Darksiders is a great game that can feel reminiscent of previous games in its genre, but it still has a original story.
In Darksiders, you play as War, one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse whose job is to fight in the cataclysmic confrontation between the forces of Heaven, Hell and Earth on Judgment Day. The game kicks off when War is summoned to earth before the seal which holds him and the other horsemen is officially broken, which triggers the apocalypse early, before Mankind is ready. As a result Mankind is utterly destroyed and the balance between good and evil is "thrown off" forever. War is blamed by his shady masters, "The Council," who are in charge of maintaining the good-evil balance, for the destruction of mankind and the resulting imbalance in the universe. He is sentenced to return to demon infested and shattered earth to try and unravel the mystery of his betrayal and bring retribution for the crime or to die in the process.
The game's story is very intriguing and even though it is completely over the top and outlandish in the extreme, it never feels silly. There are plenty of twists and surprises and despite the fact that War himself seems little more than a reticent roving death engine, dealing out hefty amounts of slaughter and mayhem to both angels and demons alike, the supporting characters are surprisingly deep and for the most part, likable. From the oddly Scottish Giant-like Ulthane, to your demon buddy Sameal, each of the supporting characters have their own unique charm and motivations which help bring some realism to an otherwise insane world of wanton carnage. The world itself is unique due to it's range of influences, including the biblical (obviously as it's dealing with angels, demons and the apocalypse), literary (Paradise Lost) and random references to modern film and pop culture (the gladiator scene), but none of these influences "take over" and Darksiders manages to use them and make them it's own unique story. This is probably the factor that really sets Darksiders apart in a genre that is full of games with relatively shallow stories. The game is mostly linear however, and the story plays out in a typical mission, cutscene, mission sequence, but it doesn't detract from the enjoyment of the game at all and the music and sound effects are suitably epic at the right moments.
The technical aspects of the game are both hit and miss. The art style is very intriguing and is in the vein of Blizzard style character presentation, with a focus on very large and imposing environments that are pleasantly diverse and relatively unique in each of their respective presentations. However, the game tends to have visible screen tearing and anti-aliasing issues during actual gameplay that are somewhat distracting and take away from the experience and the ability to appreciate the style. The cutscenes are thankfully free of this problem and are relatively problem free which allows you to see the potential of the unique art style in representing the imagination of Joe Madureira. The control scheme is relatively simple and intuitive and it presents a simple enough configuration for beginners, with the standard actions (attack, block, dash etc.) mapped to easily reached buttons, while providing more advanced options for players to chain different abilities and attacks into gruesome combos. The combat itself is very fluid. All of War's attacks, spells and abilities flow into each other with relative ease and it doesn't ever feel "clunky." It is also worth mentioning that every enemy that War faces has its own very entertaining "finishing move," which, once at low enough health becomes available to War and at the push of a button, has him perform a suitably visceral and gory coup de grace to the enemy.
There are a slew of abilities and weapons available to War that are unlocked either through various dungeons as the game progresses a la Zelda, or are purchased along with upgrades and abilities from the game's friendly neighborhood vendor demon Vulgrim. Upgrades include upgrades for your main weapon, War's sword "Chaoseater," various spells including "Blade Gyser," an area of effect attack centered on War and "Affliction", a damage over time effect that jumps from enemy to enemy, as well as ability upgrades for War's secondary weapons and passive abilities. Most of these upgrades come from Vulgrim, however some of them are found in caches hidden throughout the game world. Vulgrim, provides War with various upgrades and items in exchange for a modest amount of "souls" which are the game's primary currency. Souls are gathered from slaying enemies, destroying items or from various soul caches and chests located throughout the game's environments and dungeons. The Vulgrim ability upgrade system allows plenty of player choice in choosing which of War's abilities to upgrade, although, because of the large amount of upgrades and then the subsequent tiers, it becomes difficult to gather enough souls to buy all of them in one play through. This means that you will inevitably have to choose which weapons you prefer and upgrade those at the expense of others.
The gameplay itself can be extremely difficult at times, especially on Apocalypse, the hardest setting, and can get immensely frustrating, especially early in the game when you have limited health and abilities. However, as the game progresses and War's health increases and you gain more abilities it does get significantly easier. Most of the boss fights are immensely epic in both presentation and execution and definitely leave you with the impression and satisfaction that you actually accomplished something epic. However, the mini bosses are sometimes harder than the main bosses. Nothing is more frustrating than beating a huge monstrous boss and then getting trashed repeatedly by "Joe Shmo the stompy demon." Besides the difficulty of combat, the puzzles are for the most part pretty simple with only one or two encroaching into "completely unintuitive land." However, just like its inspiration, Darksiders has a tendency to follow the Zelda formula of welcome to Dungeon X, where you will find the Y. You will use Y in Dungeon X to solve the majority of puzzles and fight boss Z. Not to say that it doesn't work, but for those who have played any of the Zelda games it will feel really familiar. Darksiders breaks off from the typical Zelda pattern in its inclusion of combat based challenges which help break up the puzzle, puzzle, boss chain and allow you to get in there and do what War does best, chop up some bad dudes.
Essentially, when it's all said and done, Darksiders is a fun game and it's a great addition to the action-adventure genre that pays homage to the best, but doesn't really do too much that we haven't seen before. Taking all things into consideration, I would give it an 8.5 out of 10.