The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena Comments by Dan Whitehead

Definitely going to put off buying this.

I'll get it on PC when it's cheap.

Why hide the review down here?
I almost missed it.

I don't like games with celebrities in it so i totaly won't buy this.

Still a day one purchase for me, butcher bay alone is still better than 90% of the games I've played this gen.

Missed Butcher Bay the first time around so will definetly pick this up. (Not like there's much else around at the moment.)

A fair-enough review, shame you didn't have the balls to rate Killzone appropriately too my friend.

"The multiplayer feels as though it was included through obligation rather than inspiration, and contributes little of value."

And all too common blunder. I wonder, would the Dark Athena content have been more modern in its scope if the developers didn't bother with multiplayer? Development time has to be spent wisely, or else we end up with poor efforts like this and Resident Evil 5.

When will developers learn that multiplayer can and already has been taken care of in the likes of Call of Duty and such? There really is no need to add a function when your game is better known for its single player offering. I do dearly hope the developers of the good, but overrated, Bio-Shock do not give into the utter idiots whom demand multiplayer for every game released under the sun whilst developing Bio-Shock 2.

Caveat this!

It makes no sense but it is an action-movie-style game so making sense is optional. I'll grab it on PC.

Hmmm, guessed as much from the demo.

In saying that, I got Res 5 for my birthday, and while certainly flawed it's providing great entertainment. This could be a decent bargain-bin pick-up.

didnt mind the demo

loved the first game

couldnt careless about multiplayer

i'm in!!

well colour me conflicted! - Loved butcher bay (mainly the stealth, adventuring, clever regenerating health and it's greatest element - it's pacing and swapping between gamestyles before they outlive their welcome) and The Darkness was probably my game of the year last year, but this just seems.... ..lacking.

will probably still buy, but for a game I was looking forward to more than most and was probably going to buy day one - it's turned into an afterthought I may get when a tad cheaper. How did that happen!?

Multiplayer isn't just a feature, it's a customer retention tool.

Publishers feel that features like multiplayer encourage people to buy their own copy of the game, and hold on to the copy they've bought, rather than just lending it to friends or selling it on second hand.

I don;t know if they're right, but these half-baked multiplayer options aren't likely to go away.

"Perhaps the most grievous problems are the generally poor signposting of objectives"

"The static map is all but useless and with no indicators to point you in the right direction it's easy to end up going round in circles or pixel-hunting around the same areas looking for some ledge, vent or pass-key needed to progress"

Let's speak clearly, what you are asking for here is for any usable items to glow, and an arrow to direct you to them as needed to advance. Like most games do nowadays. But really, I think you are supposed to find any ledge or passkey and the right direction for yourself as part of the challenge. It's not a "clunky design decision" only "acceptable in the early days of the evolution of console first-person shooters".

I don't remember ever being stuck in one place for more than a minute in the original Butcher's Bay. "Adventure elements" were slight at best. So do we actually want them or not?

How can you say all this and then miss those same "adventure elements" in Dark Athena?

Reading reviews like this makes me glad I'm not a game designer.

"I don't like games with celebrities in it so i totaly won't buy this."

lol, think again.
You wont see riddick(vin) as a celebriti, but as a videogame character after playing this (well, butchers bay atleast)

@Crofto

I agree with everything except RE5 being a poor effort. RE5 might be GOTY for me.

Im not buying this as the multiplayer is poor as predicted and the best part is a game ive already completed 2 times.

Escape from Butcher Bay is very good though.

Still more forward thinking than most FPS games, even now. Complaints about it being aged in that regard are absolutely moot.

Has the original game been updated in any way, shape or form? I am specifically talking about the PC version.

"I don;t know if they're right, but these half-baked multiplayer options aren't likely to go away. "

If we all stop buying games with tacked on half baked multiplayer we will get rid of the shit. Im doing my part as i wont buy this even if im tempted to play escape from Butcher Bay on my 360.

I am going to get this at some point over the next couple of month, just as soon as iv finished stack of games iv got on the go,i never played butchers bay so i an looking forward to getting stuck into it.

It wouldn't be an EG review without Crofto spouting absolute bollocks in the comments section! I salute your consistent pseudo-pretentious bullshit.

Was looking forward to this game, but after finding the demo very dull and reading about the ridiculous achievements for the shoe-horned multiplayer I went off the idea of buying it. This and other reviews just confirms my apathy towards the game.

Having not played this on Xbox it's an insta-purchase for me. Well, I'm getting it for a birthday pressie, so it's win all round.

From the demo I'd say it does look dated, however, and I'm not sure why Digital Foundry wanted to heap praise upon the presentation, but what the hey.

@Crofto - I agree with most of what you wrote but I think calling this game and Resident Evil 5 "poor efforts" is a tad harsh and unfair.

I'm picking this game up for the PC as it's only £18 at Amazon. I have the PC version of Butcher Bay still and it remains an excellent game but I'm happy to buy the game again for the Dark Athena content (I'm definitely not interested whatsoever in the multiplayer modes though!).

Anyone know if the PC version fares any better? There's no way I'd buy it for a console, which renders a fair chunk of this review irrelevant to me.

Can be played at eleventybillionXeleventybillionand1 and has k&M control.

RESULT

"Yeah, a big gamer with pretty strong but informed views on gaming, which often leads to me looking down on most gaming reviewers since they talk complete nonsense. I know what makes a good game, and what makes a bad game... I've been wasting my free time playing the bloody things long enough to tell the difference (unlike most gamers out there).

You'll not often find me lavishing unfounded praise upon the likes of Grand Theft Auto or Gears of War, but rather on actual high quality games such as Okami and Super Mario Galaxy, which really are examples of excellent and polished gaming design."

by Crofto.

---

Never gets old!

I'm totally digging the Simon & Garfunkel tagline too.

"The Chronicles of Riddick, in particular, was a fairly embarrassing flop, losing a lot of money for Universal and pretty much putting an end to the Riddick saga. Well, on the cinematic front at least."

Not strictly true anymore - I think Vin came out as saying that the third in the trilogy is on its way despite the second flopping.

YEAH. YEAH.

Your chips. My piss.

/lies down

I think its probably worth a purchase for half the price...certainly not 40 quid or whatever its generally selling for...

Haha, I read Croftos profile every time I see him sprout his trying-so-hard-to-be-intellectual bullshit! I never did play this game. May have to pick it up at some point. I know it is supposed to be handled well but first person melee usually bugs the shit out of me!

Cannot wait! I know this will be AWESOME for me!

Not long EFBB, I'll have you again soon my pretty. Bastard MS and their BC LIES!

Chronicles of Riddick actually made Universal a profit, when DVD/TV sales and such are factored in. Not enough to warrant another budget splurge like the second movie, but enough for them to consider bankrolling another modestly budgeted Riddick film, I imagine.

I spend a lot of my time defending this film in various threads. Someone has to.


Someone has to.

Yeah, work has just begun on the new film. Diesel & Twohy mention it on the new Blu Ray.

I'd buy this if it was just a straight remake of Butcher Bay, it's one of my favourite games ever.

Loved it first time round on the xbox, the pc remix was also great but I aint touching this until Atari release a revocation tool for the Tages shit the pc version is wrapped in.

I'd picked up this game on the PC if it didn't have the limited activation DRM - only 3 installs, non revocable.

I love the original on the PC, but not enough to put up with those sort of restrictions - if the original game had the same DRM system I'd have run out of activations by now, because I've played it on every PC I've built since the game came out.

Oh and there won't be a revocation tool. Tages state on their website that they will never offer a way to revoke an install.

Pity that the article didn't mention game crashing bugs of xbox version of this game. I mean, seriously. Game crashing bugs. On a console. That is supposedly easy to code for. I don't know about pc version, but I'll say that you can expect your fair share of crashes there also.

I didn't know about 3 activation limit bs for pc version though. So basically, on pc you'll get a buggy mess which isn't even a purchase, but a lease.

As wow kids would say, lolz to anyone who falls for adds and buys this thing.

Sometimes I like a fairly stupid, shooty game. That's what this and Blood On The Sand are for.

Not strictly true anymore - I think Vin came out as saying that the third in the trilogy is on its way despite the second flopping.

He says that every time he has a new movie to promote though. There's still no script, no studio and no greenlight. Don't get me wrong, I really like the second Riddick movie - it has a Dune-esque earnestness that makes the dafter Buck Rogers moments all the more fun - but the only way the series continues is if another studio stumps up a smaller budget. Could happen, but right now it isn't.

Chronicles of Riddick actually made Universal a profit, when DVD/TV sales and such are factored in. Not enough to warrant another budget splurge like the second movie, but enough for them to consider bankrolling another modestly budgeted Riddick film, I imagine.

Most movies make a profit once DVD and ancilliary sales are taken into account - especially nerd-bait SF movies - but that hardly suggests that it's worth putting any money toward a theatrical sequel. Riddick didn't even make half its budget back, and when you consider that the studio generally gets around half of the box office total, that means they paid out over $100m and got back around a quarter of that in US receipts.

In Hollywood it's all about the domestic box office. If you don't break even there, the movie's a flop regardless of whether it ends up scraping into the black five years later. Universal got burned on Serenity as well as Riddick, so I doubt they'd rush down that road again.

Game crashing bugs?

SOOOO-PER Iron Giant reference :)

Loved BB on the xbox but wasn't that that taken with the new demo. Still a return to BB may be worth the asking price.

This is looking like a budget buy for me, unless the user reviews tell a different story. Which they so often do these days. This isn't the EG of 5 years ago.

"I spend a lot of my time defending this film in various threads. Someone has to."

I'm with you amigo - I really enjoyed the second film, settings, characters and everything. Bring a third on!

Loved Butcher Bay, a lot. But the demo of DA left me utterly bored and got deleted after not even one complete playthrough. Shame.

"Yeah, a big gamer with pretty strong but informed views on gaming, which often leads to me looking down on most gaming reviewers since they talk complete nonsense. I know what makes a good game, and what makes a bad game... I've been wasting my free time playing the bloody things long enough to tell the difference (unlike most gamers out there).

You'll not often find me lavishing unfounded praise upon the likes of Grand Theft Auto or Gears of War, but rather on actual high quality games such as Okami and Super Mario Galaxy, which really are examples of excellent and polished gaming design."

Outstanding as always. Never get tired of reading this.

@DanWhitehead

The first draft of the new Riddick script is supposed to be near enough finished, and both Vin Diesel and David Twohy have said they hope to have the film in production by the end of this year.

Good game sales will likely attract a studio, if they don't already have one.

disappointed, had high hopes for this. Only remember getting lost once in the original where I didn't see some moths I was supposed to catch. Spent ages pacing around a prison yard looking for the damn moths... then when I found it I had to find the right button to pick them up...:S

The original felt like it was made by game developers that had time to put details and extra stuff into it, loved the info on how things were planned and how they turned out ingame. Why they didn't evolve this in Athena is beyond me...

"Sometimes I like a fairly stupid, shooty game. That's what this and Blood On The Sand are for. "

Fair enough, but the thing is that butcher bay is far from a just a shooty game, it was thoughtful, with some of the best environment and atmosphere ever. The delight and satisfaction on sneaking up on a guard almost "predator" like, exploring the story behind each area and the excellent npc interaction.

Hell I even played through the game with the developer commentary speech bubbles dotted around the game to gain insights into the genius of butcher bay. Including that 40 minute conversation about how they replicated the sound of someone with diarrhea using marbles and a bowl of water (i think).

Its a shame that they chose a different route here with the new chapter. Im not saying that this is a bad game but In retrospect i think that that starbreeze, through listening to the reasoning to their design decisions throughout butcher bay, never really had a firm grasp on what made their first game so great, thus the slightly dissapointing darkness.

1000 online wins for a trophy... seriously crazy....I'm really getting sick of some of these near impossible trophies (Wipeout Im looking at you!)... yes i want a challenge and i want to have to spend alittle time getting them, but spending 6 months or longer of my life to get them is NOT fun...you hear that game developers!!!

Riddick also has some of the best head-body view immersion. Like it really feels like you're rotating a head on a body, and the body twists as you reach the extremeties.

And there's a glorious moment towards the beginning of Butcher Bay, where you're sneaking around the medic area in the prison, and you'er hiding behind a box while a guard comes through the door infront of you, unaware. While you're waiting for him, you realise that there is a perfect shadow silhouette of yourself crouching in anticipation, and the silhouette of the guard approaching, and when you go in for the kill, its this really grand execution playing out in plain black and white silence.

Crofto: A fair-enough review, shame you didn't have the balls to rate Killzone appropriately too my friend.

I could not agree more.