Gabriel Stanford-ReisingerIt’s baaaack
Perfect Dark makes a triumphant return to the console, only this time it doesn’t suck. Not only does the game not suck, it’s fantastic. Sporting the new name Perfect Dark Zero, the game that stole about 10 minutes of our attention on the N64 has now raped many gamers of hours upon hours of their life. Time wasted? You wouldn’t think so if you’ve seen the game in action.
The game is a prequel to its N64 predecessor, and shows Joanna Dark’s life prior to working for the Carrington Institute. Fighting along side your father as bounty hunters, you will soon find yourself wrapped up in corporate scandal, pitting you against the corrupt dataDyne corporation. Fight and sneak your way to uncovering the truth about what dataDyne is up to.
Halo who?
If you’re expecting a very “Halo like” experience, then go play Halo. People need to get off their high Halo horse and stop trying to argue why it’s so much better. You are comparing apples and oranges people; two different games that aren’t competing with one another. That said, the in-game action is a bit slower than we’re used to. Most first person shooters (FPS’ for the gaming illiterate) are very fast paced and involve far too much jumping. You won’t find either of those here, because first off the game focuses more on tactical game-play than storming down the map with your Uzi’s a blazin. Secondly, you can’t jump…at all. Personally, I think this is a good thing. If you’re aiming for a “realistic” experience, then no jumping allowed. When’s the last time you saw a guy in a gun fight jumping around the room like he had a squirrel in his tighty-whities? That’s right, never. So instead of jumping, what do we get? The ability to take cover behind objects. One word, AWESOME. With a simple tap of the A button, you can take cover behind most objects on any map. The corner of a wall, a box, a can, the side of a tipped over truck, the sky’s the limit here. Once in cover, you can pop out and shoot with a pull of the trigger, and then you will quickly tuck back in for cover, very reminiscent of that Time Crisis game in the arcades (you know, the one with the foot pedal and the badass recoiling pistol).
Bang your dead, right?
One of the greatest features about this game is a headshot is a headshot, it doesn’t matter what gun you have. While at the same time a body shot will do ding-dong for damage. Fully expect to shoot somebody a good 8-10 times before they biff it. In short, aim for the head. It is very frustrating to unload a couple clips into somebody and have them run away still very much alive. It’s almost easier to run around punching people to death, and using the amazing right bumper button to steal their weapon. After you have stolen it, pull it out and try to kill them with it, or you could just keep pimp slapping them, like I do. Slap Fest 05 !
I like guns, lots and lots of guns
So what makes this game stand out among other first person shooters? Variety. PDZ sports 25 different weapons and 8 different modes to play on Xbox Live alone. If you can’t find a type of game you love with 8 different ones to choose from, frankly something’s wrong with you. Here’s a basic breakdown of the types of games you can play:
Killcount: Your classic free for all, most kills wins.
Team Killcount: Team 1 vs Team 2, team with most total kills wins
Territorial Gains: Team based match, capture designated map locations and hold
Eradication: Team based match, Last man standing (very nerve racking)
Onslaught: One team defends a location, one attacks. Attackers respawn but only get a single weapon (choice of host), defenders can purchase weapons but don’t respawn (very fun)
Infection: A couple players start off “infected” (seen as skeletons on screen), while all the others must defend themselves as a team. If a normal player is killed by an infected, he then becomes infected. Infected respawn, but are restricted to pistol only. Non-infected can buy weapons at the start of the round (best mode in my opinion)
Sabotage: One team must destroy designated locations while the other tries to defend them
My gun can do WHAT?
On top of all these great modes to play, the sheer weapon variety is just amazing. Each weapon has AT LEAST, that’s right, I said AT LEAST, a secondary function. About a third of the guns in the game have two extra functions. Functions ranging from silencers, cloaking abilities, to player guided rockets (coolest thing ever). There is no denying that Rare really hit the cycle on this one. Each weapon is so unique, and best of all, no weapon is useless. Often times I find myself running for a pistol or smg when I spawn just for the cool secondary firing modes like ricocheting bullets, or hologram projectors.
Just be aware that the bigger then gun you carry, the slower you run. Makes sense right? Don’t expect to be truckin’ across the map carrying your rocket launcher; you’ll get there, it’ll just take a little time. If you have the need for speed, holster the weapon with your D-Pad and run like the wind, just pull it out when you need to blow somebody to bits.
Extraordinarily Average
The game itself has above average graphics, but you won’t see this game winning any awards based on its visuals. Does that mean the graphics are bad? No way Jose. Graphically standing up against games like PGR3, Madden, and Call of Duty 2 is tough to say the least. So upon comparing PDZ’s (as I will refer to it from now on) graphics to some of the visually stunning games we’re seeing now, it’s trailing a bit behind. I find the post-death animation on Xbox Live hideous, rather than a player disappearing from the ground when they respawn, they instead explode into lots of ugly lines and block shaped pixels. I know 4 year olds with crayons that could make that look better. Weather it is part of the whole futuristic theme or not, I don’t really know, even if it was meant to be that way, the future looks pretty ugly.
I don’t like playing with myself…seriously
What keeps us coming back for more? (yes, this game has me hooked too). Phenomenal online play. I’ve personally spoken to several people who felt rather “eh” after playing a single player mission or two, but after they set foot on the Live servers, instant addiction.
The single player can be fun if you like creeping around and using crazy gadgets, but it gets old quickly. The missions feel just like the N64 version of the game, they just look prettier. For a FPS to keep our attention, it has to do something that no other game does…PDZ does not really revolutionize the single player genre enough to make it a great solo game. At times you will find yourself pretty confused, and even more lost. Luckily a series of “waypoint markers” in the form of arrows on the ground can guide your way. I don’t really feel very secret-agentish when I run around the map for 10 minutes looking for a door. Better put the James Bond music on loop, it may take a while to find your way around.
The game supports three primary difficulties: Agent, Secret Agent, and Perfect Agent. As I’m sure you guessed, you can probably run all the way through Agent without stopping until you finish the game, as the AI is borderline deaf and blind. Secret Agent poses a decent challenge, as I died several times, If you’re the best of the best, or at least think you are, you can slap it on Perfect Agent and die a whole bunch. Beat the game on Perfect Agent and you will see a new difficulty setting get unlocked: Dark Agent. Best of luck to ya pal, you’re gonna need it on this one.
2 Heads are better than 1
A neat way to salvage the boring single player campaign is online and offline co-op. Split your TV in two and duke it out tag team style, or pair up on Xbox Live, working your way through the campaign with a buddy. This is a great idea in principle, and it almost works flawlessly, but I’ve got one major gripe. The co-op style isn’t just two people playing the single player campaign, you’re actually playing a slightly modified version. Objectives like “open this door with that switch” now require both of you to do something. For instance one of you will have to go work the switch while the other works the door. Trust me, you’ll find this out the hard way when you activate a door, and run across the level only to find it locked again, then you have to Rock-Paper-Scissors it up to see who gets to run back . I also suggest you give single player a whirl before you try this out, so you have a clue what the levels are like, otherwise you will end up with one of these conversations like I had with a friend: Friend: “Where are you?
Me: “I don’t know, on top of some building”
Friend: “Which building”
Me: “What the hell do I look like a GPS system? How the hell should I know?”
Friend: “ <5 second pause> , I moved, where are you now?” ….
However, I’m not gonna lie, I definitely had more fun playing co-op than I did the regular single player. Just be aware that “team oriented” objectives exist, and it may take some patience to get through them.
The Live Co-op works very well, just create a game and poof somebody shows up, or you can be the poof-show-up guy by joining one. Just be careful of meatballs. Meatballs you say? Those delicious things my aunt makes? Nope, meatballs as in morons who feel like ruining your mission. I played through Mission 1 with somebody I didn’t know (won’t do that again). In the mission you have to “scope out” certain people using crazy hi-tech binoculars, only he decided instead of looking through his goggles, he was going to look down his scoped pistol and shoot them in the face. Mission failed; a-hole leaves room. Somebody needs to invent some sort of digital boxing glove so you can e-punch people in the face through your TV, you can be damn sure he would’ve gotten a low blow.
My gun sounds fake, can I have a new one?
Sound wise the game is average. The guns themselves don’t sound terribly realistic (at least the ones that look like they could exist in the real world). You definitely won’t be blown away by special effect noises, but the sounds do their job. You’ll be having so much fun on Live you won’t notice it anyhow. An in-game announcer, who is very annoying I might add, will let you know when you’re tearing it up by saying such not real things as “killtastic” or “killtropic”, could’ve done without that one personally.
Point stingy
Rare spread the achievement points across the board, and did it well. You won’t find yourself racking up hundreds of points for completing a few missions, you’re going to earn every point in this game. The points themselves are spread over Xbox Live accomplishments, and single player ones, making you want to cover both modes. A few crazy achievements forcing you to play ridiculous amounts of certain game types will have you occupied for a little while at least. Most of the achievements you will get without even realizing it, like “10 explosive kills”, it’s not like you’re counting how many people you blew up…at least I hope not.
Go buy it, cause I said so
If you don’t have Perfect Dark Zero already, get your ass to the store and buy it, you won’t regret it. Be sure to get some Live play in to fully experience what the game has to offer. And if you feel so inclined, go sneak around in some single player and get lost, hell take a buddy with you so you have some company.
Author: Brian Nadolny