In another Star Wars PC game, the strategy sim Star Wars: Rebellion, released by Lucasarts three years after Dark Forces, the Dark Troopers were described as much more than just the next generation of Stormtrooper, but actually Force-wielders wearing the Dark Trooper armour.

It will be The Mandalorian that more formally fleshes the Dark Trooper out, but the other big reveal of “The Siege” might also borrow an old idea from the Expanded Universe that would make Moff Gideon and Doctor Pershing’s two research paths come together.

Additionally, the now-defunct mobile game Star Wars Commander actually included Dark Troopers in several missions, awkwardly ushering them into canon. Although not named as such, Thrawn’s training droids in Star Wars Rebels, the DT-Series Sentry Droid, had its design inspired by the Dark Troopers of old. We don’t know just what the new canon’s take on the Dark Trooper will ultimately be - entirely droid, cybernetic, or an exosuit - but’s not the first time that the Dark Trooper design has inspired the Disney era of Star Wars. But it’s the Phase III trooper that’s of most interest to The Mandalorian. That armour also housed a jump pack, and Phase II troopers swapped out the melee weapons for an Assault cannon capable of firing plasma bolts and missiles, as well as an “arc caster” that projected short-range bursts of electricity. Phase II was when Mohc began rolling out the Dark Trooper across his ground infantry deployments - still a droid, it was now bulked up with large, Stormtrooper-esque armour, also made of phrik. Wielding an arm-mounted vibroblade and a blast shield, the initial Dark Trooper reflected Mohc’s own thoughts on war, eschewing ranged weaponry for close-quarters combat. Phase 1 was the most droid-like: a skeletal humanoid made out of phrik (the lightsaber-resistant metallic compound). There might have been more had Kyle not blown up Mohc’s command ship, the Arc Hammer, permanently ending any Imperial research into battle droids as an infantry replacement. The Dark Trooper Project ultimately produced three phases of trooper design.

Phase zero dark trooper