The forthcoming latest in the Chronicles of Riddick series, Assault on Dark Athena (coming to PC, Xbox 360 and PS3 form Atari), has an old Quake feel about it.
Here's the trailer:
The package is essentially two games in one - a remake and graphical upgrade of the excellent original 2004 Butcher Bay and the new Dark Athena story.
I've been enjoying the demo that you can find on Xbox Live (around 600 MB) which takes about 15 minutes to run through, and left me craving more.
You play as criminal prisoner Riddick aboard Dark Athena, a mercenary vessel which hijacks Riddick's ship and he has to try to escape.
Taking on a mindless drone army controlled by ruthless Captain Reva, you start off freeing the prisoners subjugated by Reva. The pirate ship is converting humans into drones and Riddick uses all available resources like stimpacks and nanomed facilities to stay in top shape along with a variety of stealth and outright confrontational means to dispatch his foes.
Fighting initially with his somewhat menacing and wicked looking knives (Ulaks), Riddick uses brutal grappling techniques and soon acquires some heavier artillery such as the assault rifle, shotgun and submachine guns to help him on his way.
Stealth and brutal combat are the name of the game as Riddick creeps up on his opponents showing no mercy and complete savagery as the Pitch Black instincts come through.
The new 'expansion' includes a re-worked version of the original Chronicles of Riddick game and has multiplayer, which will be most welcome. Some of the game modes look enticing such as 'Pitch Black' where you hunt Riddick in a four man team and other multiplayer modes such as capture the flag and deathmatch with the most savage weaponry the future can provide.
The Chronicles of Riddick game followed the original 2004 movie and Pitch Black, starring Vin Diesel as Riddick. I'm not sure Vin Diesel's upcoming latest movie version of The Fast and Furious is going to rock (isn't it time to retire that franchise?) but his new game studio Tigon is involved in the Riddick games title and looks like it'll bring him new cred.
Expect this dark shooter out end of April.
- Mad Gamer
Visa and Mastercard push back.