Released: 2007-06-25

Genre: First-Person Shooter

Platform:

Reviewed By: Tony Perriello

Into The Void

There's not much room left for innovation in first-person shooters. Outside of minor variations, such as first person shooter / role playing hybrids like System Shock 2, the shooter formula is tried and true. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

I've played countless first person shooters along my tour of duty as a gamer. I've walked down many a corridor and I'm sure if you were to rack up my lifetime kills, you’d find that I've wiped out the entire population of a small country. I need something special to grab my attention and keep me intrigued. If I’m going to be doing the same thing over and over again, I better be enjoying every second of it. If not, it's like drinking a bottle of Coke that's been left open for three days: bland, flat and a challenge to digest.

The same can be said of The Darkness, a strong, comic book-inspired story mixed with minimalistic shoot-em-up gameplay. You take on the role of Jackie Estacado, a hardened contract killer working for the Franchetti crime family. After screwing up a job on the day of your 21^st birthday, your uncle Paulie—who also happens to be your boss—attempts to correct your mistake by killing you. You manage to outrun his trigger-happy henchmen, when a mysterious force called the Darkness takes control of your body. One incredibly gratuitous cinematic of hitmen slaughter later, you set out to take revenge and discover the true intentions of the Darkness itself.

At it's core, The Darkness is a barebones first person shooter. There's no real strategy or tactical thinking required in combat. Enemies stay in one spot the majority of the time and only react by spraying bullets in your general direction. The artificial intelligence doesn't make any dynamic attempt to flank you or take cover, and most of your foes can take up to half of a clip of ammo before going down. The only unique aspect is your ability to pull off gruesome executions when you are close enough to an enemy. Fire your gun when you're less than a foot away and Jackie will club the guy upside the head before blowing their brains out.

Brutal.

Fortunately, rather than ancient shooter mechanics taking center stage, the Darkness gives you supernatural powers with a simple press of a button, spicing the game up just enough to be different. Your first power is the Creeping Dark, which is basically a serpent under your control used to solve certain puzzles and pull off stealth kills. Slither along walls and ceilings, crawl down long ventilation shafts, press the right trigger close enough to an unsuspecting victim and the serpent will leap up and tear their face off. In theory, this works well, but the experience is plagued by shoddy controls. The serpent often gets stuck on corpses and fails to make the transition between floors and walls, draining your energy reserve and often forcing you to start the whole process over again.

The remaining powers tend to be more effective. Next you have the Demon Arm, a one-stab-kill melee attack that lets you tear into enemies and toss them out of your path. You get a pair of Darkness Guns, which permanently kill any undead enemies you come across, and a Black Hole attack, which rips a hole in space that drags in any unsuspecting enemies nearby. You're not given a lot of powers, but they get the job done and are very satisfying to watch.

You can also summon various minions, called Darklings, from little holes in the ground that appear when using your Darkness powers. These creatures are used primarily to solve puzzles, but they are also good sidekicks to have during a battle. The Berserker specializes in full on assault, crawling feverishly and leaping on any enemy in his path. The Gunner serves to distract your enemies and deal long-range damage. The Kamikaze sprints towards your enemies on a hellbent suicide mission, packing a wallop and blowing himself up when he's close enough. Last but not least, the Lightkiller scouts ahead and takes out any lights in your path with a quick electric zap.

Taking out lights is important, because your Darkness powers depend on staying in the shadows. Jackie carries a certain amount of Darkness energy, which acts as a shield against potential damage that must be replenished over time. To keep these shields up and your powers at the maximum, you often need to shoot every single light source in every single room, just to have a chance at survival.

This is where The Darkness starts to stumble over itself.

While the idea of staying in the darkness to utilize your powers to their full potential is appropriate and fits right in with the nature of the story, it doesn't translate into fun gameplay. Shattering bulbs from room to room gets repetitive and stale, feeling more like a chore rather than a fight for your survival. When you are unable to summon a Lightkiller or use your Demon Arm, you're reduced to shooting out every single light you come across. The task by itself is tedious and made worse by the auto-aiming system, which often locks onto a light despite objects being in the way that prevent you from hitting it. As you trudge from room to room, wasting ammo and hoping that each light will shatter so you can just get on with things, the pace of the game just lurches to a crawl.

There are also several balance issues in regards to the strength and effectiveness of the Darkness powers. Devouring the hearts of dead enemies allows you to unlock new powers and harness more energy. The hearts basically act as experience, increasing your Darkness level for every 30 or so hearts you devour. However, if you are persistent, you can unlock all four powers and achieve the maximum Darkness level at the halfway mark in the game.

This wouldn't be a problem if the game got progressively more and more difficult, but things pretty much stay the same throughout. From the beginning until the premature end, enemies continue to act as brainless targets on a firing range. The Black Hole power is ridiculously overpowered, so much so that when you acquire it, there's no real need to use any other power to fight. The player can choose to stick from shadow to shadow and spam one Black Hole after another, plowing through the game like some unstoppable battle tank with little to no challenge.

There are some side missions and hidden areas in the story mode that unlock additional content, but it only adds an extra hour or so of gameplay. After that, there’s not much left to be had from The Darkness. There's a multiplayer mode, but it feels rather extraneous and tacked on. The Darkness powers that made the story mode worth playing are nowhere to be seen, leaving only run-of-the-mill deathmatches. It's fun for a little while, but there's no depth to warrant continued play, especially in light of more robust multiplayer options on the market today.

And really, that speaks volumes about the entire Darkness experience. The story is intriguing enough to provide an enjoyable ride while it lasts, but a lack of challenge and various other issues guarantee that you won't be itching for a second trip.