Spontaneous Sunday: Perfect Dark

Welcome to another (slightly belated) Spontaneous Sunday! This week I have played the 2010 remastered edition of Perfect Dark (originally released 2000, Rare, Nintendo 64. This version released 2010, 4J Studios, Xbox 360). The 2010 remaster was included in the Rare Replay compilation, released in 2015 as an Xbox One launch title.

"Perfect Dark is a first-person shooter video game developed and published by Rare for the Nintendo 64 video game console. It is considered the spiritual successor to Rare's earlier first-person shooter GoldenEye 007. Perfect Dark was first released in North America on 22 May 2000; PAL and NTSC-J releases followed soon afterwards.The game features a single-player mode consisting of 17 main missions in which the player assumes the role of Carrington Institute agent Joanna Dark. A remaster, with enhanced graphics and online multiplayer, was exclusively released as an Xbox Live Arcade game for the Xbox 360 in 2010."

- Wikipedia on Perfect Dark

 

  

What do I expect from the game?

 

I must admit that I do not know a lot about Perfect Dark, aside from the fact that I am aware of its existence and I have a vague idea that its an old-school FPS with sci-fi and espionage themes. Though my gaming experience began in the late 90's shortly before Perfect Dark came out, I didn't own an N64 so never played it in its original incarnation.

From the little that I have seen about the game thus far, I expect that it will be a high quality FPS game with combat and/or stealth it its core, sci-fi setting and spy themes, possibly taking influence from spy and sci-fi movies. I understand that it is considered something of a classic, and it went on to spawn a prequel in 2005 and a franchise including other merchandise such as novels and comics.

I expect that its strengths will include its story and sci-fi/spy aesthetic and themes. I think that the gameplay and action might be fairly simple by the standards of modern games, but still enjoyable. The remastered version has updated graphics, so sadly I won't get to see them for how they looked upon release in 2000, but I'll try to remain objective about them anyway. I expect that the game may also offer good audio and a strong atmosphere in its environments.#

First Impressions - What do I think of the game in its first few minutes?

The game's start screen shows a cinematic in which the game's eponymous protagonist, Joanna Dark, navigates through a futuristic metropolis at night in a Jumpship (which is somewhere between a helicopter and a hover car) while being briefed by an unseen male character about an upcoming mission. Futuristic hover cars, tall city buildings and holographic billboards and lights can be seen in throughout the low-poly environment. Dark then abseils onto a roof and the cinematic repeats until the player presses start. This short cinematic introduces the game's futuristic and spy themes pretty effectively, while also showing revealing the player-character and the game world without giving too much away.

The game's main menu is simple but quite interesting, It begins with showing the character stood at a computer in a fairly non-descript room, the camera then comes into line with the character's field of view, suggesting that the player is looking at the menu through the eyes of the character. The main menu displays options on a blue box, with the room appearing out-of-focus in the background. The music is electronic and somewhat suspenseful. It has a strong sci-fi "hack"-y vibe and it distinctly reminds me of some of my earlier gaming experiences on PS1-era FPS games. The "Play Game" sub-menu offers such options as "Carrington Institute" and "Combat Simulator" - while I appreciate that this is the game remaining "in character" which helps to sell the illusion of the game's content and story, these options do seem a little unclear in regards to what they represent. I selected "Carrington Institute" which is the headquarters of the game's "good" faction to which the player-character belongs. This area acted as a hub, with computers that could be used to activate cheats and read about characters and the game's story.

 

On selecting to start a new game, the main menu disappears and the player finds themselves in control of the character in the room. This is an interesting concept - I've seen very few main menu's that are diegetic in this way, with the suggestion that the in-game character can see it too. This will help to make the player feel like they are stepping into the role of the character from the very start. I explored the Carrington Institute hub area for a while and got to grips with the basic controls before beginning the first mission.

The first mission begins with the introduction cinematic that played during the Start menu. The player takes control of Joanna Dark on a roof top and must work downwards through the building via stairwells and elevators, completing objectives on the way such as deactivating security systems. Enemies are numerous but generally quite none-threatening - there wasn't really any point where I was close to being killed, even when fighting several enemies at once. My first attempt at the level was ill-fated: I approached it at a slow pace, trying to defeat enemies stealthily where possible and explore every room in the building. I eventually failed the mission because I accidentally destroyed a vital objective! It was then that I noticed that the post-mission screen scores you on how quickly you completed the mission. So I then restarted the mission and tried to complete it as quickly as possible.

This is the view at the moment that the player takes control of the character.

The first mission was pretty fun and impressive. The city skyline seen from the rooftop is an impressive first view of the game world, and the vertical nature of the level's layout made for some interesting gameplay. The objectives were not exactly challenging as much as they were awkward - accidentally destroying a computer caused me to fail an objective which was a little deflating. Also, it was not stated that speed was the aim of the game, so I did not approach the level with this in mind. Therefore, my first attempt at the level was a bit of a false start. Nevertheless, it was fun in the end and I completed it successfully and quickly.

What do I like about the game?

I played Perfect Dark for a total of about 3 hours and completed 4 missions. The missions are fairly short, normally taking about 15-20 minutes, though some required multiple attempts due to my dying or failing objectives. The game has a number of positive features, predominantly: the overall gameplay, the unique setting and the environments and game world.

Perfect Dark's overall gameplay - such as the combat, mechanics, objectives and the actions and interactions that the player must complete to progress - are pretty strong and solid and this means that the immediate action of the game is enjoyable. The combat mechanics such as shooting, melee attacking and taking cover from enemy attacks are a big part of the action, mostly due to the high amount of enemies in the levels. The shooting feels fluid and there is a number of different weapons that act in meaningfully varied ways, such as pistols, submachine guns, shotguns, assault rifles and a rocket launcher. The game features quite a strong auto-aim and accurate response to movement of the sticks, which means that it is not plagued with the clunky and awkward aiming that is present in many old FPS games - though as this is the 2010 remaster, I cannot say whether this was the case in the 2000 original release. The player can also use melee attacks which, when used on an unsuspecting enemy, yields an instant kill - though the opportunity or need to do this rarely presents itself, as enemies are often quicker and easier to kill with guns, and there is little to no clear incentive to use stealth.

The combat is fluid and enjoyable.

The game's unique setting is also quite an interesting feature. It is set in the year 2023 - 23 years in the future from the game's original release date - in a sci-fi world of guns, metropolises and flying cars that are not all that far removed from what exists today. The ability to examine or revisit a piece of futuristic fiction years after its release, and in the time period that the piece portrays, is a phenomenon that usually occurs with films rather than games. It was interesting to see how a game from 2000 envisioned the year 2023, which is near-enough the modern day. This somehow made the setting more interesting to me. Only a little information was revealed about the setting and world of the game in the time that I spent playing it, but I was certainly hooked by the world none-the-less thanks to the environments. The futuristic city's are very nicely designed and the game makes sure to show them off well with sweeping panoramic views.

The game's story and lore are also quite interesting, though they were not very well-delivered - I will discuss this more later on. The game follows the private espionage faction the Carrington Institute, which secretly allies itself with an alien race and combats a defence contractor called dataDyne, which is allied to an opposing alien race. None of this was directly revealed through the gameplay itself during the missions that I played, but this information was accessible through a computer in the Carrington Institute hub area and is presumably revealed later on in the game. The player character is an inexperienced but highly trained female spy who presents an interesting and mysterious character. The game does a good job of placing you in the role of this character often having the camera fly directly into the characters viewpoint before handing over control to the player. The player character also makes comments on things during gameplay, such as when a new objective becomes active. This gives the character a strong sense of identity and the player a sense of ownership over the character.

The level's objectives are sufficiently varied.

The game's art style was also of particular interest to me as a 3D artist. Everything was nice and low-poly, which is something that I often aim for in my own models. The environments and assets were still effective and attractive though, despite their low poly count and texture resolution, probably due in part to the game's ramstering in 2010. Though the graphics were not terribly advanced, they are still pretty good given the game's age and I could appreciate the art style, even if it was largely for nostalgia reasons. The game also features some surprisingly high-quality cutscenes.

The Chicago street level is particularly attractive.

Another positive feature of the game is its level of replayability that is due to the inclusion of end-of-level statistics and global online leaderboards that track your score and time taken to complete each level. This will encourage more dedicated players to replay levels to try and best their score. I can imagine that the game lends itself well to speed-running. Finally, the audio is another good feature. The music is mostly electronic and has a style that is distinct for the late late-90's/early-00's console generation. Though I had never played the game before, it still made me feel nostalgic for this era because its style is so familiar. The voice acting, SFX and audio effects such as reverb and echo are also decent.

The game features leaderboards that encourage replayability.

What do I not like about the game?

Perfect Dark certainly had its share of positive points, but there are a few negatives aswell. Firstly, the game's level design and objectives are often unclear, which often resulted in frustrating backtracking and aimless wandering. More recent games are very effective at clearly communicating to the player where they need to go and what they need to do once they get there, through the use of things like maps, flashing arrows and highlighted level elements. While this could be said to be too much like "hand-holding", the alternative is often a lack of direction, and this was unfortunately the case in Perfect Dark. The objectives themselves are sufficiently clearly stated, but how they are achieved is another matter. Objectives sometimes involve interacting with one specific computer that looks exactly like all the others and is hidden somewhere within the level. This can make it very hard to tell what the game expects from the player which can lead to lengthy stalls in the flow of the level while the player figures out what to do. Now it may be possible that this lack of direction was intentional and the idea was to add a puzzle-like challenge to the objectives. If this is the case, however, then I think it was quite lazily implimented. If its was not intentional, then it is poor design - and I am not sure which option is worse.

Another issue with the game is that it seems to contain a small number of bugs that are quite serious. Examples include an instance where a hidden door failed to open and stopped me from progressing through the level. Another example involved an instance where I could backtrack to an earlier part of the skyscraper level and access a door that shouldn't have been able to be opened - behind the door was a room containing some bugged-out, invincible NPC models that simply stood there doing nothing. In the same area, I was able to open a door that allowed me to exit the playable area and fall underneath the game world. I found these bugs by accident in my first attempt at the level - as an ex-QA tester, I can safely say that these would be pretty high priority bugs that should really have been caught.

Glitched NPCs!

The final downside of the game is that it doesn't deliver its story or instructions very well at all. The game does not really do much to introduce the main factions or characters or explanation of what the player is doing in an easily-accessible way. The Carrington Institute hub area contains a computer with some long-winded text entries about the game's back story, but this would be easy for the player to miss and besides, this vital information should really be delivered through more elegent and exciting means such as cutscenes, dialogue or a voice-over. Likewise, mission and objective information is also often delivered through lengthy text screens. The problem is not that the information that the player needs is not there, its that it is not well-delivered, and the game suffers because of this. Finally, there is also no real tutorial mission and the controls are never explicitly explained.

An example of a mission explanation.

Final Thoughts

I would say that Perfect Dark is a decent game overall. It is enjoyable on the whole thanks to the rather interesting objectives and environments, charming retro graphics and the fluid combat mechanics. Sadly there's a few issues such as the unclear objectives and messy, ineffective delivery of the story - but I will cut the game some slack because of its age and the fact that I have been spoiled by how far game's have come since the year 2000 and the N64-era. It is still doubtlessly a big part of FPS history, and I think its fairly simple gameplay and the replay value that the leaderboards adds to the levels means that it holds up quite well as a casual, retro shooter today - and I will probably play it again in the future when I'm looking for a quick retro FPS fix!