Perfect Dark is a first-person shooter developed by Rare and released for the Nintendo 64 video game console in 2000. It is the first game of the Perfect Dark series and follows Joanna Dark, an agent of the Carrington Institute research centre, as she attempts to stop an extraterrestrial conspiracy by rival corporation dataDyne. The game features a campaign mode where a single player must complete a series of levels under certain difficulty settings to progress through the story. It also features a range of multiplayer options, including a co-operative mode and traditional deathmatch settings with computer-controlled bots.

As a spiritual successor to Rare's 1997 first-person shooter GoldenEye 007, Perfect Dark shares many features with its predecessor and runs on an upgraded version of its engine. GoldenEye 007 director Martin Hollis led the game's production for the first 14 months of its near three-year development cycle before he left Rare to pursue other interests. The game is technically one of the most advanced titles for the Nintendo 64 and requires an Expansion Pak to access the campaign mode and most of the multiplayer features. Shortly before the game's release, a feature that would have allowed players to place a photograph of their choice onto the face of their multiplayer character was cut due to sensitive issues surrounding the ability for players to attack images of real people.