On today twenty years in the past, one of the crucial beloved games of all time bought a sequel that wasn’t technically a sequel in any respect. After the large success of GoldenEye 007, developer Rare knew it wished to make a sequel to high its system-defining film tie-in but in addition was uncertain if it wished to work inside the confines of James Bond once more. When a rights bidding battle emerged for the power to make a Tomorrow Never Dies game, the choice was cemented, and Perfect Dark was born.
Despite the property change, Perfect Dark could be very a lot a sequel to GoldenEye. In some ways it’s GoldenEye turned as much as eleven; element is now dense sufficient that the RAM-boosting N64 Expansion Pak accent was required to even begin the marketing campaign missions. Small particulars in GoldenEye like enemy reactions to being shot in particular locations are actually writ giant. Levels are bigger and extra dynamic with lighting results that on the time boggled the thoughts. The story is delivered not simply through pre-mission briefing notes and subtitles, however via full voice performing.
All of this provides up. Let’s be clear: Perfect Dark is healthier than GoldenEye. Yes, that game is connected to a basic movie outing for a personality that’s a global icon – however as a video game, Perfect Dark is healthier by just about each metric, full of options and depth.
It isn’t all simply an incremental sequel to the 007 journey, nonetheless. Gone are the admittedly thrilling rearrangements of the acquainted Bond theme, changed as a substitute by a rating thick with ambiance and indicative of the game’s tone. That aspect of the game is a triumph, too – a narrative that’s tonally a dystopic, Blade Runner-like science fiction thriller laced with spy story tropes – however just for some time, earlier than it takes a flip into campy alien intrigue.
At first it’s company espionage, sneaking into rival company places of work to steal again know-how. This is the little bit of Perfect Dark individuals keep in mind, and that’s superb. But then it will get progressively campier – a go to to Area 51 to rescue an alien known as Elvis, saving the President aboard Air Force One, underwater bases, and in the end a visit to an alien world to avoid wasting the day. It’s mad, sensible, and utterly totally different to Bond.
Protagonist Jo Dark, impressed at the very least partly by La Femme Nikita, The X-Files’ Scully and even Joan of Arc (Joanna Dark, get it?) isn’t any mere Lara Croft clone – she was envisioned as one thing extra, as skilled and spectacular as Bond. She, too, is nice. Five years later we’d see her once more with little of this attraction, nonetheless – as an impetuous teenager in Perfect Dark Zero. That game captures a number of the magic of the unique, particularly in its DarkOps multiplayer, however in lots of different methods it fumbles, partly presumably as a result of the shadow of Halo loomed giant over the sequel, diluting parts that made its predecessor nice.
Anyway, Happy Twentieth Birthday to Perfect Dark, a captivating shooter that proved simply how properly it’d aged with a quick, excessive body charge Xbox Live Arcade port. Twenty years is a very long time, and a good time for reflection. So let’s replicate and say this: it’s time to carry Perfect Dark again.
I lined this in our checklist of top games Xbox should bring back on the Xbox Series X, however Perfect Dark is an ideal probability for Xbox Game Studios to recreate a status property – and it has the items in place to outline itself as a really totally different property to what Microsoft already has out there.
Xbox has shooters – however the unique Perfect Dark is greater than that. As a descendant of GoldenEye, it advantages from open-ended stage and goal design that within the current day is just actually represented in IO Interactive’s Hitman titles. Perfect Dark additionally had problem that scales in additional than simply enemy energy and intelligence – the more durable the issue, the extra you even have to perform in any given mission.
Basically, any future Perfect Dark must be a spy game, not only a shooter. An espionage game that includes tight, thrilling capturing with cool weapons which have outlandish alternate hearth modes. The phrase espionage is essential – as a result of this isn’t simply one other stealth game. Stealth in video games conjures up photographs of visibility meters and enemies slipping from patrol to alert to fight states and again once more. Perfect Dark isn’t fairly like that – however it’s all about feeling like a undercover agent, even in the event you do much more blasting than Bond even does within the motion pictures.
Through this particular tone and really feel, Perfect Dark has the potential to be one thing extra – half shooter, half immersive sim, half one thing else distinctive completely. As Joanna’s forebear stated on the large display in Casino Royale, it’s a possibility to be “half monk, half hit-man”.
The time is correct; Perfect Dark is ready in dystopian way forward for 2020. It’s a 12 months of cyberpunk with a return to Midgar and CD Projekt’s large RPG looming. And later this 12 months, the MI6 working quantity 007 is to be handed to a lady in the upcoming No Time to Die. Just keep in mind: so far as taking up from Bond goes, Jo was there first.
Basically, all of this can be a very good distance of claiming that Perfect Dark is bloody nice. So let this be the 12 months, be it a sequel or a reboot. Are you listening, Phil Spencer? Bring it again.
We would possibly but get our want, too. Online gaming conspiracy theorists have seen the brand of recent Xbox studio The Initiative shares its form and elegance with Perfect Dark villains DataDyne – and that studio is engaged on one thing as-yet unannounced. Fingers crossed.
