Land-based combat is frequent, but it rarely happens safely outside of cover.Despite sometimes looking like a Gears of War knock-off, with a lead who resembles Dead Space's Isaac Clarke, Deep Black, Episode 1 has one very unique hook going for it — that a good chunk of the cover-based action takes place underwater.
Shooting aquatic drones, finding safety behind submerged pillars, and hacking control panels puts a fresh slant on third-person shooters, but wet or dry, Deep Black, Episode 1 is an abject failure throughout. Death comes at a near-constant rate (even on the lowest difficulty setting) in a five-hour campaign that feels twice as long as it should, and though many foes take scads of bullets before falling, you'll often perish within moments of emerging from cover.
As cool and foreboding as this looks, it's really just frustrating in the game.Sadly, the game does a terrible job of indicating how much damage you've taken, and cover is hit-or-miss anyway; we were often gunned down despite being fully covered, or would take headshots while reloading or crawling out of sight. Ill-placed checkpoints further box you into tricky scenarios when you respawn, or they make you replay lengthy segments over and over again.
It's a joyless, grace-free slog dominated by repetitive stop-and-pop shootouts, lifeless linear environments, and inconsistent weapon physics, not to mention full-stop gameplay pauses during certain actions (like detonating a robot with an EMP grenade), obnoxiously tacky dialogue, missed audio cues, and overwrought enemy death screams that replay incessantly. And the tepid eight-player online deathmatches aren't free from the janky mechanics. Deep Black, Episode 1 is the worst shooter we've played in ages, and the prospect of a second episode seems more like a threat than a promise.
You'll kill many of these foes in the exact same way: by tapping B a few times. Yay for boring button-prompts!PUBLISHER: 505 Games • DEVELOPER: Biart • ESRB: Mature • MULTIPLAYER: 8 over Xbox Live • ACHIEVEMENTS: Average • COST: 800 Microsoft Points ($10)
– Clunky, sluggish gunplay on land or underwater.
– Cover doesn't always work; death comes frequently.
– Laughable and often glitchy presentation.
? Will the second half of this PC port be any different?
BattlingPoet
May 01, 2012 at 1:10pm
I think this game has potential if the multi-play mode can be fixed??? If any one chould get a hold of the developers to make a down loadable update fixer patch OR something that address the problems with multiplayer mid-game freez-ups,spawn lags etc...this under water sub-terrainian base to base swimming game whould realy work as a super-duper "MULTIPLAYER" stand alone game title in my humble opinion. Does any one else feel the same about this??? The game has been available on XBLA for just one weak as of this writing, sure do not want it fail as a what appears to be a work in progess action,adventure shooter.
