______________________________________
Perfect Dark (Nintendo 64) Original Review Publish Date: June 16, 2006
Perfect Dark is the spiritual successor to developer Rare’s hit shooter, Goldeneye 007. Goldeneye set the standard for multiplayer First Person Shooters on consoles and will go down in history as one of the best First Person Shooters of all time, regardless of platform. This is a lot to live up to. Perfect Dark has succeeded in building on the foundations laid by its predecessor and is an even better game in the end.
Goldeneye 007 was a great looking game in its own right, but Perfect Dark blows it away. The visuals are incredibly crisp with a level of sharpness that puts every other Nintendo 64 game to shame. The characters have very fluid animations (most of which were taken from Goldeneye). Perfect Dark definitely pushes the envelope visually. Unfortunately, all that envelope pushing comes at a technical price. The framerate, while mostly smooth, dips when there is a lot of action on screen. Try as it might, the Nintendo 64’s hardware can’t quite handle it. Perfect Dark also has support for High-res visuals, which make the graphics appear even sharper than normal. Aside from the aforementioned framerate issues, this is still by far, the best-looking game on the Nintendo 64.
The single player game is excellent. The single player campaign revolves around Joanna Dark, a secret agent working for the Carrington Institute in the not so distant future. The Carrington institute has recently made contact with a peaceful alien race called the Maians who resemble the stereotypical bigheaded grey space people portrayed in movies and television shows. Your main enemy, the corrupt dataDyne corporation has aligned themselves with an alien race known as the Skedar, who practice war as a religion, making them natural enemies of the peaceful Maian race. The storyline has a few twists and turns but doesn’t really stand out in any way. In other words, if I had to describe it in one word, I’d say “meh”.
There are around 20 missions in total, including some that are unlocked elsewhere. Each mission varies in length and features an adjustable difficulty setting, which introduce new mission objectives and make the enemies considerably tougher.
The Carrington Institute serves as a base of operations. It’s sort of like a level in itself, as there is much to explore and do within the confines of the building. Between missions, you can stop by the shooting range to brush up on your targeting skills by completing some of the many training exercises. There are other training programs to complete that help you improve your maneuvering and combat skills (both armed and unarmed) as well.
I did notice a few problems though with the single player campaign. Sometimes, the mission objectives are poorly described or otherwise unclear. Often times, you’ll find yourself wandering around, hoping you can find what you’re looking for. Another problem is that there is no mid-mission save or checkpoint feature, so if you screw up one of the primary objectives, you’re forced to start the mission over from the beginning. This gets annoying on many of the longer missions.
One thing Perfect Dark excels at is impressive enemy AI. They are considerably smarter than the enemies in Goldeneye and are much less predictable. Running around a corner and expecting them to follow you into your trap, often times, will not work. When you disarm them by either ripping the gun from their hands or shooting it from their grasp (another new feature), if you leave them alone, they will go for another nearby weapon. Of course, everything you can do to them, they can do to you. They can also shoot your gun from your hands with a well placed shot, and if they are disarmed, sometimes, they will try to snatch their weapon right back from you. Very impressive stuff to be sure.
Another area that was particularly impressive was the soundtrack. It is simply excellent and an astounding achievement for the developers. This is one of the best soundtracks of any game, on any system. The music really kicks in at the perfect moment in a mission to really fit the tempo of that particular point.
Now, Goldeneye was revered for its multiplayer component. With its many weapons, varied environments and fun multiplayer modes, it is no surprise that the only game to provide a more entertaining and deep multiplayer experience on the Nintendo 64 was Perfect Dark. Its multiplayer features everything that made Goldeneye great and much more.
There are a couple of multiplayer modes for two players, the conventional Co-op mode and the innovative Counter-operative mode. Co-op throws another player in the level so the two of you can tackle the mission objectives together. Counter-operative on the other hand pits the two players against each other. One player takes on the role of the main character and advances through the mission. The other player takes on the role of the enemy characters in the mission. The second player’s objective is to prevent the main character from completing their objectives by incapacitating them or otherwise making the mission objectives impossible to complete. The second player has all the weaknesses that the A.I. characters do, such as the low amount of health and limited ammunition. If the first player gets too far ahead of the character the second player is possessing, they can take a suicide pill and respawn closer to the main character. This mode is very innovative, and one that should be featured in future releases.
The real meat of the multiplayer game is in the “Combat simulator” mode. There are a few gametypes to choose from including the standard deathmatch, Capture the flag (dubbed “capture the briefcase” here) and king of the hill. One of the major upgrades from Goldeneye 007 is the inclusion of bots or “Simulants”. There are multiple stimulant types, such as the KazeSim, which tries to kill its target at all costs, even if it means killing themselves in the process and the VengeSim, who goes after the last player that killed them with (you guessed it) a vengeance. Up to eight Simulants can be added into any game, alongside up to four human players. The human players can also form teams with or against the Simulants. I found the Simulants to be very challenging and are great if you want to practice by yourself to improve your skills.
In the end, Perfect Dark has succeeded in building upon everything that made Goldeneye 007 such an excellent game. On the Nintendo 64, it is simply unmatched in many ways. From the excellent Single player campaign, to the even more excellent Multiplayer game, to the amazing soundtrack, Perfect Dark has it all. On consoles, this experience is unparalleled, and is a monumental achievement. This game may not be completely perfect, but few games have come closer to reaching it.
Gameplay: 10
Graphics: 10
Sound: 10
Value: 10
Tilt: 10
Overall Score: 10
Graphics: 10
Sound: 10
Value: 10
Tilt: 10
Overall Score: 10
No comments:
Post a Comment