Darksiders: Wrath of War

Lets start by pointing the obvious: Darksiders is one giant ripoff. Is it a bad thing? Depending on how you look at it, yes. Does it make the game any less enjoyable? Not at all. Is there anything original on the game? Other than the idea of picking everything from the past decade that you liked in your games and putting all in a single one?

 

The game starts as War, the main character of the story, falls on Earth to "Answer the Call", as apparently the apocalypse has been triggered before the time it was supposed to. Accused of being the one to do such thing, War proposes to cleanse his name by going back to Earth and punish the ones responsible. To ensure you won't forget your mission, the "Council" sends with you The Watcher, whose only responsibility is to "hold the leash", as he likes to put it.

 

The gameplay is a mix between the dungeon crawling with obvious "inspirations" on the Zelda series, combat, which, like half the action games on the market, has a lot to owe to God of War, and triggered events that can give a change of pace, like a "starfox-like" moment for example, where you steal an angel's flying mount and his "cannon rod", a weapon that you shoot by mashing the attack button and create a homing attack if you hold down briefly. All on-rails. Due to such diversity, it's better to talk to each of them separately.

 

The combat is really good. And i mean it. You have your sword, the sub-weapon and your dungeon items. combining the timing you press the attack button with the direction, the use of lock-on, and the use of the dash/block button, you can create long, epic combos that wipe an entire army at once. There are also extra moves for both the sword and the sub weapons, not to mention power-ups and slotted effects that can either be bought in a store with the souls you gather from killing enemies or found hidden in the world (the case of the slotted effects). Not only that, there are also four "Wrath Powers", special abilities that consume your Wrath Gauge, and later in the game, you'll be able to fight while mounting Ruin, your horse.

 

The combat itself is quite challenging, with tough enemies that not only take some time to be defeated but are also quite strong and can drain your health with just a couple blows. After you've caused enough damage, a huge icon appear over your foe's head. Pressing what i like to call the "fatality button" will trigger a quick animation where you finish off the poor creature in the most brutal way possible. But the real challenges are the bosses, who will definitely do some damage to you before you can finally kill him.

 

But while half the time is spent slaughtering demons and cherubs on steroids, the other half is spent on challenging, mind-bending puzzle solving. Most of those puzzles are solved with dungeon items, both new and previously acquired ones (something the Zelda games have been lacking recently) and while at first they might look easy, soon you find out they're just part of a bigger, more complex puzzle.

 

The story begins interesting, but is quickly turned into a premise to throw new abilities and force you to go to the next dungeon. After you land back on Earth, War makes a pact with the demon Samael: if Samael helps War fulfill his duties, War shall bring the hearts of the Chosen Ones, aka the bosses. After that, it's basically "get a power from Samael, get to the dungeon, beat the boss at the dungeon, increase your life by 1 (where did you see that before), get more powers" until you get rid of all the Chosen, and that's when the plot decides it's about time to return and gets interesting. Too bad it only happens with just a few more hours left, when you're near the ending.

 

The open world is a joke. There is a "central area" and various linear routes that lead one to each dungeon. Aside from one of the last things you'll do before beating the game, there's absolutely no incentive in exploring. You can try to look for some tokens that can be exchanged for money or even a "heart piece" of sorts (collect 4 to increase your life), but most of the time it's just move forward. The game even stimulates you to teleport around instead of exploring, as warping through "Serpent Holes" is one of the earliest abilities in the game. The idea was probably to avoid too much backtracking, but it backfires, as it's transformed into absolutely zero backtracking, meaning you won't go back to that area searching for more unless you really want to.
And what's worse, the game, instead of getting harder as you get to the end, gets relatively easier, as you're filled with extra life gauges, special moves and power-ups, while the enemies remain the same in terms of strength.

 

Darksiders is a artistically beautiful and detailed, most of it thanks to creative director and lead artist Joe Madureira, of X-men fame. Every enemy, every character, every scenery, even weapons have a level of detail beyond comparison. As for the sound, it's hard to find something to complain. While the soundtrack gives you the feeling of epicness during the most intense moments, the voice acting is simply superb, with people like Mark Hammil (Luke Skywalker, the Joker on Batman: the animated series) and Liam O'Brien (Gaara on the american version of Naruto) on the cast.

 

Even though Darksiders has a nice story (once it decides to appear), a great cast and a nice idea of mixing everything you like in a single game, you can't help but feel that they might have gone a bit too far. Just for example, one of the items you obtain later in the game is the gun from portal. Even the portals it shoots are in fiery orange and blue. The only difference (other than the weapon design, of course) is that the one from Darksiders is limited to some orange mosaics and it can be used to propel yourself, as there's a "force push" when you leave the portal that can be calibrated.

 

But if you, like me, can put aside all those "cameos" to enjoy a game, then you'll certainly like Darksiders. And with a sequel confirmed and a cliffhanger like that, you probably are already excited to see War's return.

 

Graphics: 9/10

Sound: 9/10

Gameplay: 8/10

Fun: 9/10

Replay: 6/10

Final Score: 9/10