• January 3
• PC
• Time played: 58 minutes

This one took me by surprise. It wasn't that I had forgotten that I had The Darkness II, it was just that I didn't know how to feel about drawing it. I played the first one a long time ago. (Holy crap! I just looked it up and it was 9 years ago). Back when I was teaching I had a student that would come into class with a DS and play Pokémon. One day I started talking video games with him, and every day after that he would come into class early and want to talk about video game. His favorite topic was telling me that I should play The Darkness. I had absolutely no interest in the game, but I got so sick of hearing about it that I decided to buy a copy, beat it as quickly as possible, and trade it in. (The moral of the story is to never talk to your students about video games.) I remember enjoying it, but not exactly liking it. It was one of those games that you say "yeah, it was fun, but I don't think I need another one." So, of course I bought the sequel.

Playing The Darkness II last night, I remembered some of the reasons I enjoyed playing the first one. It has some dumb shooter action - no worrying about cover or being good at FPS. I really like the art in The Darkness II; although, I don't remember the first one being so stylized. Finally, the story isn't good, per say, but has an over-the-top b-movie quality that keeps me interested. With all the positives out of the way, I have to say I had a hard time getting past the gore. I, also, don't remember the first one being so gory, although I'm sure that it wouldn't have bothered me 9 years ago. Gore is definitely one of those things that I get more sensitive to as I get older. Shit, when I was 16 I use to drive 2 hours to a little kiosk at the King of Prussia mall to get VHS tapes of Japanese death matches. Today that stuff turns my stomach; frankly it's disgusting. In the Darkness II the problem is that the gore isn't just there, it is put in front of your face. I can usually deal with a game that has gore as an aesthetic where it lingers in background, but in a game like The Darkness you grab an enemy, he is drawn right in front of the camera, and is torn in half. It's a bit much. I wish the game had an option to turn down or off gore.

Even after my rant about gore I'm torn about what to do with The Darkness II. I guess this is where I should put my little statement about what I do here: For each game I will decide if I want to put it on my "Shelved" list (games that I plan to come back to and play in depth) or put it on the "Retired" list (games that I will delete or sell and move on with my life).

What to do with The Darkness II is the hardest choice I've had to make so far. (This is only the third one, so I don't know if that is saying much.) On the one hand I have fun playing it, it's the kind of stupid shooter I like, and the story keeps me interested. Plus, the game is short, I could probably knock it off my list in a few days. On the other hand, it's unappealingly gory, and I don't know if it's something I really need to play. Will I ever talk about or think about The Darkness II in the future? This is the first time in 9 years I've thought about the first Darkness, so probably not.

In full disclosure, when I began writing this I was going to put The Darkness II on my Shelved list, then after writing the paragraph about gore I was set to Retire it. But, in another miraculous change of heart I am going to put it back on the Shelved list. Typing those last sentences about how I'll never think about The Darkness again sort of had the opposite effect then I intended. It made me think about when I clean out a closet full of old games the biggest smiles I get are when I pick up the box of a game I completely forgot about. I think it's worth playing The Darkness II to put a deposit down on one of those fleeting moments of happy nostalgia.

Judgement: Shelved

End Notes:

• I started listing the format I'm playing the game on. I might also start listing how I acquired the game (steam/humble bundle/playstation store etc.) but that might be too annoying.
• Thank you to @amafi for pointing out that random.org has a randomized list function. That is making my life a whole lot easier.
• Thank you to everyone commenting with encouragement, it really is motivating me to go through with this crazy thing.