Joanna Dark’s Raw Deal
I have to say it — the reviewers and fans must all be insane. Almost everything I’ve heard about Perfect Dark Zero has been refuted by the experience of actually playing it.
- The storyline, often lambasted, is a fun, campy scifi spy story that has been influenced more than a little bit by the television show, “Alias” — look at how Joanna’s dressed, how she has an HQ operative giving her instructions over an ear piece, or how similar her relationship with her father Jack Dark is to Sydney Bristow’s relationship with her father, Jack Bristow. It’s a camp send-up of “Alias.”
- The graphics, which fans have been bashing since day one, look phenomenal on my HDTV set — maybe they don’t translate to standard definition, but I think they look amazing.
- The AI, said to be dumb, seems pretty smart on medium difficulty — it frequently flanks, takes cover, and does all the things Halo’s AI is often praised for.
- The weapons feel great (the assault rifles feel a lot better and are more fun to shoot than Halo 2’s sluggish assault rifle), the impact of the shotgun in particular is very satisfying — even the pistols are fun to shoot.
- The music is exactly what one would expect from a British-developed spy story — and I like the mix of dance music on some levels.
- The online play definitely offers the best multiplayer FPS experience on the 360 currently (although I found the demo of Quake 4 to be slightly better and the matchmaking setup more to my liking, there’s hardly anyone playing that game).
Now, there are some issues with the game:
- You can’t jump — although you can roll, the fact that your feet are glued to the ground is a serious problem; I feel like Joanna is physically handicapped and jumping is standard in all but the most sim-oriented shooters.
- The stealth elements aren’t implemented very well — on the first mission you’re asked to sneak, but unlike Splinter Cell, you’re always spotted, even in shadow.
- The in-game physics find that the death animations for your enemy are a little slow — people taken out by a shotgun blast, for instance, fly backwards, albeit in extremely slow motion.
The only reason I can think of for the incredible amount of negativity directed at a game which is, I think, the XBOX 360’s current HD killer app, is that the lead character is female. The legions of young men who have the XBOX 360 are uncomfortable playing a first person shooter whose protagonist is a woman — they’d much prefer a man’s man like Master Chief or Sam Fisher. But, being that they’re at least partially acclimated to modern times, they don’t want to admit it, so they make up superfluous criticisms of the game’s mechanics. No, this isn’t Halo 2, but it’s still a damn good game.
