 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Advertisement |
 |
 |
 |
|
Darkwatch - custom javascript
used to display images - disable popup blockers |
|
 |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Graphics and Sound The game is fairly good in the graphical department considering the limitations of the PS2. The game has blurred vision when something explodes too near or you die, and all the texture and animation work is pretty good. I would be hard pressed to find a blurry texture anywhere in the game, and there are interesting static props scattered everywhere. The audio is sort of a mixed bag. All the voice actors are good, and the weapons and enemies sound appropriate within the context of the title, but the only music that’s worth a mention is the title theme, the in game music is virtually non-existant. I hardly noticed it at all during my play through the title. It was just "ambient". The game could have done with a bit more music in the action sections of the game, this would have greatly added some atmosphere. On a more positive note the title music aptly sets the mood. It starts off with the familiar whistle from the good, bad and the ugly and proceeds into a very stereotypical western score.
AI and Control The AI in this game is quite good for the most part. Generally enemies just come close to you and basically try to kill you but they have no problems of getting stuck on geometry - general detection seems good. They will jump away and take cover from dynamite and will even dodge your slower moving projectile weaponry. They give an overall impression of being semi intelligent which adds to the overall atmosphere. Enemy diversity is a bit of a letdown but everything that is included is all well implemented and rendered. The game has a rag doll system and all the physics are good and predictable aside from jumping. Why? Well I felt like Jericho was in outer space as he could jump quite far even as a mortal. Not very realistic. As far as the control aspect goes the game uses the fps two-stick system for moving and aiming. I thought the controls were average but a friend of mine complained that they have to use all the buttons, and that he had to take his thumb off the right stick almost constantly, which messed up his game experience.
The Plot You begin the game as a human, and at a breakneck pace become a vampire. In fact I was waiting for at some point for Jericho to say something, anything about the fact that he’s been cursed, iinstead he just instantly accepts he is going to become a vampire and naturally does so. This makes me think that in this game the undead are quite common. Our avatar cares more for the fact that he killed a horse than the fact he is now undead! I'm going to assume the story was not thought through very well. In any case it makes me feel totally unsympathetic and unconnected to the character leading to a very shallow game experience. I’d also like to talk about the ‘story pockets’ which are cut scenes. This is where they try to condense the thin plot into a 60 second snippet. Now I know it is an action title, but all the information they cram into a cut scene makes me feel like the game was designed for children with ADD. It’s too much too fast! To make a more immersive and flowing experience this really should have been paced out more. My final comment on the plot (or lack of) has to do with choices between good and evil. When you spend the whole game doing good things suddenly in the middle of the game you go out and do something really (arguably) evil via a cut scene! I was almost prepared to turn it off right there out of frustration, however motivations aside this just makes me further think that this title has came under some heavy editing or translation problems.
Gameplay Gameplay is the strong point of this title. I found myself frequently engaging in melee combat as many game enemies are one hit kills, and smacking their heads right off became quite easy after a bit of practice. I would have liked with their limited level system to at least make your character a tad stronger as you go along drinking the blood of your enemies, as they get much tougher, but this unfortunately does not happen. There is a shotgun, pistol(s), rifle(s), dynamite launching crossbow and a rocket launcher ... a good selection of weaponry choices. Downsides? you can only carry two weapons at once. I just found with the fast paced game play the rifles were the most useful as you could rifle butt or throw dynamite at closer enemies and pick off snipers without a weapon switch. The only reason I used other weaponry was I kept running out of rifle ammo. The game has a limited power system, as you gain good and evil levels you get access to new powers. The ‘story’ good and evil choices give a disproportionate amount of level progress over the secret areas and you will know all the powers by pausing the game and looking at the powers information box. Far from ideal.
My advice is to look at what 4th level power you like better and pump all the story ones into that specific power and spend all of the ‘secret’ experience you get from remnant souls on the other power, as if you are like me and like looking for everything I turned out to have 4th level good powers and 2nd level evil powers at the end of the game. I’m fairly certain if you look hard enough you can be a master of both good and evil. You will not get lost, once you get used to the quirky FPS vision in this game, as it is quite linear. There are a bunch of hidden areas that have perks but are not required to beat the game, exploring these hidden areas means you will just have more diverse powers near the end of the game. There is a portion of the game where you are allowed to ‘explore’ the Darkwatch compound. However the game did not open up as I had hoped and I was still confined to straight-aways and doors. They give you a choice of levels to complete, but in the end you have to do all three and the way you choose to beat them has no bearing on anything in the game. In regards to difficulty, a higher difficulty level simply makes the enemies do more damage and makes you do a little less, you may find yourself moving along till you find an area where you will die quite regulary .. there is no real penalty to dying. You just start back at one of their many checkpoints, but as you would expect it is time consuming and equally annoying.
The checkpoints however are very good, and the game autosaves between each level. The only downside is that if you wish to go back to an earlier level you can not do so without resetting your progress to that level. The only reason I can think to go back with such a penalty is that you missed a number of secrets. The game is primarily handled on foot, however a regular occurance with a First person shooter in recent years is the addition of vehicles, Darkwatch has a few of these to keep up with the times, but there is really nothing extraordinary in the way they are handled. The game is quite long for an action title. It has about 25 hours of solid game play which is respectible. Multiplayer The multiplayer has standard deathmatch mode, cooperative mode and blood battle. The blood game is where you simply have to get your blood bar up full first. It’s a bit more variety to a standard death match, but it is just not near spicy enough and left me unfufilled. The Co-op portion is highly recommended and is handled in the same manner as HALO, that being the single player game with a bit more firepower being dealt to your enemies, also playing with friends can be much more fun when you’re not accidentally slugging them or blowing them up with the crossbow. With the title's many cramped quarters it can get a bit tricky, but overall it’s still the most fun multiplayer mode.
Conclusion Even with all the faults ive mentioned the gameplay is great with a very high standard of graphical detail. The game mechanics are quite enjoyable, and it is a good action romp alone or in cooperative mode. The story, while rushed and seemingly incomplete, is good enough for an action title and certainly better than many arcade conversion games. The game has little replay value as there is only art unlockable content, which is unfortunate. So unless you like vanilla death match with only one other player expect to be trading this title in after completing. All in all I find Darkwatch could have been improved with
a bit of story tweaking and the addition of more multiplayer
modes, even internet compatibility, but it is still a fun
game regardless. It warrants more than a rental, however
you just might want to try it out before you buy.
|
|
|
