The Darkness
Jun 25, 2007
As far as shooters go, you could do a lot worse than The Darkness. It's a serviceable attempt at combining gunplay and demonic powers, built from a passable this-gen engine, and folded into a story that's a bit more than your average excuse for stringing a few dungeons together. But the whole thing is ultimately disappointing for how much better it could have been.
The story is adapted from a comic of the same name. The premise is that you're a double-crossed mobster out for revenge. Oh yeah, you also have demonic powers. These come to you courtesy of a sentient parasitic infection called the Darkness. The setting is modern day-ish New York City and the tone is characterized by plenty of gory cop-killing, mobster mauling, and eating bloody hearts ripped out of chests. There are a couple of nice changes of scenery that work best if you don't know about them - our lips are sealed! - but for the most part, you're playing The Sopranos by way of Clive Barker.
In a typical battle, you can use guns, toothy free-roaming tentacles, a rigid impaling tail, a variety of summoned demons called darklings, or even a miniature black hole. However, even with the powers of Darkness, you're no Rambo. A few shots can kill you, particularly if you're standing around in the light.
The gimmick is that your powers are proportionate to how dark it is where you're standing. Therefore, much of the gameplay involves shooting out lights. In theory, this sounds like a good idea: take the light/dark dynamic from a stealth game and build an action game around it! But in practice, this just means popping out light bulbs as you go. Late in the game, some of your opponents wise up and bring flood lamps, but these are just as easily shot out as light fixtures. There's even one mission that looks as if you're going to have to fight during the day, but a deus ex machina arrives on cue.
The result is that there's almost no challenge here. The battles offer a bit of variety for how many ways there are to dispatch bad guys, but there's no reason to vary your approach or develop your character a particular way. All guns and powers eventually come to you as you sweep everything out of your way. By the time the SWAT teams arrive, you couldn't care less. Just spam your black hole on the way from plot point to plot point until you get to the credits. In one of the game's most puzzling design decisions, the climactic battle is played out for you. You watch a variety of vignettes of what it would be like if you were actually playing the game. Huh? You've come all this way just to be reduced to a spectator?
It's a shame the story and pacing weren't better to make up for the gameplay. But unfortunately, the storyline is full of stereotypical Goodfellas goombahs and wanna-bes. The main character dresses like a Goth and talks like someone doing a DeNiro impression, with added pauses. For heavy. Dramatic. Effect. During loading screens, you'll be treated to his weird contemplative monologues and gun porn, which are at least slightly more interesting than watching the loading bar creep to the right.
The game's biggest problem is all the filler between the reasonably exciting combat sequences. This New York City consists of two subway stations and about eight neighborhoods separated by long loading screens. You'll get sent back and forth across them all. Get this key. Visit that character. Trigger this sequence. Kill that guy. Along the way, we counted exactly two (2!) optional missions.
The world is built from an engine that looked great in 2004 when it pre-dated Doom 3 by two months. But now these empty streets and plastic people just look awkward and unfinished. It's telling that the only time the game springs to life is when you have a few gibbering darklings running around talking to each other. Their non-sequiturs and obscure references are the most memorable parts of The Darkness. "What's your name?" "Shirley Brick." "Lemon curd!" "Pay my respects to your family."
At least the Darkness effects, which play liberally with lighting and color, are lively and entertaining. You get the same HUD-less presentation as the Chronicles of Riddick game, which frees the screen of your typical health bar and ammo count so you can admire the decent graphics, gunplay, and gore. But when it's all said and done, The Darkness is just a minor diversion good for little more than whiling away about ten hours.