Reviews// Dark Void

I'll take a moment to mention the Watchers, because they can be irksome. The design's pretty cool - they're spidery-looking robot-types (actually - slugs in four-limbed robot suits) but they're not as smart as they could be. They will take cover and dance away from your shots, but beyond that there doesn't seem to be a vast amount of thought going into their attacks beyond dithering about and shooting at you.

The spindly nasties also take a few too many shots to die for my taste. I'm not saying I want would-be world conquerors to just roll over and die, but I don't think it should take 20 seconds of dead-on rapid fire to kill a bog-standard grunt. It gets annoying. I'd rather see more of them that die quicker. This hardiness of the standard grunts might be explained as a development decision by the fact that there aren't that many enemy types. There are standard Watchers with automatic weapons, guys with more powerful cannon-jobbies, snipers, kamikaze exploding chaps and more boss-like 'Knights'. That's a nearly exhaustive list, and many of them look quite same-y to me.

Similarly, there aren't that many weapon types. I'm no gun whore, in fact I am prone to feeling a bit overwhelmed when presented with too many variations of weapon. But in Dark Void there are only around eight weapons in total, and a couple of those don't turn up until quite late in the game and have overly specific applications. You can upgrade said weapons using tech points acquired when you take down enemies, but it doesn't feel massively necessary and the results of doing it could be a bit more noticeable.

Neither of the above gripes, however, are deal-breakers - they're just the sort of details that stop Dark Void from ascending beyond 'good' to become 'excellent'.

You probably want to know how the full-on flight works, eh? I was dubious about it at first, but really that was my own prejudices kicking in. I have a nasty tendency, when presented with airborne combat games that offer fully three dimensional manoeuvring, to revert to the kind of head bobbling that you see in first-time FPS players. I'm pleased to report, however, that after a few minutes wrestling with the flight mechanics, they became natural and smooth.

When flying with your jet pack you have the controls you'd expect – you've got full 3D movement, you've got guns, you've got boost, you've got brakes. You've also, handily, got evasive manoeuvres that can be activated by holding down the right analogue stick and flicking both sticks around (different combos activate different moves). This is a nice touch. A tad awkward at first, they quickly become useful when you've taken a run at one of the enemy saucers (yes, flying saucers), over-shot it and need to get a bead on the despicable disc again. If you try to just steer around, you'll lose it. Put your special manoeuvres to work and double back quickly, however, and you'll be back on it in no time.

You also get the option to hijack the saucers, hitting [B] to activate a quick-time event. This makes you the new boss of the saucer, meaning you can take on the rest of your enemies with a bit less concern for your health.

The strongest thing the flight sections have going for them, however, is probably the fact that the battles are fought out against a back-drop of high-rise terrain. To complement all the 'verticality' going on in Dark Void, Airtight Games has created a geography that towers over you, consisting of mountainous pillars of rock adorned with jungle.

You rarely see the ground - that's covered in mist, but no matter how high you go (and you will get turned back by the game at some point) - you will always be flanked by landscape. This means that you never find yourself flapping about in empty space, trying to get your bearings (and the bearings of whatever you're trying to shoot down). It sounds like a small touch, but that seemingly small design point makes a huge difference to the flying experience.

My only grumble is that when you're trying to fight certain ground-based enemies - the giant four-legged lizzard-shaped robot-thingies (Archons) - it becomes awkward in that you're trying to target very specific points on their bodies while continually zooming past them. I found myself, where possible, landing to take care of them - but that wasn't always possible. For the most part, however, the controls are tight and the flight sections are good fun.