Game review: Chronicles of Riddick 

Source: GamefreaksChronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena

Platform: PC, Xbox 360, PS3
Publisher: Atari

Ever seen the fantastic sci-fi movie Pitch Black? Or it's also-surprisingly-good sequel Chronicles of Riddick?

If not, you probably ought to be reading something else, like maybe Fishing Monthly. Then again, you might just not have gotten around to it yet. Either way, it's high time you gave them a go, at the very least so you can play the Chronicles of Riddick titles without being completely confused - we promise you won't be disappointed with the films, something we can't really promise for the newest Riddick game to be released, Assault on Dark Athena.

It all started out being so very promising. Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay was a thoroughly enjoyable title, developed in part by Vin Diesel's own game studio, Tigon (for you Fishing Monthly fans, Diesel stars as Riddick in both films).

Outlining the events leading up to the films, Butcher Bay was an example of a movie game done right; it looked great, had a fantastic plot and involved a decent variety of first-person action, adventure and stealth gaming.

Five years after the release of Butchers Bay, Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena appears at least at first to offer up more fun and excitement, but more in-depth exploration reveals it's really just more of the same; fairly stock standard FPS gaming.

The story begins as Riddick wakes to find his ship has been swallowed up by a mercenary ship callled the Dark Athena. Naturally, being Riddick, the plot revolves around him working his way through the massive ship, finding out who's in control and killing them all so he can leave again.

He still has his characteristic night vision which helps him out a great deal during the stealth segments of the game, of which there are a decent number.

The variety found in the original is more apparent in Assault on Dark Athena, with a very gracious mix of stealth-action and balls-out killing. The linear gameplay flows fairly smoothly and manages to keep you more or less entertained, however, while the opening few levels are the most enjoyable, with a nice pace which ensures you're kept entertained, unfortunately it doesn't always stay that way.

It's sort of like the developers just ran out of steam; after you've been playing only a few hours, everything gets very dull, with fewer opportunities for stealth, boring level design and some downright stupid AI makes winning combat more like a game of memory than strategy and reflex.

Graphically speaking, Assault on Dark Athena ain't all that. There's some fairly decent model design, but after a while it all gets pretty "samey", especially when you get further through the story and the environments change for the worse.

Thankfully though the voice acting is awesome, albeit fairly strongly worded, which takes what would otherwise be a fairly uninspired FPS and turns it into a pretty OK one.

While it won't take you long to finish the game, the developers saw fit to include a completely reworked version of Escape from Butchers Bay; this looks fantastic and continues to be the better game. There's also multiplayer fun to be had on both Xbox Live and PlayStation Network, with your standard offering of Capture the Flag and Deathmatch options keeping things interesting.

Overall, despite its obvious flaws, Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena is a fairly decent game, way better than most movie/game tie-ins usually are and certainly worth checking out, especially if you're a fan of the movies.

Synopsis: A not so stellar follow-up to a fantastic original, Assault on Dark Athena offers some good gameplay and some fun stealth-action moments; the addition of a refurbished copy of Escape from Butchers Bay makes it well worth the purchase.

This review brought to you by Gamefreaks .