The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena Review

Written by: Darren Cartledge Posted: 12th May 2009

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Riddick gets another chance?

The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena Details:

Goto The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena Game Page

	First Person Shooter
	PC/PlayStation 3/Xbox 360
	Starbreeze Studios
	Atari

15+

Out Now

I’ve never liked the idea of games being remade or re-mastered or whatever. It always seemed like a bit of a con to me, a way to get more of your hard earned cash from you. However, with The Chronicles of Riddick Atari promised a whole new follow-up campaign would come with the remake of 2004’s Escape from Butchers Bay. So now we have The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena.

Both the Escape from Butchers Bay and Assault on Dark Athena campaigns, take place before the events of the two Riddick movies. The Escape from Butchers Bay campaign tasks you with guiding anti-hero Riddick from the maximum security prison. Whilst Assault on Dark Athena follows on directly from where Butchers Bay ends and gives fans more of an insight into the Riddick character.

Escape from Butchers Bay as I’ve already mentioned is nothing more then a re-mastered version of the 2004 PC game. Which if you’re unfamiliar with was a rather good first person shooter that featured elements of stealth action and good old run and gun gameplay. Which was quite unique at the time it was released, the game encouraged players to use stealth and their wits to succeed and proved to be popular with gamers and critics alike. Also unlike many other FPS of the time you had to interact with non-playable characters and undertake side quests that would ultimately help Riddick escape the confines of Butchers Bay.

The Assault on Dark Athena campaign is a direct sequel to the original game and utilises the same mechanics as its predecessor, however despite starting well it does go a little astray towards the end.

Assault on Dark Athena plays pretty much like the original game in the opening sequences featuring large portions of stealth action. However, it soon becomes nothing more then an on rails shooter, which is something the original never was. There is the odd stealth sequence later on and it works for the most part but as you progress through the game the developers move the action to well lit areas, which is strange! As for large portions of it you’re not well armed and still have to survive using what little shadow there is. To be honest though the stealth based gameplay doesn’t really work here, since it takes place in broad daylight.

However Riddick does have a solution to this problem! For large parts of the game the only enemies you’ll have to face are simple drones - a hybrid of dead human flesh and circuit boards designed to serve the mercenaries. These drones have machine guns attached to their arms and in all honesty are pretty dim. Once downed drones can then be picked up by Riddick enabling him to use them as a weapon. The system is a nice addition and serves its purpose. However it is pretty limited in functionality! Other then this Assault on Dark Athena does little to introduce new features, apart from a couple of new weapons the most notable of which is the SCAR gun. The SCAR Gun allows you to fire mines toward enemies and then latch on once they’ve made contact. At which point you can of course detonate said mine and watch enemies blow up. What’s more the gun allows you to deploy up to five mines at once, which can come in useful if you’re up against a formidable enemy or are simply feeling a bit mean.

Both campaigns seem to suffer from the same shortcomings that appeared in the original game. Mainly the difficulty, which is pretty unforgiving due to the fact that the A.I manages to score a direct hit with every shot fired. Not really a problem when you’re against one but put three or four together and you’ve got problems. Both campaigns also require a lot of backtracking, which can be especially frustrating due to the number of load screens you’ll have to endure whilst travelling between areas. Although this seems to be less of a problem in the Dark Athena campaign!

Both campaigns offer a good amount of playing time which is to be expected as you’re more or less getting to games for the price of one here. Escape from Butcher’s Bay should take around 10-12 hours to clear whilst Dark Athena is slightly shorter at around 8 hours to beat.

The games multiplayer is pretty much an old school affair, and shares many similarities with and plays like the Unreal Tournament games, albeit not a very good version. Game types are all pretty much the now standard and include Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch and Capture the Flag. There is a pitch Black mode in which one player assumes the role of Riddick and everyone else has to hunt him down. However, the games multiplayer overall is poor it all feels very dated and I expect most gamers to quickly return to their regular shooter for online play.

Overall the game looks good, graphics from the Butchers Bay haven’t really changed its more of a case that they’ve been cleaned up. Character models and animation are all good and of course the game feature excellent and detailed environments with brilliant lighting effects. The Dark Athena campaign looks better still and with sharper environment and character model. Facial detail is absolutely superb, yet despite this polishing up the videogame still retains the gritty futuristic look that we experienced in the original.

The games audio is also top notch voice acting is all performed well, with Vin Diesel obviously performing the role of anti hero Riddick in the ice cold manner we’ve come to expect. Other voice work is performed by Ron Perlman (Hellboy), Wade Williams (Prison Break) and Michelle Forbes (Star Trek: TNG). The games soundtrack is very fitting, but mostly absent with combat music kicking in when on screen action intensifies. Presumably to help get the adrenaline pumping!

The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena offers a bit of mixed bag, yes its pretty good to get to play through two campaigns but the Dark Athena campaign does little to add to the background of the character. But not only that, it seems Starbreeze decided to ditch the successful formula of the Butchers Bay campaign after a good start and the campaign does seem a little rushed towards the end. Fans of the original maybe a little disappointed with this sequel. However, I thoroughly enjoyed playing from the Butchers Bay game again and it truly has stood the test of time. In the end the overall package is good and definitely worth playing if you missed the game the first time round.