I have been sitting on this game review for a while now. Essentially, I don’t know how to describe this game. At its core, it is a first person shooter. However, in my mind there is a strong case to be made to peg it as an adventure game. I have finally realized how I need to describe it to you, the reader: the game is a unique game whose atmosphere, story, and gameplay has yet to be duplicated ever.
This probably seems like a bit of hyperbole, and I suppose it might. But let me make the case. You start off the game in a car as the lead character, Jackie Estacado, on his 21 birthday, off to make a hit for a mob boss. On the way to make this hit, you are playing a straight forward, linear first person shooter. Slight spoilers: After the hit you “die”, and are brought back to life by a mysterious force called “The Darkness”.
The first sequence would make you think you are playing a first person shooter with an interesting control scheme (see below), but after you get "The Darkness" to come out, the game becomes more like a first person adventure. You can talk to characters, interact with objects, take on alternate quests, or follow the main plot. You aren’t shoveled down a linear corridor, you actually have the freedom to go where you want in this game world.
Overall, I liked this game a lot, and I think you will too. But you must give it the ability to work its magic. I did not like this game at first because the controls aren’t right, and the game does a terrible job at explaining your powers, why you are doing anything, or what you need to do to solve the slight puzzles. On the controls side, your character has a weight. So you will tend to over or under shoot your movement and your aiming. This makes the game not at all feel like Halo, or CoD. And it shouldn’t be. However, the emphasis on gunplay during the action sequences (especially in the beginning) can make the controls very frustrating when you are expecting the game to act and behave a certain way.
While you get used to the mechanics an hour or so into the game, the lack of any direction or explanation takes about half the game to really get comfortable with. That is why I suggest giving it a few chapters before you either decide to like it, or not.
Ultimately, it is the unique plot, the music, and the first person action adventure mechanics that will keep you popping in the disc for more. While I also felt the ending to be unsatisfying, I also recognize that it wasn’t a “bad” ending and it had its purpose.
To sum up, I give this game 4 stars because it is a game that I think you should at least try. However, having to require the player to play half the game before they realize why the game is good is a significant flaw in my book. I am hoping that Starbreeze makes more games like this in the future, because now that I understand what it is about, I want to come back to this style game for more.