If you’re not familiar with the Xbox Chronicles of Riddick game, Escape from Butcher Bay, I’ll forgive your skepticism when I say that it was one of the system’s greatest games. But it’s true… besides the still-astonishing graphics and character work, the game used a first person perspective and truly put you in the shoes of the goggled badass. An even superior version hit PC shortly after and ever since we’ve been waiting to see what else developer Starbreeze Studios had up its sleeves.
A couple of years ago it was announced that a remake of the first game was going to hit the Xbox 360, but we’ve since found out that something even better’s on the way- a completely overhauled remake of the first one along with a sequel, plus a multiplayer component. At the way this is shaping up it’s going to be the best deal since The Orange Box… especially since Butcher Bay with revamped graphics alone would have been worth a purchase.
I stepped into dark Riddick booth to try out the game and jumped into the very beginning. The portion of the game was completely finished, and might even make it into your hands as a demo. It picks up immediately where the last one left off.
The demo starts you off on a spaceship, coming out of an Alien-style sleep chamber. There’s a reason that you’ve been waken up- your ship is being captured by the titular Dark Athena, a merc ship that’s after you for some reason. Unfortunately I couldn’t hear much of the story because of some yappy fanboy that was excited about the game (and also the noise from the other monitors). Anyway, the Dark Athena pulls your ship in, but not by a tractor beam. It shoots out a massive spear attached to a tether that smashes into your ship and starts yanking it. More and more tethers smash into you until it’s all over, and you’ve been towed to the ship. But you’re more than they bargained for and are soon out free on the ship, trying to take out their soldiers.
I wish I could’ve heard more of the game on the NYCC floor, but hopefully I’ll get another chance to try it out soon. Vin Disel voices the raspy Riddick once again. Along with Mr. Glowy Eyes you’ll notice some other familiar voices, such as Lance motherfuckin’ Henrikson, who plays Dacher, a prisoner on the ship, and Michelle Forbes (Helena Cain from Battlestar Galactica) who plays the captain of the Dark Athena.
You start off in the game without a weapon, but like Butcher Bay showed us Starbreeze knows how to do hand-to-hand combat in a first person perspective, and do it perfectly. I found a couple of soldiers that were wandering around looking for me in the dark and quickly incapacitated them with a few blows. I grabbed one of their rifles and went off in hunt of more. The game is just stunningly beautiful, easily one of the best looking games I’ve seen. Your character’s body still casts shadows and really makes you feel like you’re ractually controlling the whole person (and not just a camera with hands attached to it) and it switches to third person when climbing ladders and such.
I ended up getting blasted to pieces the first playthrough because I refused to stay in the shadows, instead opting to charge at my enemies with my rifle trying to gun them all down. Big mistake. It’s all about the dark here, staying hidden and using Riddick’s night vision to take your foes out one by one. Not that there won’t be incredible weapons and moments of action, but this is a more realistic shooter.
Along the way I talked with a fellow from Atari who was repping the game (didn’t get your card, buddy, sorry!) who filled us in on all the details. He hinted at a few new modes and multiplayer features. The absolute coolest sounding multiplayer mode he mentioned has one person playing as Riddick, and all the rest as normal soldiers. The maps for this mode are purposefully made as dark as possible, and the soliders have to hunt Riddick down and kill him with the aid of their flashlights. Of course, with his night vision he thrives on the dark, and when the rep told us how much fun it was to sneak up on people and kill them before they knew it, we knew he was telling the truth.
Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena is well on its way towards being one of the best titles of 2009.
(Thanks to all the fine folks at Atari for spending time talking to me about their games!)
At the New York Comic Con this weekend, Atari was pulling in quite a crowd. On one end they had Ghostbusters: The Videogame, with four cosplayers walking around wearing ridiculously detailed proton packs. A wall behind them featured some of the biggest ghosts from the game, and on Saturday they even had a Slimer ice sculputure that soon started melting due to the overwhelming power of tens of thousands of hot, sweaty geeks. Around the corner, a guy dressed up as Riddick stood guard, scowling at anyone who came close and taking pictures with those who asked. Behind him in a dark and enclosed space there stood a group of monitors showcasing Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena. (There was also Ready 2 Rumble for the Wii but with Madworld and The Conduit next door I felt I had already fufilled my Wii quota for about a year.)
So naturally, I first turned to Ghostbusters, and played through the PS3 version, which will be identical to the Xbox 360 and PC versions.
The game takes place two years after the events of Ghostbusters 2. Supernatural activity is on the rise in the fair city of New York, seemingly coinciding with a Gozer exhibit being unveiled… but the two events are probably unrelated, natch. You play a voiceless recruit who’s been hired as a guinea pig for Egon and Ray’s new equipment, and of course end up getting more than you bargained for.
The 360/PS3 demo starts off at the beginning of the game. You’re in an office building, looking around for any ghostly presesnce and getting used to the controls. You can use a PKE Meter to find out where they’re hiding, and also to examine ghostly objects for achievements and unlockables. Right away you’ll realize that this game wants to scare you, as ghosts pop out of a door with a screech and start chasing you around. But no, these aren’t ghosts- these are pieces of the Stay-Puft Marshmallow man who is lurking outside the building, threatening to step on churches.
The little creatures are the game’s work-around for the tons of enemies in the game. While every single ghost that you’ll have to trap is unique (with its own background and history, and acting as a collectible in the game) there are plenty of smaller foes that can be destroyed just by being shot with the proton pack… no trapping required.
While fighting these first few foes you’ll notice the awesome damage you’ll cause. Everything in the game can be destroyed or burned by your nuclear stream, and since the ghosts will try to get away from it you’ll easily find yourself recreating that Ballroom scene from the original film. The Wii version takes a little more advantage of this, actually (more on that later) but of course the 360/PS3 version looks absolutely phenomenal.
Eventually you’ll come across a poor office worker who’s trapped by the huge marshmallow man and have to shoot at its hands to ward it off. After fighting through some more little creatures and making it to the roof you’ll come across some real ghosts for the first time, a group of ghostly former construction workers that fly around and cause you trouble till you figure out how to capture them. You don’t just fire at the ghosts to take them down, you have to grab them with your beam and smash them into the ground. Once they’re dazed enough you can throw out your trap and capture the guy for good.
It’s at this point that you’ll realize- Hey! I’m crossing streams with the other Ghostbusters here! The developer laughed and said that it would just be too frustrating to have kept that in, and he’s probably right. He kept silent and shrugged with a smile when asked if there would be any point in the game where you’re forced to cross the streams…
After taking out the ghosts the gigantic Stay-Puft man appeared with a tremendous marshmallowy roar over the edge of the building as the screen darkened and the demo ended. Damn.
It’s quite fun but unfortunately it didn’t grab me in as I’d hoped. You could see gamers practically orgasming while they were playing and it’s obvious why- just playing as a Ghostbuster and going through their world with the guys from the films is undeniably cool. But it’s still up in the air if it’s going to be a good game or a great one.
The Wii version is different in ways but still mostly the same. While both titles will have the same basic story, each will have a couple of unique levels and features. On the Wii everything is cartoonish- all the Ghosbusters are caricatures of themselves, with Egon’s incredibly long face making me chuckle quite a bit. It’s a smart way to get around not being able to produce realistic graphics on the system.
The level shown for this game was set in the New York Public Library (I assume), as you hunted down that librarian ghost from the first film. Along the way you’ll fight these little monsters that are made entirely of books, with book shields and book swords.
The Wii controls make for a much different experience with the game. Now to trap ghosts you’ll have to hold the cursor in a certain direction (indicated by an arrow on screen) and then smash them into the ground by shaking the remote down when they’re dazed enough. You then throw out a trap by using the Nunchuck like you’re Wii Bowling- holding the Z button and letting go as you flick it out. Drag the ghost into the trap with the remote and you’re all set.
The level ended with the Librarian fight, which was fairly simple. She throws books at you and you have to ward them off while shooting her with some charged up shots. The proton pack can overheat so you have to be careful not to be caught without a stream.
A couple of things change the experience from the other versions. For one thing, there’s co-op, something that seems so obvious but is glaringly missing from the 360/PS3 iterations. Two players can play through the whole game splitscreen as new recruits, one male and one female. Another big change is the meter on the top left of the screen that tallies how much damage you’ve caused to the world. Blasting apart objects in the world causes the meter to rise and rise till you’re given a bill at the end of the level. The glorious part? The bill gets sent to Walter Peck. If that’s not an incentive to destroy everything you come across, I don’t know what is.
So while I walked away from my experience with both demos seeing them in a positive light, I’m still not sure how I feel about how everything controls and how linear it is. The story hasn’t been fully revealed yet and I’m a little concerned with where it’s going- it still seems like complete fan-service to me that all these ghosts from the films are included (the dev shrugged again when asked about Viggo’s involvement!), but hopefully there will be a good excuse for them.
Also, keep in mind that these were only short demo levels on an unfinished build, so there’s a good chance things will change even more. As it is, it’s fun and entertaining and I’m definitely excited to try out the final game, if only just to see what other surprises and cameos they have in store for us. But I wanted to walk away from this completely sold on it, and unfortunately wasn’t.
Riddick, on the other hand….
(Hit page two for my impressions of Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena!)
