Estacado: a native PC recompilation of The Darkness (Xbox 360)

An unofficial fan port of The Darkness (Xbox 360, 2007), made by static recompilation: the game's PowerPC code is translated into C++ and runs natively on Windows, with a Direct3D 12 graphics layer built on ReXGlue and XenonRecomp.

This is a free, non-commercial fan project. No game data is included: you need your own copy of the game (see Game files and Legal).

Pre-release. So far it has been tested on one Windows 11 PC with an NVIDIA RTX graphics card. Other hardware (AMD, Intel, older NVIDIA, laptops) is untested. Please report what you find.

Steam Deck: a player reports that with 0.9.1 both the settings launcher and the game work on the Deck under Proton: the launcher starts there and launches into the game (issue #2). A Steam Deck preset is included. If you copy the folder to a Deck, see Saves and settings to take your saves along.

What it offers

• Frame rates beyond 30: 60, your display's refresh rate (120/144/240), a custom limit or uncapped, with the game's timing kept correct (scripted scenes, physics and audio run at their original speed).
• Resolution: the 3D scene at 1x, 2x or 3x the console's 1280 x 720, or automatic (the launcher measures your graphics card once), fitted to any output resolution; windowed, borderless or automatic.
• Anti-aliasing: SMAA (default) or FXAA; AMD FSR 1 or CAS sharpening when the image is fitted to your screen. The game's own 4x MSAA stays on all the time by default (the console dropped to 2x when it ran slowly).
• Widescreen (experimental): fills 21:9, 32:9 and 16:10 screens with more view at the sides; menus stay centred.
• Controls: keyboard and mouse with native mouse look and rebindable keys (on-screen prompts show your keys), or a controller; adjustable field of view.
• Settings in a launcher (presets: Enhanced, Performance, Original, Steam Deck) and in an overlay over the running game (F1).
• Motion blur on/off and support for HD texture packs: folder-based replacements made by players. No pack is included or provided (the game's textures belong to its publisher); docs/HD_TEXTURE_PACKS.md explains how to install one and how to make one.

Screenshots

Our own captures from test runs of this port.

Requirements

• Windows 10 or 11, 64-bit.
• A CPU with AVX2 (Intel Haswell / AMD Zen or newer).
• A Direct3D 12 graphics card with current drivers.
• Microsoft Visual C++ 2015-2022 Redistributable (x64).
• About 8 GB of free disk space if you use a disc image (it is extracted once).

Game files

The recompiled code is that of this version, the one we own and test:

Other releases are accepted when they contain the same code. The launcher decides this itself: it decrypts your default.xex and compares its code, its structure and the data the code depends on with the version above. Text, fonts and the game's own strings may differ, so a localised release that only replaces those works and shows its own language. We can only fully test the version we own: we checked a Russian release this way (same code, only text and font data differ) but have not played it through.

A release with different code (another build of the game, or a title update) does not run yet. The launcher says so plainly and saves a detailed report, game_version_report.txt in the logs folder (names, sizes and hashes only, no game data), that you can attach to an issue if you like. Never upload game files.

Dump the game from your own disc; this project does not provide or link to game files.

Install

Download the zip from the Releases page and extract it to a folder of your choice (not inside Program Files). Or build it yourself: see BUILDING.md.

First start

1. Run TheDarknessSettings.exe (the launcher).
2. On the first start it asks for your game: Choose disc image... (your .iso) or Choose game folder... (a folder with the extracted files, the one that contains default.xex). It checks that the version is supported; a disc image is extracted into the game folder next to the launcher.
3. Pick a preset (Enhanced is recommended), adjust anything you like and press Play.

The launcher's About button shows the version and where your saves are, and opens the licence texts and the logs folder.

Saves and settings

Your saves and settings are kept in your Saved Games folder, %USERPROFILE%\Saved Games\Estacado (settings: TheDarkness.pc.toml; saves: content), apart from the program. An update can go into a new folder or over the old one without touching your progress.

• Coming from 0.9.0: extract the new version over your old folder (or into it). On its first start it copies that folder's saves, settings and screenshots to Saved Games, checks every copied file, and leaves the originals untouched as a backup (a note, SAVES_MOVED.txt, says so). If the copy cannot be made, the game keeps using the old folder and tries again at the next start.
• 0.9.0 in another folder: in the launcher, About, then Import saves..., and choose the old folder. Saves already in Saved Games are kept under a new name, never overwritten.
• Portable (USB drive, a folder copied to a Steam Deck or another PC): put an empty file named portable.txt next to TheDarkness.exe. Saves and settings then stay inside the game folder (TheDarkness.pc.toml and runtime_data), as in 0.9.0.

Settings overview

Open the launcher, or press F1 in the game. Changes to resolution, widescreen, language and a few graphics options apply at the next start; the launcher says so for each.

• Performance / Frame Rate: Frame rate (Original 30, 60, display refresh, custom, uncapped), VSync (VSync, VRR/G-SYNC/FreeSync, immediate), Menu frame rate.
• Display: output resolution, window mode, monitor, Fill wide and tall screens (widescreen, experimental).
• Graphics Quality: resolution scale, anti-aliasing, upscaling, motion blur, HD texture packs.
• Camera: field of view.
• Controls / Key bindings: keyboard and mouse, mouse look, sensitivity, button prompts (automatic, Xbox buttons or keyboard keys), controller options.
• Language.

Languages

English, French, German, Italian and Spanish: the game's own languages, for its text and speech. Set Language in the launcher; Automatic follows the Windows display language.

Known issues

• Tested on one PC only (see the note at the top).
• Played on PC so far: every menu and the campaign from the start up to the orphanage explosion scene, including the Chinatown street and its combat. The chapters after that have not been played through yet. A check of everything the game can ask of the port found no gap on the single-player path (details in docs/WHOLE_GAME_AUDIT.md); if the game stops anyway, it shows a message and saves a crash report: please send it.
• Multiplayer: the menus work, but there is no online or local network play. The port behaves like a console without a network connection: the Xbox LIVE modes and leaderboards ask for an Xbox LIVE sign-in and stay on the menu, and System Link finds no games.
• Widescreen (experimental): at 21:9 and wider, subtitles are drawn larger than at 16:9 and two-line subtitles can overlap.
• Shaders the release's list does not cover yet (mostly later levels) are compiled for your graphics card the first time they appear, which can stutter briefly; later sessions reuse them.
• Black flickering on some cards (#20): probably the same cause as the black dots and flickering squares of #16, fixed in 0.9.6; confirmation pending. If the glow looks wrong on your graphics card, Graphics Quality > Glow reconstruction > Off draws it as in 0.9.0.
• Being looked into: green glitches in the Otherworld until a restart (#14) and face shading that flickers in some conversations (#4).
• Not in this release: HDR output, temporal anti-aliasing with upscalers (such as DLSS, FSR 3 or XeSS) and frame generation. If you would use one of them, say so in an issue.

Reporting a problem

Please open an issue with the Bug report template. It asks for:

• your CPU, graphics card, driver version, Windows version and screen resolution/refresh rate;
• your TheDarkness.pc.toml (settings, in Saved Games\Estacado) and what you did when the problem happened;
• the logs folder (launcher: About, then Logs; usually %LOCALAPPDATA%\Estacado\logs, or next to TheDarkness.exe in a portable copy): runtime_crash.log and any TheDarkness_fatal_*.dmp and TheDarkness_stall_*.dmp files.

For a visual glitch, press F9 while it is on screen: the game saves a screenshot and a small text file describing that frame in Saved Games\Estacado\screenshots; attach both. For input or other problems without a crash, create an empty file named session_log.txt next to TheDarkness.exe, play until the problem happens, and attach the session_*.log it writes in the logs folder.

Never attach game files (disc images, extracted files) to an issue.

Building from source

See BUILDING.md. In short: one script checks your game files, recompiles your own default.xex, builds the runtime and packages it.

Legal

• Unofficial. Estacado is a fan project. It is not affiliated with, endorsed or sponsored by 2K Games, Take-Two Interactive, Starbreeze Studios, Top Cow Productions or Microsoft.
• Trademarks belong to their owners. The Darkness and related names are trademarks of their respective owners; Xbox and Xbox 360 are trademarks of Microsoft. They are used here only to name the game this project works with.
• No game data. Neither this repository nor its releases contain any of the game's data: no textures, models, audio, video, text or other files from the disc.
• What the download contains. TheDarkness.exe contains the game's program code in translated form: the original PowerPC code converted into native code by static recompilation. It does nothing on its own. It needs your own, legally obtained copy of the game, which the launcher checks and prepares on your computer. The game's files and everything made from them (extracted files, shader caches, saves) stay on your computer: do not share them.
• Non-commercial. This project is free. It sells nothing and accepts no donations or sponsorships.
• No official artwork. The repository and the releases contain no logos, box art or marketing art of the game; titles are plain text and the screenshots are our own.
• Licences. Our source code is released under the MIT licence (LICENSE). The licence covers the source code of this repository only: it does not cover the game The Darkness or anything derived from it, such as the game's files or its recompiled code. Third-party components keep their own licences (THIRD_PARTY_NOTICES.md).
• Rights holders with a concern about this project: please open an issue and we will respond.

Credits

• djanice1980: the bloom fix at higher internal resolutions (the cause in #11, the fix in #15 and Estacado-ReXGlue #1), the Quit game button, and the idea of keeping saves outside the program folder (#7).
• blax434-ctrl: the patient testing that found the cause of the black dots and flickering squares (#16).
• The ReXGlue SDK and the Xenia project, whose work this port's system and graphics layer builds on.
• XenonRecomp (hedge-dev).
• SMAA (Jimenez et al.), AMD FidelityFX FSR 1 and CAS, Dear ImGui, SDL, and the other libraries listed in THIRD_PARTY_NOTICES.md.