Dark Sector

1) You Can Steer the Glaive in Mid-Flight: “The after-touch is another of those evolving glaive mechanics for advanced players,” says Dark Sector Associate Producer Dave Kudirka. “It’s tricky to do, but it lets you modify the glaive’s [your hurled weapon’s] flight path in mid-throw. This becomes handy when enemies start getting wise to the damage a spinning glaive can do and duck behind cover just before the weapon reaches them. With the after-touch, if you’re quick enough, you can send the glaive behind that cover right away or alter its return flight path so it strikes your foe on the way back. It’s really satisfying to pull off and offers some extra play mechanics for those who want the complete Dark Sector experience.”

2) There's More to the Glaive than Meets the Eye: “I think we’ve revealed a lot about how electricity and fire work in tandem with the glaive,” admits Producer Sheldon Carter, “but I don’t think anyone has really seen the other ways the glaive changes as you evolve. There are more elemental pieces, like ice — which allows you to freeze enemies and create your own cover — but even cooler is the power throw. It’s a skillbased evolution where you have to release your throw at exactly the right time. If you do it right, the results are devastating: the glaive tears through multiple foes, and if you happen to have it buffed with an elemental charge as well, it has a massive area-of-effect on impact.”

3) The Outbreak has Happened Before: “The game has a huge backstory/fictional world,” Carter explains. “Once Hayden [your character] is infected with the disease plaguing the game world, one of the first things he realizes is that this has actually happened before. In 1987, Lasria was a key Soviet satellite that suddenly went completely off the grid. When the Russians saw the imagery coming back from Lasria, they sent in a special team equipped with most powerful technology that the Cold War had ever seen. Because of the skill of their leader — Yargo Menshik — they were just barely able to contain it. How Hayden develops a better understanding of the ’87 incident and Yargo, now 20 years older, is critical.”

4) You Can Pilot a Walking Tank: “One of [Sector ’s] more unique adversaries is the Jackal Tank,” Kudirka tells us. “It’s an immensely powerful mechanized enemy that, when you meet it early in the game, is one of the hardest opponents to handle. Your glaive won’t be enough, and you’ll have to use newly acquired powers to crack open the Jackal and literally rip the pilot right out of the cockpit and assume control of the tank yourself. It’s amazing to be able to turn a boss enemy into one of your most destructive weapons.”

5) The Colossus Vocalizations are Mostly Human: “This huge ape-like monstrosity presented a unique challenge,” reveals Digital Extremes Sound Designer George Spanos. “Not only did it need to convey emotion (pain, anger, and rage), but it also needed to sound natural and believable. The end result is mostly my vocal performances recorded through a pitchshifting device, along with some special digitalsignal processing to alter it slightly. Creating believable character sounds is one of the hardest things to pull off, but sometimes a basic approach is all you need.”