Reviewed: December 21, 2005
Reviewed by: Mark Smith

Publisher
Microsoft

Developer
Rare

Released: November 22, 2005
Genre: FPS
Players: 1-4 / 32
ESRB: Mature

7
8
8
9
8.1

Supported Features:

As the opening movie montage unfolded my eyes lit up. This was cool…James Bond cool…only rather than having Bond Girls; Bond was a girl…a hot girl…with guns. It didn’t take long for the illusion to wear off and Perfect Dark Zero showed its true colors.

Even as early as the opening tutorial I was disappointed with the total lack of instruction. There were times where I had no idea where to go or what to do. If you slack off for too long the computer will light you a path or indicate a waypoint, but if you aren’t looking down or in the right direction you’ll miss these subtle indicators.

Playing alone you are doomed to a sequence of missions and very little cohesive story. Pick a mission and a level of difficulty and dive in. Completing the game on each skill setting unlocks the next and only when you have completed the entire game can you unlock the Dark Agent mode.

Another hint that this game was never meant for single player consumption is the weak enemy A.I. There are almost no tactics employed by human opponents and enemies like those damned spider-bots in the opening level just overwhelm you with sheer numbers. Only on the higher skill levels will the enemy show any hint of strategy and that is usually reduced to them taking cover when available. Normally, once the enemy spots you it’s a relentless pursuit and exchange of gunfire until somebody is dead.

Missions have a set number of objectives with secondary goals being added as you advance to the higher difficulty settings. The escort and protect missions prove to be the most troublesome since the friendly A.I. is just as flawed as the enemy. Your escorts will simply stand in the line of fire and suck up damage until the mission has failed.

If it weren’t for the multiplayer it would be hard to recommend this game to anyone. Once you have honed your skills on the dismal solo experience you can tackle the pure genius that is multiplayer PDZ.

Xbox Live offers cooperative gameplay through the solo missions. It’s a nice twist on the gameplay but you likely won’t do it for any reason other than the Achievement points. Perfect Dark Zero shows its Rare and GoldenEye roots with a host of multiplayer battle modes including Deathmatch, CTF, Domination, and Dark Ops modes like infection, sabotage, onslaught, and eradication.

There are solo modes and team variations for many of these games and depending on the maps you can mix and match human players and bots for games with up to 32 agents. Bots are incredibly intelligent, which begs the question – what happened to the single player A.I.? Don’t be surprised to see the computer driving vehicles or capture the flag with more accuracy than humans on their team.

There aren’t that many vehicles in multiplayer but the few that do exist are powerful yet carefully balanced so they don’t overpower the game. The host has the ability to customize all aspects of the game including weapon limitations, game rules, and map selection. There are only six multiplayer maps but they have enough variations to keep things fresh.

The game engine is more than capable of displaying massive levels and loads of action within those levels. The gun models are amazing and the character models and animation are particularly slick, especially those of the enemy. They might be stupid but they look good.

Special effects are off the hook with fantastic lighting, shadows, particle effects, explosions, and some wicked blurring effects that rival King Kong.

The overall presentation has its highs and lows with the high point coming at the beginning with the rocking intro movie and everything else going downhill quick with awkward menus, clumsy interface, and lengthy load times.

Sound effects are mostly gun related and in that area the sound effect are dramatic and deliver a punch. Gunfire is loud, explosions are louder, and it all surrounds you in a great Dolby Digital mix.

The voice work is pretty lame and won’t be winning any awards for quality. Of course you have to have a decent script to work from and there isn’t much of a story or quality dialogue even if they did have talent to back it up.

The true staying power in PDZ is the online play, both cooperatively and the extensive versus modes. Once you knock off those 46 Achievement point goals you can start working your way to the top of the leaderboards.

But if dominating the masses with your mad sniping and rocket launching skills is what you do best then Perfect Dark Zero is your new religion, and the Xbox 360 is the altar upon which you can sacrifice your slain enemies.