Black

[HaHaUK]

Been playing the Xbox version of Black this afternoon, and I'm really liking it. Best FPS I've played since COD2. Graphics and sound are superb and the gameplay is great.

Was worried that it was going to be a let down after I sampled the demo, but Criterion have impressed me.

Only slight niggles I've encountered are unskippable cutscenes between each mission And some silly AI, like a soldier running straight past me and not attacking, and another coming down the stairs, shooting one shot, and running back up

Also, it has no multiplayer But I'd prefer a really good single player game, rather than one with multiplayer, and not so good single player (ala PD0).

More impressions later!

[Flompy]

Does it work on 360?

[Yoshimax]

Yep had a blast of the xbox version of this myself and got to say it's mighty impressive - Would have loved to have seen multiplayer in there as the engine & control are tremendous - Hopefully they'll give us that with Black2 on 360

Special shout to the splash screen at the start - the rendered guns are amazing - you can sit and watch it for ages

EDIT : Dunno Haribo running it on an xbox1 myself

[HaHaUK]

Does it work on 360?

Nope.

Also like the menu system and how it seems like your reloading a gun everytime you change an option.

And when your health is really low, sound goe in slo-mo mode and sounds like some classical music.

[PeteJ]

I hear it has a pretty lazy bug in which the enemys turn on god-mode during their hit animations. If true that is pretty awful!

Doubt it is though.

Can someone test if this works on the 360?

Doubt it does though.

Anyone know if it's getting a 360 port?

Doubt it though, tbh.

[MartyG]

You do have to watch it for ages - the unskippable cut scenes mean it takes nearly 7 minutes before you actually get to play anything - there's no good reason not to make these skippable, because they're in no way essential to actually playing the game.

The games does look great (Xbox version), and the levels are massive, but the AI sucks big time, and that blur effect, although great at first soon becomes annoying. If you can't get head shots, which can be a pain given the AI and difficulty being stealthy, it takes nearly a entire magazine to kill things.

Done the first two levels, and other than the snazzy gfx I'm finding this a fairly average experience atm.

[HaHaUK]

It does'nt work on 360

[Baseley09]

The enemies take too many shots, unless in the head.

Your guy walks too slowly.

Other than those minor gripes, highly impressive, them levels are BIG, im not used to long missions i seriously need a rest after each one.

[yosai]

Had a quick blast too. Echoing the above, the cut scenes are ****e and annoying but the game delivers where it counts. The first level ain't so hot but the next two seem a lot better. Blowing **** up is great.

Players can choose the Southpaw controls which is always a bonus, for me at least.

[anephric]

I've completed this up, down, left and right in two evenings: it's well short.

Nice enough, but not, like, a huge splurge of gun porn love.

[chopemon]

the cut scenes are done in real time but with no functionality for either fast forwarding or skipping in the engine. i've implemented cutscenes like that in games and i know why its happened although it should never ever happen anymore

it was down to work on 360. MS were hoping to have it backwards compatible on release day but it doesn't look like it will be (according to someone at criterion)

[anephric]

It isn't. According to Criterion it's MS's job to get it working via emulation, not theirs. What do you mean about realtime cutscenes, btw? It's live action.

[Mephistopheles]

You do have to watch it for ages - the unskippable cut scenes mean it takes nearly 7 minutes before you actually get to play anything - there's no good reason not to make these skippable, because they're in no way essential to actually playing the game.

The games does look great (Xbox version), and the levels are massive, but the AI sucks big time, and that blur effect, although great at first soon becomes annoying. If you can't get head shots, which can be a pain given the AI and difficulty being stealthy, it takes nearly a entire magazine to kill things.

Done the first two levels, and other than the snazzy gfx I'm finding this a fairly average experience atm.

Ditto mate. Graphics and sound effects aside, it's a bog-standard FPS and gets repetitive quick since you've seen all its tricks half-way through. You can't save until you've completed an entire level - which can sometimes take an hour. The more guns you get, the more you'll notice that most of them feel exactly the same (ie. the ones with burst/single/auto options). Plus the probs you mentioned and its short length.

It's alright for PS2, but there are far superior FPS on Xbox (HL2, Farcry etc.) Gets a 6/10 from me.

[chopemon]

It isn't. According to Criterion it's MS's job to get it working via emulation, not theirs. What do you mean about realtime cutscenes, btw? It's live action.

oh right, well the live action unskippable cut scenes is standard EA practice (lor of the rings games)

i was referring to the in game ones. there are some (at least in the demo) that use in game stuff. these are worked out via in game AI and thats why they are unskippable.

in the demo there is a little cut scene of two dude fighting the enemies. this was put together in the engine in the level editor. its not a cutscene in the normal sense of the word

[anephric]

In the release version of the game it's just live action - no in-engine stuff, apart from loading screens and menu backgrounds.