Back in 2007, I played the Darkness from Starbreeze. I really liked the game, although it did have it’s problems. Now, we have Darkness 2; which is from Digital Extremes. Darkness 2 picks up basically where the player left off in the first game. Except that, rather than a hitman, Jackie is now the head of the crime family. There are certainly some marked differences between the first and second games; but not as many as you would expect with a new studio and a span of 5 years separating the two games.
One of the most noticeable differences between the first and second game. Is the cell shaded style the second game has adopted. Digital Extremes has said that they used the cell shading to portray the connection that game has with the source material, that being comics. But I’m not entirely sure that it was used to good effect in this game. It’s not that the game doesn’t look great. The game looks SO GOOD that there are too many places where the cell shading just seems to interfere with the periphery details both in the characters and in the surroundings. Most of the time these inconsistencies are completely invisible. In fact, I would have to say that in most cases the cell shading doesn’t effect anything at all. It’s just here and there where things just look, wrong. The game is graphically amazing and certainly looks better than the first, but that may also be a symptom of the first game being 5 years ago.
Digital Extremes also decided to change the pacing and general design of the Darkness in Darkness 2. This game is a down the corridor FPS, not an FPS with open world elements as the first one was. There is a subway, there is a television and there are even some quiet moments with Jenny. But all of these are more tributes to the first game than anything playing into something substantial in this one. I did like all these references but some of the moments seemed a little forced. They appeared to be in there not to serve the game; but to say to fans, “Here! Come look at this.”
The gameplay is extremely tight. Using two weapons and your darkness tentacles is extremely satisfying and by the end you will be using your Darkness powers and guns all most unconsciously. The actual gameplay is incredibly satisfying. The overall design however, is pretty boring. I really liked some of the areas in the game. But I don’t want to see anymore abandoned junkyards or buildings in a Darkness game. They are annoying, boring, and far too trite. There are some great moments in the Darkness 2 that really stand out. Everything from a Haunted House to a sequence where you take direct control over a darkling. These pieces seem to be far too few and far between. In fact, the last half the of the game seemed the best part of the entire game. I would have been happy to give up the mansion entirely if there was more in the beginning half like there was in the end half.
Overall, I was pretty happy with the short primary campaign. With two endings a new game plus to explore. It’s not totally unreasonable to have your game’s primary campaign clock in at around 5-7 hours. Throughout the campaign, Jackie levels up and you work to fill in a talent tree. Each part of the talent tree informs how you play the game. Or vice versa, depending on how you want to do it. This plays into new game plus I’m sure. The second ending no matter which you pick the first time, is pretty hard to figure out; so that alone could be enough to play through again.
There is also a co-op campaign called, “Vendettas.” That tells the story either solo or with 4 people. Each person takes on the role of one of 4 different characters with four different darkness based weapons and one darkness power. This was pretty interesting, but I would have really like more in the way differentiation from one character to the next and I would have also liked to see something of a little bit better quality with that secondary campaign. It kind of reminded me of a MMO shooter rather than a fleshed out game that I just played for around 7 hours. I will say that playing Solo in the Vendettas will remind the player more of the end of the single player campaign right off the bat. In the way that the game throws a lot of enemies at you all at once, practically right away. The main Vendetta campaign is around 2-4 hours long depending on the difficulty. The Hit Lists which are individual character specific missions are even shorter. So the entire game with this included will probably take you around 10-13 hours maximum.
All of my criticisms should be taken in the context of the fact that I played all the way through the Darkness 2 in a single sitting; because I couldn’t stop playing it. This ran around 6-8 hours which I practically never do. The game is a lot of fun. But it isn’t great, its just good. That’s why I’m giving it a 7.8/10.
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