Dark Void – The MMOMFG Preview

Dark Void

After a quick download off of the Xbox Live Marketplace, I settled down onto my couch for what I thought was going to be a few enjoyable minutes of flying around, blasting aliens, and jacking their spaceships in Capcom’s latest demo, Dark Void.

Below are a few key impressions I took away after delving into the demo’s content:

Location Location Location – Your character starts off in a small hangar, attempting to repair what looks like an airplane, and while the object/character models look decent, I found the over all presentation to be very dark with most of the colors washed out. I though it was pretty funny that when Will, the main character, tosses his wrench over into a corner, it hits a jetpack he seemingly didn’t notice before. I’m not sure, but a jetpack the size of a large man’s torso just hanging on a rack next to me would probably get my attention quickly.

Walkie Talkie – The speech in the game was pretty unoriginal, as I could practically guess what was going to come out of each person’s mouth word for word. The controls were also hit or miss. I did, however find that combat was enjoyable on the ground, but the aerial combat was a pain, in my opinion. The steering was your typical inverted, simulator layout, but the boost/takeoff button and hover button, while they would be comfortable on the shoulder buttons, were actually on the Y and A buttons, respectively.

My Thumby Hurts - In a game where you need to steer the camera and control barrel rolls, you shouldn’t need to take your thumb off the control stick to boost out of danger. There were times where I just wanted to rocket out of an indoor area, and when going to hit Y to takeoff, it inadvertently rocketed my character into a wall, killing him. Another button I found tricky to use was the B button, which is used to hijack other aircraft. I found myself scrambling to barrel roll to miss an attacker and also pound on the B button to grab him on his way past, but to no avail.

While just a demo, I was kind of disappointed in both storyline and ease of use. Overall, I think there will be many gamers out there that can get adjusted to it very quickly and will find a knockout game underneath it all. I would say to the jetpack masses out there, though; make sure you can adjust to the controls by checking out the demo first.

Dark Void (DS, PC, PS3, Xbox 360) hits your local retailer’s shelves next Tuesday, January 19^th. Visit www.darkvoidgame.com for more info.

*Dark Void was demoed on the Xbox 360 console

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