Alien first person shooter
In a genre asphyxiated with mediocre titles, BlackSite, the first person alien shooter from Midway Games, really needs to stand out amongst the crowd if it has any aspirations of making a lasting impression. Its potential success isn’t helped by this busy time in the gaming calendar, where a number of AAA titles are competing for our cash. Halo 3 and its hype machine are still going strong and Call of Duty 4 has received high critical success. There’s also Vivendi’s scary shooter, F.E.A.R Files, plus many big titles from other genres, such as Assassin’s Creed, Mass Effect and Kane & Lynch: Dead Men all vying for our pennies.So, why should you spend your cash on BlackSite?
Well, earlier this year I met the lead campaign designer Ricardo Bare and executive creative director Harvey Smith, both of whom worked on the critically acclaimed Deus Ex. They were aware back then that any direct attempt to compete with Halo 3 and Call of Duty 4 would be ridiculous and so their team had decided to focus on creating a moody and gritty, fast-paced shooter, a title that would ‘redefine the genre.’ It was all looking pretty good and shaping up well at my first hands-on session, but the game still needed plenty of tweaking and refinement before it was fit for public consumption.
Click for larger image
Click for larger imageDisappointingly, BlackSite seems as if it still needs that tweaking and doesn’t get anywhere close to revitalising the genre, it even takes it a few steps backwards in places. Blacksite is a title that doesn’t quite feel like the finished product.
