My open letter to Criterion involving this game. Also helpful if you're wondering if it's worth your money.
Before I begin, I would like to say that I thoroughly enjoyed the Burnout series of games, even if I have only played one installment as I write this letter (Burnout 3: Takedown on the PlayStation 2). I am happy for you to branch out into other genres, as making the same game every single time can seem boring. However, I feel that your first effort, Black, a first-person shooter on the Microsoft Xbox, is not your finest hour. So you make a first-person shooter, where you basically shoot a lot of things and get to the end of a stage, like most games in that genre. In this day and age, first-person shooters are a dime a dozen, and the trick of making a shooter memorable, or at least passably enjoyable, is to have a good story, decent shooting mechanics, an occasional break from a gunfight, smart and challenging A.I., and multiplayer. And you got about 2 of those right.
First off, I must say that the plot is very forgettable. I didn't even know of the protagonist's name (Jack Kellar) until very late in the game. So he plays this Black Ops soldier, or something, and has to assassinate this terrorist person of whom I forgot their name. See, what would have helped is if you told me who this guy is, his back story, and what the game's about in more than these FMV cutscenes. Now, I'm not saying that you didn't tell us the story, because you guys did, but you didn't tell us ENOUGH of the story. If you're gonna shroud it in mystery, let us at least find out more of the story for ourselves somehow. By the way, these FMV cutscenes are decent, and show of good FMV, when nowadays it's strictly verboten to put FMV in video games after the hell of FMV games in the 1990's.
I do appreciate the locales that Kellar goes to. Mostly Eastern European locations, with forests, a large bridge, even a gulag. However, it seems that these places are painfully linear, with only a few locations to branch out to, leading all to the same area needed to progress. Dynamic level structure would've been nice, and a few more levels than just 8 would've been better. Even the most famous and well-received of first-person shooters have more levels than that. Making them excessively long with only 2-3 checkpoints per stage is also frustrating, as well. It also bothers me that you don't effectively use the Xbox's hard drive to insert quick saving and quick loading, like a PC game. Other games like Splinter Cell and Max Payne gave the opportunity on that platform, and it would've made the game less frustrating at points. It's never fun to go back through the same area several times over a 30 minute period.
Since this isn't about aliens conquering Earth or some other clichéd Sci-Fi plot, I can understand why there's only humans. But wouldn't it have killed you to make the enemy AI a little sharper? I've seen enemies run past me, not notice me even though I'm in sight, not take cover, and rarely flank. Some even stupidly prop themselves near dangerous flammable barrels. Your AI rivals EA's Goldeneye: Rogue Agent in absolute stupidity. And that was made two years before Black was. Also, why do enemies with special weapons like shotguns take more damage? Even if you had the most powerful of kevlar armor, it shouldn't take you 3-4 shotgun shells to down those types of enemies. By the way, the game's hit detection is spotty. I've made several shots that clearly look like fatal headshots, only to find out it hit their neck/chest region and just made them flinch. This becomes very problematic when there's large chunks of enemies, and some are at a distance.
I will say that the game looks damn good. With all the bloom effects, blurring and some of the graphic quality, I swear I was playing a first-generation Xbox 360 game. So, bravo on that. Having destructible environments helps as well. However, a lot of dust tends to appear in heavy firefights, making it real hard to see in some areas. But, for the record, other games like Monolith's F.E.A.R. had similar problems, but not as severe as how you made it. It can become a gameplay disadvantage, especially since the enemies have somewhat hack-like aim, no matter what the situation is.
Remember the "gun porn" angle? You probably blocked it out of your minds, but let me refresh you. See, gun porn, when you usually ask Joe Schmoe, implies that you're gonna put guns in erotic positions. But then you clarified saying "the guns were the star of the game." I was expecting relatively realistic firearms. But there's loads of inaccuracies. Like I've never heard of a "DC-3 Elite" pistol. Or of AK-47s with an charging handle on the left side (Played a bit too much Counter-Strike while making this?). Or that most of the weapons have ammo capacities that are about 2-3 times the size of the actual weapon's magazine. I can understand why you did it this way, to make it have more of an "action movie" feel, but next time, make them at least ACT realistically, could you? I'm not saying that the guns aren't fun to wield, but they should at least be realistic. Also, I'm not saying the game should be uber-realistic, as I got other games to satiate my urges for that. Besides, this game has medkits and health packs, which are a good thing in this day and age, what with all these developers ripping off Halo's regenerating health/armor system. Which is quite stupid.
I must give you guys props for making the guns at least sound meaty enough to give a sense of satisfaction upon using them. And even though there's not much voice acting, I guess that's a good enough job as well. Getting Chris Tilton to do the score was a decent plan, but the problem is that parts just sound too much like most other action movie scores. It's sad, because there's a good score here, but it's in-one-ear, out-the-other. Forgettable.
Now, once I beat this game, I found out it was fairly short for a first-person shooter. 5-6 hours? Perhaps for other genres, but shooters need to be at least 8-10 hours. And if you're making Black shorter than a traditional FPS, then you need to put in incentives to extend the playtime of the game. Unlocking silver weapons on the skill level you beat is a step in the right direction, but what about cheats? Other weapons? Behind-the-scenes goodies? It's a bit lacking here, Criterion.
And no multiplayer? There are shooters that can get away with no multiplayer, like Deus Ex and BioShock, but not Black. Hell, Black would've definitely benefited from a multiplayer, even if it was a bog-standard deathmatch mode. But when it's singleplayer-only and lasts only 5-6 hours, it's seriously lacking. It makes the game only worthwhile to play once, finish, then put away with the rest of my game library.
I'm gonna finish this open letter now. Criterion, you make a good racing game series. I hope you keep that up. But if you ever make another first-person shooter, or even a Black 2, please learn from the mistakes that you made with this game. Good A.I., a reliable story, realistic but enjoyable weaponry. And some multiplayer. You made mistakes that rookie game developers make, which makes me feel like you stuck your C team on this game while your A and B teams were busy with Burnout Paradise. So please, learn from your mistakes. Otherwise, stick to making Burnout because you'll never make it as a shooter developer.
Sincerely,
B.J. Brown