BlackSite: Area 51

"Blacksite is nothing special"

I would like to start this review by noting this to the fans of the original 2005 Area 51- Blacksite is almost nothing like it. Yes, it is an FPS, but I think it's safe to say that the Area 51 was a much better game, even though its graphics may not be as good.

The main reason I bought blacksite was because I was hoping that it would continue or elaborate on where the story left off in the original. Unfortunately, it does nothing of the sort.

This game has caught some awful reviews, and with good reason. The main flaw of the game is that it's filled with technical bugs- I'm using a 9400 GT graphics card and the menu stutters on me all too often. I can spend as much as 10 minutes trying to get the menu to run properly. However, I'm a man of patience and I'm willing to wait that long- the game seems interesting and I was a fan of the original, so I should like this game at least somewhat.

The game offers 3 difficulty levels- Code Yellow, Code Orange, and Code Red (A nod to the terror alerts of the Bush era). I decided to go with Code Orange and see how hard the game was.

The game starts off with you- playing as Aeran Pierce, captain of Echo squad- and two of your squad members riding in the back of a wagon of an Iraqi civilian attempting to get you two an alleged WMB bunker. The action starts almost immediately as you and your buddies are discovered and fired upon by the Iraqis. The game play is similar to most first person shooters- there's ammo, aim-down-sight, grenades, and places to take cover. I thought it was interesting how you could command your squad to concentrate fire on certain enemies, or move to certain areas, though it's often unnecessary because they do these things themselves.

If you manage to get past the menu and into the game, it can actually be quite satisfying. There's some blood, but not much. I never encountered any stuttering except for at the beginning of certain missions, and the guns have just the right amount of kick. However, what worried me deeply is that there are only 7 weapons- a disturbingly low amount for an FPS. You have your standard weapons- M4 assault rifle, desert eagle, javelin missile launcher and sniper rifle. Then there two interesting weapons, the scatter gun and the plasma rifle. These are more advanced weapons which are more powerful than the standard guns but aren't as rapid.

The game will last you about 3 hours; depending on how often you stutter and how much time you spend exploring. There are items in game that you can pick up and look at later, but I was too afraid the menu would stutter again I didn't bother doing that. There are some vehicles, but often you have no choice but to ride in them and you don't always get to pick whether you are gunner or driver. You're usually fighting with only two other people, but at some points you can be fighting as many as 10 others.

The game demands a beefed up video card, but surprisingly enough the graphics aren't all that great. The game is blurry and it's difficult to pick things apart in terrain which is troublesome, especially when you're looking for something that is supposed to advance the plot.

The game seems to revolve around the Bush administration era, and ask the question- what if things had gone worse? Society seems to be nearing collapse and the whole mood of the game is pretty depressing if you play it for a while. I have to note though that the game does actually have a deeper lesson and is more about just blowing stuff up- it concerns controversial topics like GI testing, chemical and biological weapons, civil unrest and government takeover as well as cover-ups of sensitive information.

Don't ask me about the multiplayer aspect because there is none- I'm patient but the amount of time it takes to find a game is just too long. If your computer can handle the menus without stuttering, then hopefully you'll be able to get into a multiplayer game. It has the general deathmatch and CTF games, but what seemed interesting was abduction mode- one player starts off as a "reborn" while everyone else is "US military". When a "reborn" kills a "US" player then the US player turns into a reborn after spawning, and it continues until there are no US players left.

All in all the game is decent, but not good. I generally prefer the single player aspect of most games so the online part didn't bother me. In fact, I liked the campaign so much that I'm going to play it a second time- after that though; I will definitely install it because it is not enough fun to justify clogging up 15 GB of my limited disk space.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 06/18/09

Game Release: BlackSite: Area 51 (US, 11/12/07)