfighters. Like the films, the player initially pilots craft such as the TIE Fighter, TIE/sa bomber, and TIE/IN interceptor, all of which lack shields and a hyperdrive. However, there are few missions where the player is part of swarms of fragile craft conducting near suicidal assaults (as what the canonical Imperial Navy would do).

Later missions become very customized, becoming similar to the preceding X-Wing, depart from the mass attacks with suicidal TIEs and mirror the main character's advancement in importance and significance through the ranks. Especially in the Defender of the Empire and Enemies of the Empire expansions, most of the missions feature the player against overwhelming odds, often without wingmen because this would make the player a catalyst in how the battle unfolds. There are several original craft like the Assault Gunboat, TIE Advanced or "Avenger", TIE Defender (later added to The Essential Guide to Vehicles and Vessels) and Missile Boat (in the expansions only).

The TIE Avenger, TIE Defender, and Missile Boat, possessing capabilities far exceeding those of existing starfighters, were either weakened or excluded in subsequent iterations of the X-Wing series.

Similar to other games in the X-Wing series that emphasized game mechanics, TIE Fighter is known to employ alternate models and statistics that diverge from both the films' canon and the Star Wars Legends (formerly Expanded Universe) sourcebooks.

TIE Fighter introduced new weaponry, including proton rockets, proton bombs, magnetic pulse warheads, tractor beam, and the jamming beam. Additionally, it featured advanced concussion missiles and advanced proton torpedoes, enhanced versions of the original warheads with improved tracking and power. Consequently, the effectiveness of standard concussion missiles and proton torpedoes was reduced for gameplay balance, a departure from established canon. The visual representations of concussion missiles and proton torpedoes also differed from official sources.

As in X-Wing, in TIE Fighter, ions will gradually bring down shields like laser cannons, however on unshielded craft a few shots will permanently disable it for the duration of the mission unless there is a repair vessel. This contradicts canon and Star Wars Legends where, ion cannons can punch through shields but will only disable temporarily. All laser cannons are of equal strength; there is no differentiation between a TIE Interceptor's laser cannons and a Star Destroyer's turbolasers.

Capital ship and space station shields do not regenerate once depleted. Furthermore, capital ships like Star Destroyers and Mon Calamari cruisers possess fewer weapons than specified in official sourcebooks. As a result, they pose less of a threat (particularly if a player "surgically" disables their weapons or exploits a blind spot behind the engines), although destroying them still requires significant firepower. This design choice reflected the limitations of the game engine at the time - since the targeting and combat AI of each turret on a starship used almost as many resources as a single starfighter, the presence of a single Star Destroyer would count almost as much as an entire squadron of fighters.

The briefing includes a dialogue-like interface with questions to an Imperial briefing officer, reminiscent of the LucasArts' concurrent adventure games. Apart from the standard briefing, there is a secondary briefing in some missions, given from a Sith-like Cloaked Figure. This person briefs the pilot on the Secondary and Bonus objectives (see below for detail).

Success of secondary and bonus objectives (also referred in-game as secret mission objectives) doesn't alter the scenario or the outcome. However, these optional objectives increase the pilot's score and prestige: as after completing a tour of duty, the medal will contain green and red pins based on perfect completion of secondary and bonus objectives per mission, respectively. However completing the secondary or bonus objectives in the simulation chamber will give the player no awards.

• Secondary Objectives are given by the Cloaked Figure and they aim to reinforce Imperial Intelligence . Success in completing them catches the attention of Emperor Palpatine , who initiates the pilot into his Secret Order and enables him to move up the ranks of the Order. Completing all secondary objectives in a mission awards the pilot a small silver star with a green gem.

• Bonus Objectives (also known as Secret Mission Objectives ) are intended to increase the replayability of the game. Bonus goals are not mentioned in the briefings and require to be discovered only on the player's initiative, activity and/or luck. The player can guess or complete an objective if he is lucky or active enough to do something 'right', either by hints from secondary objectives or simply by a random action. The nature of bonus goals usually include, for example, to identify a craft before destroying it, or destroy/capture a craft not required to by the official objectives. Completing all bonus objectives in a mission awards the pilot a small gold star with a red gem. The existence of the bonus objectives is revealed only after completing them in the mission log (when all of them are completed, the player will be notified audibly with the message "Secret Mission Objectives complete!"), or in the debriefing (by displaying how many out of the total have been completed). The full list of bonus objectives is also revealed in the combat simulation chamber once the player has successfully passed the mission in "actual flight".

The story evolves in seven different systems, separated in seven Tours of Duty, of four to six missions each.

Hoth system: Pursue Rebels fleeing from Hoth.

Sepan system: End a prolonged civil war.

Pakuuni system: Establish a new Imperial base.

Mylok system: Battle pirates in the Outer Rim.

Parmel system: Capture a defecting officer.

Parmic system: Demetrius Zaarin builds new technology.

Parmel system: Stop a revolt by rogue Imperials.

One additional campaign disk was sold separately, Defender of the Empire which added three new tours of duty, and four additional training missions.

The scenario ends with Thrawn's promotion to Grand Admiral, and Emperor Palpatine tasking him to hunt down Zaarin. An additional campaign disk, "Enemies of the Empire" concluded the plot, but was never sold separately. Instead, it was included in Star Wars: TIE Fighter: Collector's CD-ROM.

Although not actual missions, one can do four training simulations of past missions for each of the fighters in the game. Completing at least two will result in a combat medallion of the specific fighter used, with the color depending on how many training missions have been completed.

Like X-Wing, TIE Fighter was also re-released a year later (1995) in an enhanced version including the original release plus two expansions. The game engine was also rebuilt to run under Windows 95.

Like the previous X-Wing Collector's CD-ROM, it offered full voice-over soundtrack, and an improved rendering engine which supported 640x480 resolution.

The Collector's Edition featured a completely redone introduction cutscene, all of it was fully rendered. There is now a Super Star Destroyer and a Nebulon-B frigate alongside the many Imperial Star Destroyers. During the assault on the Rebel platform, the Imperials are attacking with TIE Bombers instead of just TIE Interceptors, making the assault more realistic as starfighters' laser cannons would have been unable to do significant damage to a large space station. However the kind of bombs they use to bombard the facility, do not appear in-game.

The CD-ROM Edition also added a new campaign Enemies of the Empire with 3 brand new Tours of Duty that conclude the scenario.

• " Hunt for Zaarin " ( Semag system ) - Thrawn seeks the traitor Zaarin.
• " Prelude to Endor " ( Yllotat system ) - Investigate Bothan connection.
• " The Emperor's Will " ( Iast system ) - Final triumph...?

TIE Fighter had a major retouch for its release along with the collections X-Wing Collector Series (1998) and X-Wing Trilogy (1999). The game was retrofitted with the Star Wars: X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter graphics engine, which uses texture mapping instead of Gouraud shading. Concourse graphics and some cutscenes were also retouched. This version is the one which will work with MS Windows XP, though the iMuse music system was removed. However, the original DOS-based Collector's CD version, which includes iMuse, can be emulated using Dosbox.

On October 28, 2014, Disney Interactive revealed a new partnership with GOG.com, a DRM-free digital distributor, that would allow for more than twenty classic Lucasfilm video game titles to be re-released digitally for modern computers. Along with Star Wars: X-Wing and Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Star Wars: TIE Fighter became available for digital download for a price of $9.99.

LucasArts made available a demo version of TIE Fighter during the early months of 1994. Due to its origin in an incomplete version of the game, this demo contains certain distinctive attributes. It presents a single, extended mission where players pilot a TIE Fighter against various Rebel forces. The cockpit design differs from the final game [1], the sound effects are unique, and the soundtrack is taken from Star Wars: X-Wing.

The demo was supported by Dodge and showed an advertisement for a Neon car prior to the commencement of gameplay. It was distributed on two 3.5" 1.44 MiB floppy disks. The demo announced the game's release date as "Spring 1994" but it wasn't released until July.