05/02/2009 Dark Void, daily life

Good morning friends, today I'd like to take a moment of your time to talk to you about something that is in many ways bothering me, its a video game, as issues in my life often are.
I am talking about Capcom's Dark void

Its a fun game, by all means, don't get me wrong. There's just something that annoys me about it, and I'm about to try and place it.
When you first start playing (barring the throwaway tutorial mission)you are without a jetpack, and the game plays as nothing more than a watered down Gears of War, with watered down versions of Uncharted characters. It doesn't play badly, by any means, I just... sort of wished I was playing Uncharted.
I think a major flaw is how the first few hours present themselves, bearing in mind the opening of a game is supposed to be the hook to draw you in, it seems odd that they would throw an escort mission AND an item hunt mission at you so early on. Its just poor form, as far as I'm concerned, although Capcom is pretty famed for its escort missions *cough* dead rising *cough* resident evil 4.
The gameplay itself, once you're up in the air, is great fun, it all plays very fluidly, Will soars through the tiniest of gaps with great ease, and I have never yet had a problem with steering or any such. The vertical cover system is great fun to play around with, and for such an innovation, it is pulled off quite well.
Let me explain the Vertical cover system, for those who have not yet read up on this game. Basically, whenever you approach a wall, or a ledge, provided it has ledges or protusions all the way up or down it, you can hang on to the bottom or top of the ledge, and shoot enemies above or below you. You can move through this cover as you would on the ground, provided it's withing flying (or falling) distance. Sounds complicated? it really isn't. It's pretty hard to describe, so here's a handy screenshot.

Understand? Okay its not the best screenshot, but it pretty much shows what i'm trying to say.
The combat mechanics are nice. Played Gears of War? nothing new here. Nice, simple, stop 'n' pop. Groovy.
So, graphics. The game uses Unreal engine 3, so obviously, it looks nice. Not incredible, although some of the lighting and draw distance effects are likely to impress. I guess this is just a slightly outdated engine now, which seems a shame considering how impressive Gears of War and Bioshock looked at the time of release. The characters all look a little... odd. Like they've blurred the lines between reality and Titan A.E. I guess you have to see it to know what I'm talking about.

So overall Dark void is good. Not amazing, its a little too derivative for that, and the plot is average at best. The game lacks multiplayer, but for some of us, that's not a bad thing. It's a good work of alternate reality steampunkish fiction, which will please most, but a lot of things are sure to annoy, and missions can be frustrating.

So that's my review of Dark Void, hope you enjoyed it, I'll probably give an update once I've actually finished the thing. But them's my thoughts so far.

Other than that, I've had to sort out some nasty business at work recently, I wont say who I work for, but I will simply say; never trust a manager with a gut bigger than his brain.

I'm excited about this whole blog prospect, I hope I get a few of you guys interested.

Anyway, I'm out

Quiff