The Darkness 2 is a first person shooter developed by Digital Extremes. This is not the team that was responsible for the first Darkness, and with the new team comes a completely new art style. Does Digital Extremes do right by the original Darkness or do they leave Jackie in the dark?
While it is a new team making The Darkness 2 it would mainly be a different team either way as most of the minds behind The Darkness have left Starbreeze. Digital Extremes does a good job following up the original Darkness with a revamped art-style, new executions and weapons. I will start by explaining a bit about the story behind Jackie and the Darkness.
The Darkness is something that runs in Jackie’s family and was given to him when he turned 21. Things quickly went bad for, the then hit man. The Darkness takes over Jackie and leads to his girlfriend, Jenny dying. Flash-forward two years, Jackie is the head of the Estacado mob family and has managed to suppress The Darkness these two years. That is until he is attacked from an unknown group. To survive Jackie must use The Darkness and this leads him on a path to find who tried to kill him.
Things twist and turn along the road, with Jackie waking up in what seems to be an insane asylum, and him losing another loved one. Throughout the quest to find the ones who tried to hit him Jackie goes from places like a pool hall, warehouses, and cemeteries. All of this places look great with the new cell shading (I’m sure that’s not what they call it in house) comic-book art style and lights placed at the most in opportune places. While the art-style has changed the voice cast is back in full force with Mike Patton reprising his role as The Darkness and doing a fantastic job at it.
In order for Jackie to use The Darkness and its powers he must get rid of any and all light sources or he will lose The Darkness and become weak. You find out a bit into the game that you are not the only one who knows about The Darkness and from then on these enemies will use light to their advantage. This means coming equipped with giant flashlights, or throwing light grenades. I have to say that those enemies are the most annoying enemies from recent memory.
This is to the benefit to the game because they do what they should do, suppress The Darkness in Jackie. The enemies who shine you with giant flashlights, and I do mean giant, are never alone, and you are left back pedaling you get to some dark to take potshots at the lights. The majority of lights in the game can be easily shot and they are done, while some are bullet-proof and you must take out the generator to take out the light.
Overall the entire single player experience took me just over six hours to complete. Now you are probably saying “That crazy I paid $60 and I want more than six hours.” I thought the length of the story was perfect, the pacing was great and Digital Extremes did what they needed to do when it comes to the story. Many games suffer from not ending when they should have or even ending too early, if this were the situation with The Darkness 2 I could totally understand your argument but this isn’t so.
If you do want some more Darkness power wielding fun there is a co-op mode called “Vendettas” where you play a side story as people who are graced with certain darkness powers but not the full darkness abilities that Jackie has. This story runs concurrent with the events of The Darkness 2, and you will see characters from the main story appear in this co-op mode. This can be played with four people either locally or online.
Also there is plenty of reason to go back and replay the story mode. Once you beat the game on any difficulty you unlock “New Game+” which allows you to keep progress on your talent tree which grants Jackie the different darkness powers as well increases their power and the power of his own guns. IF you like collectibles there are 29 relics scatted throughout the game that when collected with help you complete Jackie’s talent tree.
Overall The Darkness 2 is a short and sweet experience with plenty of things to do once you complete the story mode. The Darkness 2 is more linear than the first Darkness and it benefits from that with greater detail able to be put in to everything. Also the comic book art-style fits the action of the darkness more than the art-style in the original Darkness. I suggest if you remotely enjoyed The Darkness to pick up the second one, and if you didn’t play the first Darkness (and that is highly possible) give its sequel a chance, because it is an experience that is great from start to finish.
Comments