Chronicles of Riddick for Xbox | reviews, previews, cheats, walkthroughs, FAQs, downloads and videos!

Chronicles Of Riddick review: I have to admit that I have a weak spot for atmosphere. Movies, games, whatever - my favorites are those that suck you in so completely that you forget life is going on around you. There are some games that are so involving that you get lost in them, and at the end of the day the sun’s gone down, you haven’t bothered to turn the light on, and you’re in the dark. You get tunnel vision on the TV screen, and as far as you’re concerned, that’s all there is to the world. Naturally, this works best with the darkest and grittiest games. To give examples, I’d have to say, think of Doom. Think of Quake. Half-Life. Red Faction. Halo. All these are FPS games that were so fully realized that you could suspend your disbelief and feel the atmosphere surround you. Well, the Xbox has been blessed with another such title: The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay.For those of you who didn’t know, The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay is a prequel of sorts to the sci-fi thriller film Pitch Black. The new theatrical release of The Chronicles of Riddick will round off the series, at least for the time being (I have heard of such a thing as Pitch Black 2). In any case, this game will put you in the shoes of Richard B. Riddick, a nasty space-murderer with a vague past, a survivalist attitude, a gruff voice and a dry sense of humor. Just as in the movies, the character of Riddick is played by Vin Diesel, who lends his voice and appearance to the game, and who founded Tigon Studios, which helped produce it. Chronicles tells a segment of Riddick’s story, well after he has done whatever he did that got him into all the trouble he’s in. The game covers his incarceration in and break from the galaxy’s toughest prison. It ties in brilliantly with Pitch Black and lays light groundwork for some of the revelations to be delivered in the new movie. The storyline aspect of the game itself is well-written, well-acted and quite involving. The directing of the cutscenes, combined with good voice acting and outstanding graphics, add up to a very cinematic gaming experience that could easily stand shoulder to shoulder with the movies that inspired it, as was intended - a rare feat indeed.At first glance, or if you played the demo, you would probably consider Riddick to be another first person shooter, albeit a pretty promising one. And, while the game is played entirely from a first person perspective (with the occasional cutscene or action deviation), parts of it are little more than that - a first person shooter. However, much of the game very successfully sets itself apart from the genre. Riddick successfully blends elements of many different types of games. To garnish the aforementioned FPS engine, there is a surprisingly well executed and enjoyable melee combat system, which involves bludgeoning, slashing and fist-fighting your enemies using the right analog stick to guide your attacks, as well as an assortment of stealth kills. The melee fighting is what truly sets the game apart as far as shooters go, and the developers seemed to recognize this; there are hours of gameplay in which guns are unattainable, as the guards’ weapons are DNA encoded and will shock you if you touch them. No worries, though - the melee combat works beautifully. As this is a first person game, your point of view will react appropriately to blows from enemies - you will stagger backwards, throw your arms up, go down on your knees, etc. There’s also a disarm/counterattack option available if you can time a button press correctly. Sticking a guard’s gun into his own chin is pretty satisfying. Stealth kills, while basic, are also entertaining. Primarily, you can break someone’s neck or shank them, but in a few cases, Riddick will utilize the environment to finish a guard off, perhaps shoving him into a rock grinder or dropping on him from a high ledge. In every case, the first person perspective is fully realized - you will often see Riddick’s legs and arms come into the screen as he moves.Then the guns come in, even though it isn’t that common. In the course of TCoR, you will find yourself equipped with many different shivs, clubs, and knuckle bars, but from time to time you can get your hand on one of the guards’ weapons. The selection for these weapons is not especially extensive, consisting only of a shotgun, assault rifle, pistol and eventually a mini-gun, further suggesting that the developers intended for players to look deeper in the game than gunfights. For what it’s worth, anyway, the guns are well done and enjoyable to use. They look and sound great, and are very useful - if nothing else, you can always shoot the lights out, switch on Riddick’s nightvision and pull the shiv back out. However, gunfights in the game are genuinely exciting, even if they are simple, and allow for several levels of strategy - attack directly or dart from shadow to shadow, so that the guards can’t follow your movement, and listen to them panic.Finally, the RPG elements. Drawing from games like Morrowind, KOTOR, Deus Ex and more, there are segments of Riddick where you are simply meandering about, plotting your escape, and doing favors for other inmates (no, not like that, this isn’t Oz) in order to enlist their help or earn their advice. These favors vary from following someone to a stash to killing someone to delivering a mafioso style warning from a loan shark. In one area, you have to challenge other inmates, and eventually a guard, to fights-to-the-death to earn the attention of a certain prison employee. The alternative there is to return a drug pusher’s equipment to him and catch him a few moths so he can make his dope. Yeah, moths... but hey - it’s a different galaxy. These sequences of the game break up the pacing and really flesh out the feeling of being in Riddick’s quest, and are probably the strongest deviation from stock FPS gameplay. Technically the game is beautiful. It possesses what could very well be the best graphics to date on a console, and is effectively the first game in the new generation to more effectively utilize the resources of the Xbox, to be followed by games like Call of Duty, FarCry, Doom 3, Brothers in Arms, Half Life 2 and Halo 2, all of which due this year. Developers are realizing that they can make console games just about as advanced as PC games, graphically speaking, and Riddick showcases that discovery as the first of this latest generation of games to be console-specific. Because of the story and the nature of the character, the single most important variable in the game is light, so the lighting system had to come off perfectly. Luckily, it did. Shadows dance, light sources swing, and the detail of environments and character models shows beautifully. Even the menu interface looks awesome. Control is effective and tight, there are few bugs, framerate stays consistent and I never felt frustrated with the game. Level design is decent - the game environments reminded me more of Red Faction than anything else, with a few Half Life moments in it. Granted, the entirety of it is confined to a prison; that being said, you’ll move through mines, sewers, guard housing, power works, max security lockups, double max lockups, and some kind of crazy futuristic cryo-thing you’ll just have to see for yourself. The game diversifies itself as best as it can within the confines set for it by its story premise. That is to say, you’re not going to see jungles or beaches or bright blue skies or anything like that - you are in a prison, most of which is deep underground, located on a desolate planet with very little life. But you won’t get bored of it, either.However, as in all things, there is some bad with the good. Luckily, in Riddick, the bad isn’t all that bad, and is pretty insignificant. Primarily my gripe would be that the game didn’t last long enough. I’m not sure if I managed to stretch it out to ten hours, but that’s the max, I’d say. There’s no multiplayer (which, contrary to popular belief, I don’t think should be a requirement of all games, so I don’t care), and since the game is relatively short, there’s very little replay value. It does seem like one of those that you just get in the mood for from time to time, at least, so it has that going for it, but little else as far as replay goes. Also, there are a few times when the resolution just goes to pot suddenly - usually in cutscenes. It’s not a serious problem, but you’ll notice it occasionally. See what I mean? The good definitely outweighs the bad.Unbelievable graphics, great sound, great pacing, plot and action. Cinematic gaming at its finest. Definitely demands a rental, if nothing else. Probably more than one rental if there’s nothing better to play. Well, that may not be true - it doesn’t seem like there is going to be a dry spell for good games any time in the next year, so there will always be something new to play, but this one is not to be passed up, just the same.

Chronicles Of Riddick for Xbox, rating: 92%