04/11/09 -- The Chronicles of Riddick Assault on Dark Athena is one heck of a package. In the box you get a full remake of the 2004 hit Escape From Butcher Bay and a whole new game: Assault on Dark Athena. You also get a full multiplayer mode (which was noticeably missing from the 2004 release). If you bought the game from Gamestop you will also get some extra goodies like miltiplayer maps and Butcher Bay in game commentary, but since these extras do not come with every single copy of the game, they will not be considered in this review.

Before I delve into each game, however, let me give a brief overview of how this game fits into the overarching Riddick universe. Both Butcher Bay and Dark Athena (which takes place directly after Butcher Bay) take place before either of the Riddick movies: Pitch Black and The Chronicles of Riddick. This might be bit confusing for those who have seen the most recent film and notice that many of the locations in Butcher Bay, and some of the plot elements in Dark Athena, are extremely reminiscent of the Chronicles of Riddick Movie. Nevertheless, after hours and hours of research I have determined that none of the characters or set pieces in either game are mentioned in either movie. I don't know if this is a good thing or a bad thing for true fans of the series, but as someone who has enjoyed the series I thought it was a nice change of pace to get a brand new story.

When you start a new game, you are given the option of playing either Butcher Bay or Dark Athena, so those that have already played the Xbox version are not forced to break out of prison one more time (although its likely going to be a lot more fun this time around). Butcher Bay begins with Riddick in chains, apprehended by the bounty hunter Johns. Johns has taken him to Butcher Bay, the most secure maximum security prison in the system, where he hopes to collect a large bounty and leave Riddick there to rot. Shockingly, things do not go according to plan for Johns and Riddick quickly breaks out of his initial custody as you, the player, attempt to guide him to freedom. Dark Athena takes place directly after Butcher Bay when Riddick's ship (SPOILER: HE ESCAPES FROM BUTCHER BAY) is captured by a band of Mercs who have something nefarious planned for our hero.

Despite being a remake of a five year old game, Butcher Bay manages to feel both fresh and innovative. Even though you play from the first person perspective, the game is not a traditional first person shooter. Most of the combat throughout the game is hand-to-hand, and Riddick's plethora of bloody finishing moves makes this combat feel appropriately brutal. Initially, Riddick starts out with only his fists, but you quickly pick up a shiv and other bladed weapons in addition to riot sticks and clubs, which attack slower but do more damage. The melee combat is both accessible and fulfilling. It contains three options: attack, block, and counter. Both attack and block are buttons, and when you see Riddick's weapon flash or his palm open (assuming you are unarmed) you may hit attack to preform a gory counter move.

Considering that Riddick is often faced with armed foes who must be ambushed in order to engage them in close combat, stealth plays a large role in both games as well. Riddick can enter stealth-mode (a glorified crouch) at any time with the press of a button and will become essentially invisible if he is in the darkness. In order to alert the player when Riddick is invisible, his health bar will glow blue. This will allow Riddick to sneak up behind enemies and dispatch them silently, or almost as commonly, skip past his enemies all together. The latter is especially necessary in Butcher Bay because the player is often confronted with enemies he cannot physically defeat, and therefore must sneak past in order to get to the next objective. Needless to say, while varying up the gameplay, this tactic adds to Butcher Bay's already somewhat steep difficulty, and many players will likely take advantage of the on-the-fly difficulty switching after being gunned down by Mech from behind one too many times.

Despite both game's focus on hand to hand fighting, guns still play a prominent role, especially in Dark Athena were Riddick has access to guns for a large portion of the game. The player can access all of the classic FPS weaponry such as the shotgun, assault rifle, pistol and SMG, and all of these guns play as you would imagine they would. The back half of Dark Athena introduces a new gun: a sticky grenade launcher, which varies between somewhat interesting and downright gimmicky. At multiple points, the player will be required to stick grenades to door locks in order to open them up and a new enemy is introduced that is mostly harmless, but must be killed only by sticky grenade. There's nothing inherently wrong with the launcher, but it sometimes feels as if Starbreeze, the developer, is trying a bit too hard to justify the weapon's existence.

Dark Athena essentially features the same general gameplay as Butcher Bay does, but with the important addition of the Drone. Drones are what those abducted by the Dark Athena (the titular ship) are turned into: humans who have been changed into fleshy remote control soldiers who are operated by the Dark Athena crew in order to both defend the ship and do dangerous jobs that sentient humans would balk at. These change the gameplay up a bit because instead of dropping their weapons, Drones have their gun soldered onto their arm, preventing Riddick from taking it with him. He can, however, pick up the Drone like a human shield and use its gun to mow down nearby enemies. The only drawback to using a drone gun is that you can't move while shooting it, the gun runs out of ammo quickly, and you can barely move at all while carrying the drone. This creates a happy medium between outright FPS and not being able to use guns at all. The player is still rewarded for his kill with a short term burst of firepower, but is then forced to continue to get up close and kill those enemies in the next room who are out of range.

The multipayer in Riddick is very remicient of quake, with power ups and weapons pick ups featured all over the map. The action is fast paced and fun despite being very different from the actual game. All of the traditional modes such as team deathmatch, capture the flag, etc. are present and accounted for, along with two unique game modes: Pitch Black and Prison Riot. In Pitch Black, one player is Riddick and the rest are gaurds who are hunting him in a dark pit. Riddick has his night vision and the guards have flashlights which will alert Riddick when they are near, and a limited supply of ammo, making them sitting ducks. Whichever guard kills Riddick becomes the new Riddick and so on. Prison Riot features three teams; prisoners, Mercs, and guards, and is essentially a new twist on counter strike where each team tries to steal a power node and gets money to spend at the end of the round on weapons and armor based on their performance. The only downside to the multiplayer is that there is almost no one online. I managed to find about six people to play with during my time with the game, and each of them stated that they hadn't seen anyone online in days. Hopefully this will change once everyone figures out that the game offers more than just the single player experience.

In all, the general gameplay is excellent in Riddick, if a bit linear, but my favorite part of the game (apart from stabbing fools in the face with my shiv) was listening to Vin Diesels amazingly awesome dialog. Those who have seen the films know what I'm talking about. At no point does Riddick pass up the chance to drop a really hammy one-liner, which probably wouldn't work if Vin Diesel didn't do such a believable job saying it. I could spend pages just typing out some of the dialog highlights, but I think this one exchange from early in the game is indicative of the general trend.

*Riddick tackles some poor sap of a guard and they both go falling down a long vent shaft*

Riddick *as they are falling*: It's not the fall that kills ya...

*Riddick lands on top of the guard, using the guard's face to cushion his fall*

Riddick: It's the sudden stop at the bottom.

You almost expect CSI Miami's David Caruso to pop out of a nearby locker and put his glasses on while the prisoners in the background sing YAAAAAAAAAAAAA.

And in reality, its these kind of intangibles that make Riddick a great game instead of a good game. Both Athena and Butcher Bay are innovative enough and the graphics look pretty nice on the highest settings, but its the “sluurk” of your combat knife jamming someone in the skull and the feeling you get once you've cleared a room of enemies by dropping from the ceiling, stealing a Drone gun, mowing down some guards and then cutting someone in half in order to finish the fight that really makes this game stand out as something special (and for those who want to relive this moment, Riddick lets you jump back to any checkpoint you've cleared in either game). The world that the Starbreeze team creates, from the entire cast's voice acting to the detailed environments, feels completely real and both game's stories (especially Butcher Bay's) are gripping and make you want to spend that extra hour in order to find out what happens next.

My only issue with either of these games is that neither one provides clear objectives for the player. Your mission log might say “Escape the ship”, but it won't give you any other advice on how to do so. This may leave you wandering around for a half an hour trying to find a switch, or a door that is not easy to find. These incidents add up quickly and go a long way toward souring the experience. I understand that not every game needs to baby the player along with a radar or big floating arrow (like Bioshock, for example) but there is nothing less fun than not knowing what to do. Had Starbreeze made each objective easy to find and figure out it would be one thing, but in many cases they seem to deliberately trick you into going the wrong way.

In spite of this defect, The Chronicles of Riddick Assault on Dark Athena is a deal at twice the price. You get two amazing games, some really great Vin Diesel dialog, and a perfectly competent multiplayer mode for the price of a regular game. Five years in the making, this game decapitates the competition and then hides their corpse in the dark section of the BestBuy.