|
Dark Sector has been a long time coming; it is the first next-generation title to be announced for both the Xbox 360 and the PlayStation 3 back in 2004, and later shown as a tech demo for the PlayStation 3 in 2005. Since then it has gone through a makeover and a facelift; the gameplay, story, and controls borrowing heavily from other games released since the game was first shown. Most notably, it borrows gameplay elements quite liberally from Gears of War, which while that is uninspired, there are few games out there that I would like to see a developer rip-off other than Gears of War. It shouldn’t be surprising though after all, Digital Extremes, the developer of Dark Sector made its way through the industry working on Unreal Tournament games, working alongside Epic Games these past few years. Their last original title, Pariah was somewhat of a flop, Dark Sector redeems DE in more ways than one. The ‘Gears’ gameplay mixed with some fun boss battles, a bodacious unique weapon, and a bit of multiplayer makes it a decent experience, although it lacks the luster of the titles it borrows from.
You take on the role of Hayden Tenno, a secret agent on an assassination mission that goes horribly awry. The story seems to have borrowed some elements from the likes of game such as Metal Gear Solid, however it reads more like they ripped the story from a fan-fiction site than actually took the time to flesh it out themselves. It doesn’t help that the protagonist isn’t particularly likeable either. A great deal of the game is spent trying to make the story believable; although the “twist and turns” they throw at you were predictable a level or so before they even happen. The story is told through in game cut scenes; strangely they let you move the camera around an inch all around, probably just to prove they are in-game visuals. What story is there can be hard to hear at times, especially because so many different voices and sounds may be thrown at you at once. This typically isn’t a problem in most games, and for the most part the sound effects, from the screeches of monsters getting under your skin, to the big bass booms of explosions are exceptional, but sometimes they are muddled and over-barring and depending on your audio set-up can sound like a big mess.
Your glaive has many uses.
The biggest draw of the campaign is definitely the glaive weapon you weld. The glaive is the result of the virus you are infected with, and sprouts out of your hand in the form of an over-sized ninja star that acts similarly to boomerang. With it you slice up enemies, homes in on weapons to swipe them up off the battlefield, and you can even control where the glaive moves eventually, allowing you to swipe through more enemies strategically. Controlling the trajectory of the glaive is specifically the most interesting, as the world around you slows down, giving you more control of how it directs, curving it around walls to cut enemies down, and guiding it to switches or other parts of puzzles. As you progress, you receive even more powers, and every single one of them you use through the course of the campaign, with not one being just tacked on. Even better for those of you that care about achievements, you are handsomely rewarded just for using the glaives various abilities. The glaives biggest downfall is you feel almost to powerful, with very little challenge as the only time you don’t have it is when it is airborne, and even then you can use your other hand with a very powerful and accurate sidearm.
You have three other types of weapons besides the glaive you use throughout most the game, sidearms, shotguns, and machine guns. You are allowed to carry a sidearm and either one of the latter, but with how powerful your glaive is, the majority of the game you won’t need to use either of the other ones, unless you don’t feel like spending that extra five minutes to kill the enemies around you. The virus you have contracted gives you some more useful powers throughout the game, such as a shield that lets you deflect projectiles back at your enemy, and a power that lets you turn invisible. These powers are incredibly useful, especially since in the later levels you have literally wave after wave of bad guys coming your way, and it’s a good way to get the hell out of the way of them. The A.I. for all the enemies isn’t particularly bad, but they all follow the same pattern of attacking, getting out of the way, and popping their head up from cover to shoot at you for a minute, although this actually becomes a challenge in the later levels as they up the numbers coming at you.
|
| No one has posted a comment yet. Be the first one by logging in if need be and submitting your comment to the right. Be aware that we do not tolerate those who post "First" comments. If done enough times, you could be banned from posting comments. |
|
|
|
