Darksiders Review

by Brian Buckley

Not exactly the game you think it is, but that’s a good thing.

Let’s get one thing out in the open straight away, from looking at the promo videos for Darksiders, you’d be forgiven for thinking that this game is a mindless hack and slash game. But you’d be wrong, o so wrong. What we have in Darksiders is one of the most well rounded gaming experiences I’ve had in a while. There’s just enough of everything, a perfect mix of combat, strategy and puzzles to keep you entertained for quite some time. Just when you are perhaps starting to tire of the battles, a puzzle comes along, and just when you’ve had your fill of the puzzles a tough little battle is probably lurking around the next corner. This game doesn’t allow you to get bored, or to anticipate what’s coming next, it keeps things fresh without diluting the experience or confusing the player.

You play as War, one of the four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, who is wrongly charged with messing up nature’s balance. See, back in the day Heaven and Hell existed, not so much in perfect harmony but in an understanding that if they fought, they’d have to answer to the Four Horsemen. War is summoned to earth to sort out an infringement and subsequently starts fighting both angels and demons (not Dan Brown’s book) in order to restore some peace. This however leads to the demise of humankind and War is charged with causing all this by the Council. A weakened War asks the Council for a chance to redeem himself and prove his innocence or to at least die trying. Having nothing to lose the Council sends him on his way, and so our journey begins.

Starting out the game as one of the most feared creatures in the universe is something special, while War is far from at he’s physical peak, he certainly demands respect. While you won’t get this from the standard enemies as they mindlessly run towards you, any of the more powerful foes will certainly show you respect, before, of course, trying to kill you. While War is certainly underpowered, you do get a sense of his abilities at the start when you can just instant kill some undead type enemies, with a satisfying head crush or slamming their body onto the ground. The instant kill is a feature that lasts throughout; wounding an enemy sufficiently enough will prompt you with a “B” above their head, so you can do some crazy finish moves. There seems to at least 2 of these finish animations per enemy type so the finishing never gets stale. And just to put your mind at ease, these button prompts are not in the line of Quick Time Events.

But while the enemies are relatively easy to begin with, you will encounter the odd rascal that will give you a headache. Underlining the fact that, while you are the most feared War, you are still pretty vulnerable at the moment, so don’t lose the run of yourself.

As you progress through the story, you have the chance to unlock and upgrade weapons and abilities, helping you customise the kind of the game you wish to play. You also get to scrounge around dungeons for chests, that will either give you health, currency or special abilities. A lot of these are never too far off the beaten track, and sometimes you will find a map detailing the locations of all the loot, to make your searching a little easier.

As I mentioned earlier, Darksiders strikes the perfect balance and you never get bored. The puzzles are varied enough and on such a scale as to allow you explore the area in order to find out what you have to do. You don’t get any striking visual clues, like Drake in Uncharted, but surveying the area lets you know what has to be done; now all you’ve got to do is figure out how to do it. The one thing I liked was the level of detail in these puzzles, not so much the complexity, but the fact that they existed on so many levels. I guess around 3 hours in you enter the Twilight Cathedral, here the main puzzle involved doing a dozen or so mini puzzles so everything will fall into place. The area is well designed and keeps you exploring, and throws the odd hostile or mini boss your way to keep you on your toes. It’s like a level within a level within a level. It can feel overwhelming at first, but keep your head and the satisfaction is immense.

So, I love the combat and I love the puzzles, but do you know what else rocks in this game, the bosses. Darksiders has real bosses, bosses that take you ten or fifteen minutes to kill, where you struggle to keep your concentration, making sure you don’t get hit (because War’s health isn’t regenerative) where you tense up every time you have to get close enough to the boss to inflict damage, all the while making sure you can make a quick getaway when needed. This is proper by the seat of your pants action. I miss that in games, but it makes me appreciate it so much more when I get to experience it again.

For me, I’d recommend this game to everyone, FPS and RPG fans alike. It has plenty here to keep you entertained for a long while, with constantly changing objectives to ensure it never feels old.

Darksiders is a must purchase.