I recently got my hands on a copy of Black for the Xbox. I was always intrigued by Criterion's vision, so I wanted to see whether they achieved it or not. Now I know Black is considered an 'old' game now, but after experiencing it on my Xbox 360 with surround sound, I've not really been complaining about its age. It looks so much sharper on the Xbox 360 and there are literally no framerate issues. The first couple of levels look a bit bland, but once you're past them, you see some incredible stuff.



The enemy A.I might be a bit stupid, but when you're surrounded and you've got an RPG aimed at you, its quite a challenge to stay alive. I'm very impressed with the look, sound and feel of the weapons. It just feels like Criterion have put a lot of work into making the weapons as realistic as possible. The music is definitely a highlight of the game, just because it makes you feel like you're in a BIG Hollywood action movie and it works perfectly with the different levels.



I have some criticisms though. The most obvious one is the lack of a multiplayer. It would have been nice to see some kind of multiplayer, even a very basic one would have been nice. I also feel that the saving system was a bit annoying, as you have to use checkpoints that happen rarely during each level. The storyline seemed rather uninteresting and tiresome, I just wanted to continuing playing the game rather than having to endure the cut-scenes telling the story.



Black has all the 'ingredients' you require to make an entertaining FPS. I'll probably play it all over again at some point because I enjoyed it so much.

---

I finally saw the V for Vendetta film. It was quite good and Hugo Weaving was superb as V, but if they just made it more like the book (e.g having it set the 1980s) then it would have been so much better.