Dark Void Demo

Originality is hard to come by in the FPS genre, mostly because there have been many titles across the years that managed to introduce almost any kind of gimmick and mechanic possible. However, there are always good ideas that can sparkle a revolution and they always come from where you least expect it.

Dark Void is a third-person shooter that tries to innovate the genre in its own way and include a few new original mechanics, which are meant to make the gameplay more engaging and fluid. However, it also needed to create an entire universe for itself before that, in order to put those mechanics into practice and explain them as best as possible, using a clever story do to so.

Hence, it all starts when your character, William Grey, unknowingly flies through a portal somewhere in the Bermuda Triangle and somehow reaches a separate reality filled with vicious aliens and humans that fight them. Since the story takes place before the second World War, the Nazis are also involved, because Will does his best to return and use the new technology in order to turn the tide of the war.

As previously mentioned, there are a couple of new mechanics that aim to change the pace of the gameplay by quite a lot. In essence, it all revolves around the jetpack that you acquire at some point in the game, which allows you to quickly escape confrontations by flying away. However, it is also possible to use them offensively, as well as make use of the intriguing vertical cover system in order to avoid being shoot when you are up in the air.

Unfortunately, while the idea seems good on paper, the execution was not exactly top notch and everything gets rather dull at some point, as well as repetitive and unsatisfying. The first few minutes of flying through the air are quite intense and entertaining, but the gimmick stops there and you do not really get to make proper use of the mechanic, which is very disappointing and annoying.

In the end, Dark Void had the potential to strike much higher than it did, especially since the mechanics are there and they are highly entertaining. However, the developers ran out of imagination after that, which means that you do not get too many opportunities to make use of the new gimmicks and the gameplay somehow manages to remain just as dull.