It’s the Darkness and this one’s from Starbreeze, the developers who made the fantastic Chronicles of Riddick on the Xbox, and example of a short but fantastic game over a rubbish movie. Probably the best thing Vin Diesel’s been in to be honest.
In this FPS you play a mobster called Jackie on his 21st birthday. The game starts with a car chase where you get thrown from the vehicle and soon after you get possessed by The Darkness, so instead of just using guns to slay your foes, you now get two handy snakes on each shoulder with which to stealthily creep up and bit people, access new areas and devour the hearts of your victims.
But there’s a catch, and that is your powers only work best when you’re in the dark, so even though much of the game is set at night, you must shoot out the lights for your Creeping Dark, Demon Arm, Darkness Guns and Block Hole (which essentially a smart bomb), to work.
Just like Chronicles of Riddick, this game has a fantastic atmosphere and the characters in the game not only look good but also work on an emotional level. You even get achievement points for hanging around with your girlfriend in her flat watching To Kill a Mocking Bird.
It’s these moments in the game that give you a break from all the merciless killing. Taking a tip from Half-Life, there are moments where you walk through the subway with your guns safely packed away, taking in the atmosphere and talking to other characters in the game. Here you can choose from a limited choice how to answer them and in certain situations, whether you kill them after your chat if you find them boring or don’t like the look of them.
If you’re after a challenge this one actually gets easier the further you get into it. As you devour more hearts you really do turn into one bad mother so when you get to the end it does fall a bit flat without that final tough challenge. Still, it’s a very enjoyable, if gory single player game with lots of style and there’s the added multiplayer mode where you can play as mobsters or the Darklings that help you out in the single player mode.
If you love the FPS experience this isn’t revolutionary but it’s certainly different enough to keep you playing ‘til the end. The Darkness gets 8 out of 10.
