The Darkness II Preview

Time has passed since the first Darkness, both for us and for brooding protagonist Jackie Estacato. A new game, a new threat, a new voice actor and most importantly a new studio at the helm. Based on the Top Cow comic of the same name, this gory first person shooter is bequeathed to Digital Extremes, recently memorable as the minds behind the decidedly uninspired Homefront. Meanwhile, former host to the darkness Starbreeze (the studio that made it's name with the Chronicles of Riddick games), moves onto foster it's upcoming co-op shooter reboot Syndicate. Thus the passing down of the franchise to a lesser known studio marks a turning for fans of the series and it's easy to be sceptical at a glance: a new co-op multiplayer mode and other trendy mechanics like a talent tree have wormed their way into the mix in the intervening five years since the release of the original The Darkness. Without fair consideration it would be easy to see these features as a sign of dumbing down, an effort by parent publisher 2K to make the game more accessible and shift more units. And maybe they are just that, but then again it's easy to forget what things where like back in 2007. For a start there were no aiming down the sights and a decidedly awkward subway station hub that the player was forced to shuffle around in between missions. Thankfully problems that have now both been rectified. All this aside, fans of the series are really only interested in seeing the fiction done justice. It's important that the uneasy to truce between Jackie and the darkness remains tested and relevant; the world must retain it's unique and seductive blend of the gangster and gothic genres; it must finally have Mike Patton voicing the darkness. Well the demo arrives this week and one thing is for sure: Mike Patton is as creepy and raspy as any desperate chain smoker or supernatural force of evil you're likely to meet. But playing through this introductory sequence a few changes are immediately apparently. For a start the game looks different. As you'd hope in five years things are a sight sharper, but really the biggest difference is the almost cell shaded nature of the presentation here. It's easy to scoff but this new look blends well with subject matter, allowing Jackie and his unfriendly appendages to remain distinct, as with the rest of the characters and environments, without rendering the dark levels muddy and grey. That's to say Jackie has to stay in the dark at all times in order to retain his powers and so the game does a good job of making otherwise pitch black alleyways vibrant and interesting. As for the gameplay itself, work has been done to distill Jackie's multitude of skills in a logical fashion. With one weapon equipped the left trigger (or L2) aims down the sights and the right trigger (R2) fires. Whilst dual wielding however, each weapon is assigned a trigger and sight aiming enables automatically after a few seconds of sustained fire. This may sound simple enough, but coupled with Jackie''s demon arms theres a lot of options for the player in combat but luckily not much fiddling to pull any of it off. This refinement from the previously convoluted system is generally indicative of the game's shift away from head snake stealth sequences and into combat. Playing the demo you'll feel the snappy shooting you expect from this end of the generation but also more interesting options for combat than many other shooters currently on the market. You can control a vicious headsnake slice with a stick, throw objects to impale enemies, eat their hearts, smash off their heads etc. etc. Needless to say the cinematic and immersive action returns both in gameplay and cutscenes. Though that said it's not all roses and sunshine, although the game looks to be on an interesting path narratively, the lack of up-and-close weapon executions leaves a big hole in the game for fans of the original. Executions are back, but seemingly as a demon arm only affair. Gone are the days of kissing a thugs eyelids with the barrels of your pistols and then pulling both triggers. All told The Darkness II is shaping up to be at least be relevant to it's fans, though whether it will get bogged down in co-op modes and accessibility, unable to tell a great story, this remains to be seen. The Darkness II will be released on February 7th in the US and on the 10th in the UK. The demo is available on Xbox Live and PSN now. Stay tuned to What Culture for our review.