Impresario
May 12th, 2004, 04:34 pm
Played the Chronicles of Riddick Escape from Butcher Bay demo included on the current OXM disc - mixed impressions, slightly positive.
It's a FPS but anytime you perform an action you witness it in 3rd person perspective. The protagonist I guess is a guy named Riddick and in 3rd person does look a lot like Vin Diesel (sp?) which if you're a fan of his I imagine is a plus. To me I was simply controlling some bald dude who was shorter then the guy in "Hitman" sans barcode on his noggin. Anyway the premise seems to be you have to escape from some sort of prison. There weren't any prison cells in the demo as far as I could tell but more like rooms you had to get out of - a bunch of the standard crate/cube type environs having doors with red lights (door won't open) or green lit doors (can open). The level design wasn't extraordinary but it wasn't all tiny corridors either. Some of the rooms were small to mid size. The level has a lot of bump mapping and I could see some of the dynamic lighting, and you do cast your own shadow that moves with you, though it is a bit off and strange looking. Some of this looked very cool but a lot of it was way too sparkly looking. The overall problem was that there was nothing very interesting to look at.
In the demo you find an assault rifle pretty soon so the melee combat didn't play a big part. In the final game I guess you duke it out to a much greater extent. Can't really comment how good the first person fist o' cuffs is b/c I didn't use it much. Apparently you can string together some combo punches using the left analog stick and I think there is a stealth melee attack. All I know is the demo started w/ me jumping down on some guard and wailing on him. He got a couple of punches in but then he dropped. In the room with the guard there was an assault rifle but it was DNA coded and wouldn't work unless you scanned your DNA into the mainframe. Upon doing that I could use the AR rifle but the entire prison went on alert looking for me with alarms going off etc.
Finally I had a weapon and this is where it got fun. Can't really say how good the AI was but the guards didn't seem that smart but they weren't totally dumb either. What was cool is that they would nade you, so you had to keep an eye out for that. Also you can click the analog stick in to go into stealth mode which I used a lot. The assault rifle didn't have a scope but there were 3 levels of zoom. At first it seemed confusing but it works pretty well. This zoom thing can be used at all times in FP perspective - it's kind of weird and I'm not sure what the explanation is for being able to see wide, mid and close range. The AR rifle zoom isn't a sniper type zoom and doesn't get you in that close but it's like you have telephoto eyesight? Many of the lights are totally destructible so you can immerse yourself in darkness. This was one of the best parts of the demo b/c guards would come into the darkness and you could just make them out and have a fire fight in the near dark. It was alot of fun. If you turned on your weapon's flashlight the guards would certainly spot you.
Towards the end of the demo I had three weapons the assault rifle, a pistol type thing (I think) and a shotgun. To be honest I only used the AR b/c it was so damn satisfying. The AR really was meaty in both sound and action. They did a good job with that. Toward the end some big a$$ bot came out after me and I was able to ride an elevator up to get away from it.
The worst thing in the demo unfortunately was controlling Riddick. He wasn't floaty but he wasn't anywhere near as tight as in Halo. When you got too close to objects it was easy to become disoriented. They do have a sensitivity option for the controller so that probably will have to be tweaked to get it right.
All in all, the demo was fun albeit with some problems. Riddick seems to hold some promise - the AR rifle was truly a blast to use, the lighting is definitely next gen for a console and the fighting in near darkness is great. Until I hear more about the final release version though I can't determine if it's a must buy. Sorry for any typos but I wrote this fast.
It's a FPS but anytime you perform an action you witness it in 3rd person perspective. The protagonist I guess is a guy named Riddick and in 3rd person does look a lot like Vin Diesel (sp?) which if you're a fan of his I imagine is a plus. To me I was simply controlling some bald dude who was shorter then the guy in "Hitman" sans barcode on his noggin. Anyway the premise seems to be you have to escape from some sort of prison. There weren't any prison cells in the demo as far as I could tell but more like rooms you had to get out of - a bunch of the standard crate/cube type environs having doors with red lights (door won't open) or green lit doors (can open). The level design wasn't extraordinary but it wasn't all tiny corridors either. Some of the rooms were small to mid size. The level has a lot of bump mapping and I could see some of the dynamic lighting, and you do cast your own shadow that moves with you, though it is a bit off and strange looking. Some of this looked very cool but a lot of it was way too sparkly looking. The overall problem was that there was nothing very interesting to look at.
In the demo you find an assault rifle pretty soon so the melee combat didn't play a big part. In the final game I guess you duke it out to a much greater extent. Can't really comment how good the first person fist o' cuffs is b/c I didn't use it much. Apparently you can string together some combo punches using the left analog stick and I think there is a stealth melee attack. All I know is the demo started w/ me jumping down on some guard and wailing on him. He got a couple of punches in but then he dropped. In the room with the guard there was an assault rifle but it was DNA coded and wouldn't work unless you scanned your DNA into the mainframe. Upon doing that I could use the AR rifle but the entire prison went on alert looking for me with alarms going off etc.
Finally I had a weapon and this is where it got fun. Can't really say how good the AI was but the guards didn't seem that smart but they weren't totally dumb either. What was cool is that they would nade you, so you had to keep an eye out for that. Also you can click the analog stick in to go into stealth mode which I used a lot. The assault rifle didn't have a scope but there were 3 levels of zoom. At first it seemed confusing but it works pretty well. This zoom thing can be used at all times in FP perspective - it's kind of weird and I'm not sure what the explanation is for being able to see wide, mid and close range. The AR rifle zoom isn't a sniper type zoom and doesn't get you in that close but it's like you have telephoto eyesight? Many of the lights are totally destructible so you can immerse yourself in darkness. This was one of the best parts of the demo b/c guards would come into the darkness and you could just make them out and have a fire fight in the near dark. It was alot of fun. If you turned on your weapon's flashlight the guards would certainly spot you.
Towards the end of the demo I had three weapons the assault rifle, a pistol type thing (I think) and a shotgun. To be honest I only used the AR b/c it was so damn satisfying. The AR really was meaty in both sound and action. They did a good job with that. Toward the end some big a$$ bot came out after me and I was able to ride an elevator up to get away from it.
The worst thing in the demo unfortunately was controlling Riddick. He wasn't floaty but he wasn't anywhere near as tight as in Halo. When you got too close to objects it was easy to become disoriented. They do have a sensitivity option for the controller so that probably will have to be tweaked to get it right.
All in all, the demo was fun albeit with some problems. Riddick seems to hold some promise - the AR rifle was truly a blast to use, the lighting is definitely next gen for a console and the fighting in near darkness is great. Until I hear more about the final release version though I can't determine if it's a must buy. Sorry for any typos but I wrote this fast.