Review:
As someone familiar with comic books, I knew the reputation of The Darkness: decent comic, chronically late. This is the way of Marc Silvestri’s Top Cow. Honestly, it’s a comic I never had any interest in, either. A hitman named Jackie Estacado with unlimited evil power. *Yawn* In the words of Samuel Goldwyn: “Include me out.” When I heard it was picked up for a video game, my interest increased, though. Who wouldn’t want unlimited evil power in a virtual world? With only a little trepidation, I picked up the game.
The story, I think, is key in The Darkness. It raises it above other first-person shooters where characters and motivations are clearly secondary (or sometimes tertiary). On his 21st birthday, Jackie is imbued with the power of the Darkness. All the Darkness wants in exchange is Jackie’s soul, which he is somewhat less than willing to give up. He also is being hunted by his Uncle Frankie, a mob boss who wants Jackie dead.
The Darkness not only makes Jackie tougher, but through it he can do things from summoning imp-like darklings to conjuring miniature black holes. These abilities are easy and fun to use. My personal favorite was the Alien-tailwhip-inspired Dark Claw. With it, you impale enemies and skewer scenery. It’s a lot of fun. These abilities are much more fun than the selection of guns you get and certainly make the game more interesting to play.
The graphics engine built by developer Starbreeze looks quite good. When loading is going on, there are interludes with Jackie talking to no one (or someone?). As I watched these, I realized we are finally on the cusp of having Toy Story-quality graphics. The textures on Jackie’s face look great. The only odd things are his inhumanly clear eyes. His movements are fluid and human-like. The enemies are equally well-animated. There were visual quirks, though: some odd texture seams, poorly constructed fingers on the models, and odd points of light. I don’t know whether these issues are present on all the versions or whether it’s limited to the much newer PS3. There was at least one side quest that was bugged: I was sent to kill someone. I killed him, but the quest didn’t update. That’s a much bigger problem than the graphical ones.
One design element I really appreciated was your inability to die. Get shot too many times and you fall, but the Darkness resurrects you. It’s done interestingly with flashing images that change depending on where you are in the game. Unfortunately, that leads to another issue. The game just isn’t that difficult. If it were longer, it wouldn’t matter. As it stands, this game feels as though it were designed to be sold in episodes (which wouldn’t have been a bad idea necessarily).
Overall, The Darkness is quite enjoyable, though. I will look forward to a sequel if one is made. The engine is great, the powers are fun, and the story is compelling. Starbreeze and 2K Games have a hit on their hands, especially on the game-poor PS3.