The Darkness

          The First-Person Shooter genre is quite an interesting topic of conversation. Ask around, and you’ll find many people who feel that the genre is full of games that are cut from the same cloth as one another. How many times can we be the space marine in another futuristic sci-fi setting, taking on an alien legion who threatens to destroy the planet? Even though games that follow that mold can clearly be successful, it’s nice to finally find a game that can be the square-pegged example of a different take on the dormant genre. The Darkness is the latest game from the folks at Starbreeze, and is a game based off of the comic from Top Cow. While the story and setting of The Darkness may not have been created from the minds of Starbreeze, the gritty world depicted in this hit comic is fully and successfully realized, and proves to be one of the better FPS experiences of this generation.

          Players take on the role of Jackie Estacado, a young mobster who turns 21 during the timeline of the game. On the night of his birthday, Jackie gets screwed by his uncle, Paulie Franchetti, and is attacked by all of Uncle Paulie’s men. Paulie Franchetti is a ruthless and relentless crime lord, and sees Jackie as a threat to his mob empire. The story in The Darkness is very much a mob story, and that alone could steer even the most open-minded person away from the premise of this game. The story, however, is a wonderfully crafted and engaging one. Jackie’s problems run far deeper than having a power hungry tyrant of an uncle breathing down his neck. As he fights off these hordes of mobster lackeys to get back at his uncle, he begins to hear a twisted voice in his head, telling him to embrace the darkness, and urging him to keep killing and murdering. Jackie inexplicably acquires the power of “The Darkness,” a strange presence that manifests itself into the mind and body of Jackie, which gives him tentacle-like appendages that can attack and aid their host. Jackie’s fight clearly gets a lot more interesting because of these events, and he finds himself on a quest to kill a killer, and more importantly, protect the people he loves.

          The fact that this review focuses so much on the storyline and narrative of The Darkness says a lot about the kind of game this is. As with The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay, Starbreeze always places a huge priority on nailing the storyline and characters. The plot always moves along at a consistent basis, and manages to keep players interested all the way through. One of the more inventive ways Starbreeze keeps the pace of the story going is by having a monologue from Jackie Estacado during every loading screen. It kills two birds with one stone, in that you’re not pulled out of the experience by watching a loading bar, and you’re getting a minute-by-minute update about however Jackie is feeling about your current situation. As alluded to before, the whole idea of embarking on a dark mob story could have backfired greatly, since many of us would assume a game with this setting would be a little to ‘badda-boom, badda-bing.’ Thankfully, that’s never the case; thanks in part to the incredible set of characters in the game. Each have their own distinct personalities, and feel like real people you’d encounter in real life; personality issues and all. These phenomenal characters are match with equally incredible voice acting. Each and every single major and minor character in the game sound just as you would imagine them, each with that sore-thumb accent, but as stated before, tasteful and distinct. The dialogue and writing in general are wonderfully crafted. Nothing sounds corny or out of sync with the mood of the story -- it’s a very smart writing, with just enough wit and slightly sick humor included. It’s by far one of the best story-driven games in recent memory, complete with awesome plot moments that will leave you very satisfied.

          The Darkness matches an excellent story and characters with a near perfect atmosphere. Being that The Darkness is set in New York, the game captures the look and feel of a gritty city very well. The subway stations you’ll traverse through are just as old and worn down looking as they’d look in real life. Tiles on the walls are stained and dirty looking, old newspapers and poster ads take up residence on the graffiti laden walls. You can hear the sound of funky dance music in the distance, and upon examining where that sound is coming from, you’ll find a group of four break dancers having a good time. You can even tip them if you wish. In another station, you’ll find a man playing a harmonica amidst the small hustle and bustle of people in each station. There are even televisions scattered throughout the locations you’ll travel. This time, it’s not just a slideshow of images like the last generation of games. It’s full music videos, television shows, cartoons and full length movies -- even more so with the PS3 version, thanks to the extra Blu-ray space. It’s such a powerful sense of atmosphere. Exploring the city streets isn’t quite as engrossing, since there’s a lack of cars traveling around, with hardly anyone walking around. However, it still manages to uphold that engrossing feeling of actually being there. The Darkness will pull you into it’s world in ways that you wouldn’t have assumed you’d be.

          On the gameplay end of the spectrum, this is still a FPS at heart. However, it’s very clear that Starbreeze has a very different take on handling a FPS game. The focus on story and setting is one thing, but actual gameplay is a whole other case. Many of the simplest things, like player movement, sensitivity and aiming are all handled very differently with Starbreeze. One of the first things players will notice about the gameplay is that it may feel too slow, or sloppy moving. That is a deliberate design choice by Starbreeze to simulate running in a more realistic manner. You won’t be shooting through every room like Quake. Of course, you can tinker with sensitivity options a little, but it won’t get The Darkness to play like our beloved Halo. That’s where this game will lose some people. Aiming is another big difference. The Darkness (by default) relies quite heavily on the use of auto-aim. This is seen by many as being a cheap gameplay dynamic, and those people can breathe easier because it is a changeable option. However, it does have it’s advantages. For example, say you’d like to shoot out a light above you. Most games make you look up and line your target reticule exactly on the light to shoot it out. The Darkness does things a smidge differently. When you look up and start to try and line up the reticule to the light, the game will recognize that you’re wanting to shoot that light off, and the reticule will move over to that light source, and all you have to do is pull the trigger. Your camera perspective doesn’t move; only the red reticule does. This also helps with dual pistols, since you would be able to target two different enemies at once, or maybe an enemy and a light source. It’s a very helpful feature, but it does take time getting used to. Instead of having melee attacks in the game, Starbreeze decided to do something much cooler. Now, when you get really close to an enemy and fire your weapon, you’ll do a stylized kill move. It’s all randomized, and it also depends on your weapon and where you are facing the enemy from. Jackie will do everything from shooting someone in the heart and in the face, to firing his gun right in the mouth of your soon-to-be-dead foe. Don’t forget, Jackie Estacado is no angel himself.

          You may have wondered why there’s all this talk about shooting out lights. Well, this is where the x-factor of The Darkness comes into play. We’re talking about the powers Jackie gets from The Darkness itself. Once you’ve obtained these powers, you’ll have these aforementioned tentacle-like creatures; one at each side. Throughout the game, you’ll gain a handful of powers that will give you an advantage over your mobster enemies. Creeping Dark is an ability where you can send one of your tentacle creatures ahead of you to scout an area ahead, climb up and bite out a light source or perform stealth kills where you can eat the faces off of an enemy. Demon Arm is a power that allows you to strike an enemy straight through the chest with a sharp tentacle. It’s also possible to pick up objects, such as cars or other objects and throw them at waves of enemies. The Black Hole power allows you to cast a swirling black hole in front of you, which sweeps up every nearby enemy and inanimate object in that area. You then can trigger the black hole to explode, which sends all of the things caught in the black hole to be thrown wildly. Hello ragdoll physics. The last demon power are the Darkness Guns, which are a demonically enhanced set of dual pistol-like weapons. The left gun shoots lighting rounds in pistol fashion, and the left gun shoots thunder blasts, shotgun style. They are way more powerful than conventional weapons, and don’t have an ammo limit. Instead, they rely upon darkness energy. Remember shooting out those lights? Well, your darkness energy will deplete when you have your tentacles out (which can be toggled on and off) when you’re in intense light. Shooting out lights and staying in dim areas will regain darkness energy. You can also regain darkness energy, and increase the power level of your darkness powers, by devouring the hearts of dead enemies. You can watch in glee as both of your tentacle creatures pull out the heart of a fallen enemy and shred it into two pieces, and chomp away.

          These darkness powers work very well within the gameplay, and allow for a bit more fun in deciding how you want to kill off the legions of enemies you’ll be facing. Having these powers may sound a little overwhelming at first, but they’re introduced at a good pace. It’s a shame that you can’t start another game with these powers right off the bat, but then again, it’s understandable. While these darkness powers prove to be neat and useful, there’s another power that isn’t so useful -- Darklings. You can call upon these little creatures from little holes scattered throughout most areas, when you have the darkness powers toggled on. You can choose from a Berserker, a creature will run up and attack the nearest enemy around. Gunners are creatures that carry chain guns and fire relentlessly at your enemies. Kamikaze’s are creatures with a bomb placed on their backs, who run up to an enemy and suicide bomb them.   Lastly, Lightkillers will short out any light sources in your way. It sounds pretty cool, but it is pretty flawed system. Unless you have shot out a large enough number of lights for these guys to do their thing, they’ll just burn in the light and die off instantly. That makes it hard for the Berserkers and Kamikaze’s to get to their target in time, and if an enemy happens to shoot at the Kamikaze, forget it. He’s exploding. Gunners almost always seemed to shoot at walls, and barely locked onto an enemy; more often than not. Lightkillers proved to be the most reliable Darkling to use, but even then, there were times when there would be a light source right in his location, and he’d leave it untouched. While it was nice to give players added battle options along with the darkness powers, it proved to be too unreliable, and often times useless to bother with. There were only a handful of times when the Darklings were legitimately needed for the sake of manpower. To their credit, they are a funny bunch of creatures. Some of their actions and one-liners are hilarious, and nothing is a bigger slap in the face than having a Darkling lift a leg and 'draining lizard' all over a fool.

          The full experience that The Darkness brings is an excellent one, however, it’s not a very long one. For those who need 20+ hour long games to justify a purchase, you’ll find yourself disappointed at the 8-10 hour long quest The Darkness presents to you. While there is a multiplayer mode included, it’s so much of an afterthought by the developers that it’s not even worth mentioning. It’s poorly done. Despite that, the single player experience is never dull, and you’re never at one place for way too long, but for most, it’s still too little. The Darkness also has a healthy amount of side quests to take part in, and you can jot down phone numbers you see on posters, billboards and signs and dial those numbers on the payphones in the Subway station for some seriously laugh out loud messages, and of course, unlockable content. Nifty unlockables in this game include unused cutscenes, character art and renders, and the coolest of them all, actual comics. Flipping through some classic comics of The Darkness, as well as other comic series’ from Top Cow is the ultimate novelty here, especially if the story of The Darkness leaves you interested for more, and it probably will. The Darkness breaks away from many of the conventions of the FPS genre. You may not like it when you play it, and it’s gameplay is certainly not for everyone. It feels very different. While that might steer people away, it’s also the absolute best quality about this game. It places priorities in a very different order than most FPS titles out there, and Starbreeze should be commended for sticking with their vision of how a FPS should play and feel. And hey, they got Mike Patton from Faith No More to do the voice of The Darkness. How cool is that? Although there’s a swarm of games coming soon that will no doubt take away the much deserved attention for The Darkness, it’s one of the best games released this year, and shouldn’t be overlooked by anyone who’s looking for that square-pegged game to sink their teeth into.