Perfect Dark

"A definite tribute to the pinnacle of FPS gaming."

There are certain games that you just can't leave them, they are magnetic and unforgettable. They just have that essence which will always makes you want to come back for more, even just to run the game and see its title screen. This is what I feel about Perfect Dark, a glorious masterpiece which can only be interpreted by splitting it into little parts, because each second of its gameplay, each detail and each bit of its quality would give ideas to write encyclopedias about how to create video games. This is definitely my all time favourite video game I have ever had the pleasure of playing in my whole life of gaming, which is more than 20 years, and I still play through it every other month. So that's why I am here.

Perfect Dark does what no other First Person Shooter does. It provides great music, varied missions, a huge range of weapons and gadgets, a vast replay value, nonlinear gameplay, well designed characters, the best firing range I have ever seen in a video game, cool mission objectives, an original story and especially a huge array of settings and features which suit everyone's playing style. As you can see, there is so much to mention I don't know where to start!



GRAPHICS & FRAME RATE:

The graphics are pure awesomeness. They maintain an inordinate level of creativity and detail, ranging from the astounding sparkling effects of lights to those scrolling green texts usually seen on computers, or the beautiful rain in the Chicago mission, which gives a beautiful cyberpunk atmosphere to the game. Each texture is perfectly rendered and rich in colour, you won't even see those square pixels on them if you get too close. In addition, large areas have a long draw distance and no distance fog, thus allowing you to smartly use the sniper rifle in outdoor missions, such as Carrington Villa or Crash Site. Sadly, the frame rate may suffer in certain situations, but this is definitely an OVERRATED flaw because it doesn't bash its gameplay excellence at all. Believe me, I've been playing this game since it came out and I haven't had any problems with this issue. The game just has some minor and irrelevant slowdowns which are only common if you play with a mess of simulants and players, or when there are a lot of explosions. Seriously, it is not as bad as it seems. Rareware no doubt did a remarkable effort in order to keep the frame rate smooth and acceptable.

On the other hand, the game also features a blur effect when you are sedated or punched and has an orange effect if you are hit when carrying a shield. Also, unlike its predecessor, each weapon has its unique and bad ass reload animation and this fact gives personality to the character, rest assured Joanna is pretty damn good! Also, rooms become darker if lights are destroyed whereas gun fires light them. There is quite a cool and well designed contrast between dark and light. Animations are very fluid and don't feature any robotic movement, they also fit properly with the voice acting. Like its predecessor, bullet holes are surprisingly good, and by meaning surprisingly good I mean great 3D-looking holes which can vary depending on the type of wall: wood, metal, tile or cement. These little details may sound stupid but they give a realistic feel to the game, with great physics, not to mention the brilliant enemy hit reactions or the blood animation. Simply WOW. Overall, the graphics are outstanding and are the main reason why this game is so clean and so pleasant to look at.


MUSIC & SOUND:

As with any Rareware game, such as GoldenEye 007, Banjo-Kazooie or Conker's Bad Fur Day, music and sound effects are by far one of the high points of this game. Aside the game being rich in ambient sounds, each level provides incredibly well composed techno and industrial rock tunes which set the stage. Notice that these tunes are also part of the attraction in Perfect Dark because they seriously draw you into the missions, they even make you hum while playing. Furthermore, when the action is increased in certain levels, tracks become faster, more stunning and powerful in order to put you even deeper into the mood. I still remember the first time I listened to the Carington Institute X track at the ending of the Carrington Institute mission. Believe me, I ended up crying tears of joy! As for the sound, everything has a specific high quality sound effect. Each weapon has their amazing and realistic gunfire and gun discharging sound. Footsteps sounds vary depending on what kind of floor you step, I particularly love the sound effect of metallic stairs, I still have it stuck in my head. You can also hear enemy footsteps if he or she is getting closer or bullet cases hitting the floor when you stop firing. Also, the bullet impact sound when you hit an enemy, which is too bad ass. In addition, each character has their clear and own voice (not common for a N64 game), aside their superb voice acting. And you can even hear enemies talking, calling for help or getting frightened when you suddenly show up. Just brilliant. I wouldn't be surprised if this game won an Academy Award for best sound effects.


GAMEPLAY & REPLAY VALUE:

Yay! This is where things start getting real good. I'm going to go into it in depth because it is where the game absolutely excels. The gameplay in Perfect Dark is so damn perfect that will keep you interested in the game FOREVER, seriously, it is just too awesome. No matter how hard developers try, even with online features, the gameplay of this game simply cannot be topped. Anyway, I will firstly start talking about its huge range of weapons and gadgets because they have a strong influence on the gameplay.

The game has nearly 40 distinct weapons, ranging from Silenced Pistols to Missile Launchers, Alien Weapons or all sort of grenades, and all of them have two functions, where the secondary one is usually useful in a particular situation. This is probably one of my favourite features in Perfect Dark because it enrichs the gameplay with A LOT of tricks in the campaign mode and makes the multiplayer mode extremely fun. Keep in mind that secondary functions weren't just put there so that the game sounded great, no. They really offer a strategy and are actually the main reason why it is possible to complete the toughest missions. I will give you some specific examples later. On the other hand, the game also offers more than 20 gadgets which are mainly designed in order to complete mission objectives, such as Keycards, Explosives, the Data Uplink, Night Vision Goggles or the well known CamSpy, which is a remote camera designed for stealth recording. Regarding mission objectives, rest assured they aren't repetitive at all, I mean, they are not the kind of, you know, "go there and press that button". Instead, they do offer plenty of diversity to keep you engaged, from disguising oneself to ordering a particular employee to access some files for you, but you have to be very careful because he might cheat and sound a nearby alarm or delete the files you were interested in, notice surprises are quite common in this game. Overall, objectives also have a strong influence on the missions.

As for its brilliant story mode, Perfect Dark provides 17 main levels which are grouped into 9 unique missions, 3 extra levels known as special assignments and a minigame know as the duel. 17 + 3 + 1. Got it? Now, unlike most First Person Shooters, where the story mode looks like a linear adventure, these levels are quite short and don't feature any save points. Actually, when you complete a level you are asked whether you want to play the next level or whether you want to come back to the main menu. Like GoldenEye 007, all of them can be accessed through the menu and are essentially designed to be played plenty of times. I just loved this system because it gives a nonlinear structure to the game, which is mainly focused on a vast replay value. In addition, each level can be played through 3 remarkable difficulties: the easiest being Agent, medium is Special Agent and the hardest is the joy of Perfect Agent, which is what the game is all about. To each higher difficulty, the game adds more objectives to the missions and, in certain cases, new paths and areas. Also, damage is strongly increased against you, shields are removed and the AI is increased whereas ammunition is decreased, nevertheless enemies still require the same amount of hits to kill them. This feature is really great because it maintains the same spy excellence instead of turning it into a massive gameplay.

The hardest difficulty offers a surprisingly dynamic gameplay because everything depends on how you face your smart enemies. Unlike GoldenEye 007, guards can call for help and sound nearby alarms. They can also throw grenades and can easily be altered if you don't use silenced weapons, rest assured surprises are simply astounding, even better than some recent games. Perfect Agent is pretty challenging but not frustrating and everything has a well designed strategy, it actually requires more brain than skill and that's why it is so awesome. You have to study and decide which is the best way to get to a certain point, because missions aren't linear and provide alternative paths, you also have to save your ammo and go for headshots by sneaking up behind the enemy, and you especially have to know how to benefit from secondary functions of weapons in order to achieve a particular purpose. For instance, the primary function of the Dragon is a Machine Gun and the secondary one is a Proximity Mine. Now, if you are in a corridor and you know enemies will come to you from both sides, you can place the Proximity Dragon in one of the two sides and cover the other side by using other weapon from your inventory. This helps a lot, it is extremely useful in order to preempt troubles. Also, if you have to enter a room and you don't know whether or not it is filled with enemies, just use your Laptop Gun as a Sentry Gun and place it in front of the door, then open it without being seen, cool eh? Or you can even use the cloak function of the RC-P120 in order to skip more enemies. Regarding the X-Ray Scanner, it is also very useful because it allows you to track enemies. Overall, the playability in Perfect Agent is very dynamic and well balanced, it always keeps on changing in different ways, it is actually so awesome that it doesn't even matter how many times you replay through a mission because it will always be different, just like a chess match.

The story mode also provides a ton of replay value because it takes quite a while to beat the missions on every difficulty. In addition, if that wasn't enough for you, more than 40 cheats can be unlocked by completing missions through a certain difficulty under a time limit. This is one of the most challenging feature in Perfect Dark because it requires you to master the game, it actually took me more than 4 years in order to unlock all of them. Cheats are great and add even more replay to the missions because you can always try new things with them. For instance, the perfect darkness cheat makes levels pitch dark but gives you Night Vision Goggles, this is great because enemies won't see you so easily. Or the Enemy Rockets cheat, where all the guards carry Rocket Launchers, completing a missions using this cheat is extremely fun and challenging. There are also classic ones, such as invincible or unlimited ammo. Aside cheats, three new missions (the special assignments) are your reward by completing the three difficulties, one for each difficulty. And my favourite, once you beat all the missions on Perfect Agent, you will gain access to the Perfect Dark setting, which is basically an enemy editor where you can edit enemy's health, damage and accuracy. So, here you can create your own difficulty. Not yet satisfied? The game also offers a full co/counter-op mode which was pretty unbelievable at that time and it is surprisingly good, especially for the N64 processor because it is only a little bit slow and laggy in outdoor missions, but nothing that affects the whole gaming experience of co/counter-op. And you know what? Cheats and the Perfect Dark editor can also be used in co/counter-op mode, thus making it possible to have the same experience with two players.

The multiplayer, known as Combat Simulator, is legendary. The options available here have never been equalled in any game since: You can create sims (bots), any number of teams, choice of which weapons appear where on any level, health editor, 6 gametypes with their particular settings, 6 sim difficulties, 12 sim personalities, music settings, limits settings and much more. The most remarkable feature is that sims are fully customizable, this means you can edit their appearance, difficulty and personality, ranging from cowards to judges. This is definitely one of the best feature in Combat Simulator because you can have unique experiences. For instance, the Judge Sim will only attack the winning player, so be careful if you are on top. There is also the Prey Sim, which will only attack players who have low health. Or the Venge Sim, which will always attack the last player who killed him, and more, up to 12 distinct personalities. As you can see, this feature is extremely fun, especially if you increase their difficulties to almost unbeatable, and although they don't place mines, they do use secondary functions, so they can disarm, cloak themselves and more. Also, you can order sims from your team to do tasks and there are different orders whether or not you are in a different gametype. For example, in King of the Hill mode, where the player must hold the Hill in order to achieve points. Now, if your team has sims, you can order one of them (or all of them) to hold the current Hill for you. Meanwhile, you can go to another area where the next Hill may appear. What I'm meaning is that the playability in Combat Simulator is tremendous because of the sims and will never be boring, even if you are playing alone because there is plenty of variety to keep you on the edge of your seat. This is what I call the pinnacle of FPS gaming!

On the other hand, the Combat Simulator also provides 30 default challenges which must be completed in order to unlock new settings, such as characters, gametypes, arenas, more weapons, up to 8 sims in a match, and much more. Keep in mind that the game doesn't give you all the different settings from the beginning, no, it is actually a hard work to unlock the coolest stuff because everything has a prize in Perfect Dark. This is great because it makes the game very challenging and highly addictive. And let me tell you about the player stats. The game records everything for you, such as the number of enemies killed, headshots, games won, deaths, played time, ammo used, etc. so that you are given a rank and rewarded with medals based on how well you play. There are 21 ranks, 21 being labeled as beginner and rank 1 being perfect, I actually don't know anyone who have reached the rank 1. Mine is the rank of Elite at 4 and I've played more than 800 matches. Anyway, if you reach rank 1 the game will give you a login and a password. Oh, I forgot to mention that this game has a lot of mysteries which continue to defy explanation nowadays. In my opinion, this just proves that developers put plenty of love in this game. Overall, as you can see, the replay value is endless in Perfect Dark.

And now, let's switch to the icing on the cake, which is the fantastic Carrington Institute. The Carrington Institute is like the central hub of the entire game. Actually, Perfect Dark's Main Menu is the Pause Menu of the Carrington Institute, so you can always come back to it by pressing the Start button. Anyway, the Institute is a place which can be explored by the player and has quite a lot of offices and terminals which provide you information about the background story of Perfect Dark, the plot itself, characters, the different places you have visited during your missions, as well as weapons and gadgets. In addition, it features 3 training areas: the device training, the HR training and the well known firing range, which allows you to try out all the weapons available in the game. Notice that each weapon has their three difficulty medals (bronze, silver and gold) and a particular target program for each medal, thus making the firing range varied enough and fun because each weapon offers you their unique gameplay, including their secondary functions. It is very challenging, especially the gold medals, because the game records targets destroyed, accuracy and time, and you have to achieve a specific overall score based on these stats. My favourite? The gold level of the Tranquilizer: your ammo limit is 18 and you have to destroy 18 targets under 15 seconds, each target will appear in a different spot and will just take one shot to destroy so you have to make sure that you don't miss any. GREAT! In addition, if you achieve all the gold medals the game will unlock classic weapons (the ones from GoldenEye 007) to use in the missions. Plus, if you complete the three training areas, a new minigame (the duel) will be added to the game. Ha! Talk about replay! To summarize, there will always be a reward if you achieve something required. Seriously, this game will NEVER bore you!


CONTROLS:

Controls mean A LOT to a Console First Person Shooter because they can easily ruin the whole game if they are not good enough. Rareware absolutely did a great work, they took the superb controls from its predecessor and made sure to improve them where they used to fail. They added a crosshair to the HUD, this may sound stupid but it really helps because it allows you to easily aim and move simultaneously, without holding the R button which prevents you from moving. They also added a quick menu to easily select a certain weapon or gadget which saves you from the slow weapon-switching. In addition, unlike GoldenEye 007, the start button will INSTANTLY pull up the Pause Menu. This fact is really great because it prevents you from being hit if an enemy shows up and start shooting at you while you are waiting for the tedious menu. Notice that it is very common to use the Pause Menu in Perfect Dark or GoldenEye 007 because it provides a lot of useful information, such as your health, objectives, mission briefings and your inventory, which is notably useful to select a specific item in speedruns, so this improvement is more important than you think.

On the other hand, the Stick and C buttons feature a surprisingly high accuracy level. The responsiveness and fluidity of Joanna's actions are just too awesome. Watch as she gently turns around without any sudden movements, how she cleanly reloads guns right after pressing the B button or how she moves her weapon when she walks or aims. The high level of quality is remarkable and it is the main reason why you really feel the character when you play the game. Although the N64 controller only has one analogic stick, Perfect Dark knows how to benefit from it. The vertical axis of the stick allows you to move forward or backward and the horizontal axis is used for turning (left or right), whereas up/down C buttons allow you to look up/down, and you can strafe by pressing the right/left C button. As you can see, player and camera movements are very well balanced because they feature a semi-analogic design and that's why it is very easy to aim. Of course, these are the default controls, because the game provides up to 8 controller configurations, aside specific options such as the inversion of the axes or whether or not you want to hold the R button to target manually. You can even use two controllers (one on each hand) and use both sticks to control player and camera movements, I have never tried it though. Overall, controls couldn't be any better for a N64 controller.


STORY (NO SPOILERS):

Combined with unique characters, an incredible voice acting, an original and entertaining plot, a superb and fun screenplay and beautifully detailed cutscenes with great background music, the story is no doubt a true work of artists. The humour is all there and make you feel the charm of Rareware. Regarding the development, at the beginning you don't have a clue about the story, but you will eventually find it out as you progress. I especially liked this fact because it kept me engaged a lot, which is the most important. Also, the storyline is very well put together and everything has a reason, and you can have a look at the terminals of the Institute or you can replay any cutscenes from the options menu if you miss something. Seriously, I really enjoyed Perfect Dark's story.



In conclusion, Rareware has done the impossible and made a game which is still unrivaled nine years after its release. I bet that if they showed a preview of this game to the people of Nintendo when the N64 was released in 1996, the people of Nintendo would tell them that it is impossible to develop such an advanced game for the N64 system, and that they would have to wait until the next generation comes out if they want to create a game of this caliber. But Rareware made it and PROVED that magic exists! Oh, and I forgot to mention, Perfect Dark's size is only 32MB, so yes, magic exists. Personally, I honestly doubt I will cherish a game as much as I cherished Perfect Dark in my lifetime. I literally fell in love with it the first time I played it, at the age of 15, and knew it would always have a special place in my heart. GOD, it is just too awesome, it is not just my favourite game, but my favourite product. As if it isn't obvious, I'm giving this game a 10/10. Congratulations British people of Rareware for this loudly crafted masterpiece, as well as the rest of your BRILLIANT franchises, you absolutely have gained my respect. Finally, you know the definite tribute: Perfect Dark IS forever.

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 11/11/09

Game Release: Perfect Dark (EU, 06/30/00)