By Jim Rossignol on December 4th, 2008 at 5:55 pm.
Earlier in the year we talked about just how good Chronicles Of Riddick was. Astonishingly, the Riddick game to be released next year, Assault On Dark Athena, is not only a complete remake of that original game in Starbreeze’s modern engine, but also its sequel, with a full-length campaign of new man-butchering material. The debut trailer for this delectable double whammy is after the jump. If you’re interested, I’ve written more on my first look at the game in next month’s PC Gamer UK.
(Fans of the original game should see how many scenes from that they recognise in the trailer.)
04/12/2008 at 18:49 The Poisoned Sponge says:
I count seven, and I can’t bloody wait for this game.
04/12/2008 at 18:52 Stuk says:
I’ve heard really good things about this game (from here and friends), but I’m not sure if I should grab Chronicles, or wait to get the remake next year?
04/12/2008 at 18:58 hydra9 says:
I loved the original game and am excited for Dark Athena, but I wonder whether they will take this opportunity to change some of the few things that didn’t work in the original: Like that stupid bit, running around in the dark, shooting endlessly respawning mutants.
Come to think of it, that may have been the only bad spot in an otherwise flawless gem.
04/12/2008 at 19:04 Pags says:
I never picked up the game the first time around – didn’t enjoy the movies and assumed Vin Diesel = mindless action shooter. I guess I was wrong, so this is a nice package. Hopefully they don’t mess with the formula of what made it good too much.
Also, is there any game which actually benefits from introducing mutants halfway through? It just seems like developers can avoid that pitfall so easily by, y’know, not putting mutants in.
04/12/2008 at 19:08 mrt181 says:
as far as i remember this fine pc-gem, the mutants were alien critters, which overrun the prison because you set them free to help you escape but i could be mistaken
04/12/2008 at 19:11 Dan says:
Looks like we’re going to have to JUUUUUMP!
04/12/2008 at 19:20 hydra9 says:
@Pags: As I’m sure you’re now aware, the game is soooo much better than the movies. I thought the movies were crap, too.
@mrt181: Actually, I meant those pale skinny humanoid mutants earlier on. The bit where you’re running around in the dark, having to use flares and trying to find a bit of broken machinery so you can open a door to get out of there.
04/12/2008 at 19:24 Pags says:
Aye, I realise that now unfortunately. But at the time nothing could shake my assumption that the game would be rubbish. Sometimes you just have to be stubborn to save the pennies.
04/12/2008 at 19:31 Benny says:
As far as i’m aware the movies had alot of stuff cut from them by the studio producers, before and after filming. The game on the other hand was less prone to the crap of hollywood and ended up being excelent
Lets hope they do the same with this (and yes the mutants in the underground area were the only flaw i can really think of in the game)
Pack of menthols for a surgical eye shine please Doc!
04/12/2008 at 19:34 mrt181 says:
yes, now i remember those hillbillies before you get your shiny new eyes. that part wasn’t a flaw just a poor part of this game, imo.first game of 2009 i am excited about
04/12/2008 at 19:49 PHeMoX says:
As long as they make a PC version, it’s all good.
04/12/2008 at 19:55 roBurky says:
I never finished this, as overheating problems with my old PC meant it kept crashing and corrupting my saved games. I could only keep replaying the early levels so many times.
04/12/2008 at 19:58 artofwot says:
I’m just echoing Stuk’s comment. Should I pick up the original on Amazon right now, or wait for the remake?
04/12/2008 at 20:10 Rudolf says:
so this is lara croft, on steroids, with real killing people, and well executed dark passages…it’s riddick all right
04/12/2008 at 20:12 Tei says:
@Pags: I think (YMMV) if you like good sci-fi books, you will like the movies. There are some good sci-fic on it, and this is rare. You can put “Romeo and Juliet” in the future in a movie, but that not make Shakespeare a sci-fi author. So most “future themed” movies are not sci-fi. The movies about Riddick feel like are good sci-fi.
04/12/2008 at 20:17 mrt181 says:
@artofwot & Stuk: just wait a little longer.
04/12/2008 at 20:29 hydra9 says:
@Tei: I like good sci-fi books, but the Riddick movies just didn’t measure up. I know what you mean: The second film did aim for a sort of Dune-like feel which is incredibly rare in films. But for me, it totally failed. Didn’t help that the main villains were so lame. I liked that bounty hunter guy, though.
04/12/2008 at 20:35 mrt181 says:
i wish the devs would make games based on great scifi books instead of lame scifi movies.
04/12/2008 at 20:37 Ian says:
Wait, as well as new stuff they’re remaking the entire first game?
04/12/2008 at 20:38 artofwot says:
Just downloaded the demo of the original game, and I must say I’m impressed. It was a console port published in 2004 that had FULL widescreen support. That’s impressive enough.
Atmosphere and graphics reminded me a lot of Doom 3.
04/12/2008 at 20:39 hydra9 says:
@mrt181: ‘The Stars My Destination’ is prime material for an excellent game. However, if the movie ever gets made, it will spawn an awful tie-in game.
04/12/2008 at 20:45 Fang says:
Great game, hope they include the Dev Commentary that they added to the PC version of the original, as I missed out on it with getting the console version :/
04/12/2008 at 20:56 mrt181 says:
a game in the schismatrix plus world or of the intersolar commonwealth, could be great
i have not read ‘The Stars My Destination’ yet but it is on my reading list.
04/12/2008 at 21:09 eyemessiah says:
I hope it has the cool spinning cube menu from the original. That was great. I’d like it if they did an RPG set in the Riddick universe. Vin is the king of RPGs.
04/12/2008 at 21:14 Scandalon says:
First game – I played through a fair portion on xbox, and got stuck/bored, TBH. It was intriguing at first, but then fell into the same repetitive trap most fall into. (Also, wtf is up w/ them turning the eye-shine into some mystical, magical gift bestowed by the (Furion?) gods?)
New/Remade game – It may be more a function of art direction, but how is this a “new” engine? Looks pretty much like the old one, i.e. Doom3, i.e. nice shadows, everything looks like play-dough…
Movies – the first one was a nice small, unique movie, with some interesting concepts. The second movie was pure crap, held together only by the Riddick character.
04/12/2008 at 21:21 luphisto says:
looks awesome. always loved escape from butcher bay. and now with beter graphics!
04/12/2008 at 22:05 Lim-Dul says:
Escape from Butcher Bay was absolutely brilliant – the game was like a hundred times better than the epically shitty and stupid movie. People predicted this would begin a new age of awesome movie tie-ins and yet The Chronicles of Riddick remain unchallenged in this regard. Can’t await the sequel(ish thingie).
04/12/2008 at 22:44 MetalCircus says:
RAWK MUSIC
04/12/2008 at 22:49 Pags says:
@eyemessiah: Vin has no spell capabilities?!
04/12/2008 at 23:37 Y3k-Bug says:
Oh, I hadnt realized that it was including a REMAKE of the original game with the new game!
That’s a very nice value.
04/12/2008 at 23:50 MeestaNob! says:
That looks fantastic. Want.
They had me at ‘man in posh skivvy getting punched in face’.
05/12/2008 at 00:04 Dracko says:
Both Pitch Black and Dark Fury are all you need to see of Riddick honestly. Escape from Butcher Bay is astoundingly good. I’m really looking forward to this one.
05/12/2008 at 00:21 DeliriumWartner says:
I never liked the films so I didn’t play the original. Can I get by without liking the central character, you reckon? Seems to me most people place a lot on how cool he is, so disliking him might ruin the game.
05/12/2008 at 02:28 hydra9 says:
He seems a lot cooler when you play as him. Honestly. Download the demo – Try it out.
05/12/2008 at 04:44 Echo says:
The original game is easily my game of the year for… whatever year that was. Very amazing game, and I’m totally picking this up when it’s out.
05/12/2008 at 05:07 DigitalSignalX says:
Add another fanboy to the list, was disappointed at the time that more people didn’t jump on the “this game kicks ass” feeling, I think too many dismissed it as a gimmicky shooter trying to make a buck with a sci-fi IP. The “oh, this is actually quite a decent game” movement picked up steam at least a year after release. It still stands up against today’s 3A titles.
05/12/2008 at 09:00 Mr. President says:
I think Riddick is lame, but that didn’t stop me from enjoying the game a great deal. He’s noticeably less lame in the game btw.
05/12/2008 at 09:19 Hermit says:
Yeah, Pitch Black was a good film but Chronicles was poor. doesn’t change the fact that Butcher Bay was awesome though. If they’re still including the original game and Dark Athena as one package this is like two games in one, which is just awesome.
Saw some stuff today about the multiplayer too, the Pitch Black mode sounds highly entertaining. One bloke plays Riddick, everyone else plays soldiers with flashlights in very dark maps. Given that Hidden Source is awesome I’m surprised that it took this long for a commercial game to follow the idea up.
05/12/2008 at 09:21 Hermit says:
Also, wow, I used the word ‘awesome’ far too much there.
05/12/2008 at 09:50 karthik says:
(Fans of the original game should see how many scenes from that they recognise in the trailer.)
I counted eight. Maybe nine.
Ahh, memories. Come to think of it, Riddick looked fantastic for its time, and still does with a few tweaks. Bump the settings to pixel shader 2.0+, with everything else on high, and I’d say it comes fairly close to the trailer.
05/12/2008 at 10:11 pkt-zer0 says:
People going “wait there is a remake as well?” have it a bit backwards. This game was supposed to be a remake originally, but somehow managed to turn into a sequel over time with all the added content, apparently.
05/12/2008 at 10:23 Bobsy says:
Does it have the infamous screwdriver-sniffing thing?
05/12/2008 at 11:11 danielcardigan says:
I liked Chronicles. 1 man with a couple of knives versus about a million armoured gun toting minions? Death by tea cup? Brilliant film.
05/12/2008 at 11:22 Senethro says:
Just to clear up a little misinformation going around, Riddick does not use the Doom3 engine. Yes, it looks a little similar and came out around the same time, but its Starbreeze’s own inhouse engine.
05/12/2008 at 12:30 adem says:
Thanks danielcardigan, I thought I was the only one. I know the movies aren’t really ‘quality cinema’ but I thought they were really enjoyable for what they were.
Looking forward to this game, I was going to buy the original from eBay but I think I’ll just wait for this now instead.
05/12/2008 at 12:42 Dante says:
I’ve still got an old xbox version of the last Riddick lying around, I should really dig it out and finish it sometime.
The tutorial remains one of the most inspired I’ve ever played.
05/12/2008 at 14:30 thefanciestofpants says:
Oh hell yes.
Hopefully has ace developer commentary like Escape from butcher bay.
Love these guys
06/12/2008 at 19:30 absentblue says:
@Scandalon: It is a different engine, probably the one they used for the less-awesome-but-still-really-awesome Darkness. Like Senethro said though the first, like this one, was an in-house engine. I do remember it came out prior to Doom III and a lot of people, myself included, thought it used the id Tech 4 engine given the visual similarities.
Fantastic game though! Pitch Black was decent and I didn’t hate CoR like most people did, but EFBB made me like the Riddick character as a whole seeing him be put to good use.
Shame about that underground tunnel part, it was the one disappointing part. Not that it wasn’t fun, or was broken, or anything like that but Starbreeze maintains such a high quality that running around blowing mutants to kingdom-come end-over-end was such a contrast and a great lull to an other-wise perfectly orchestrated experience.
Definitely one of my favorite games of all time, I can’t wait for this… now I’m just wondering if I should get it for PC or 360.
07/12/2008 at 12:09 James T says:
I’m just playing it now, and that respawny tunnel part is, like, 5 minutes long. I’m pretty sure I took no damage at all; not exactly a deal-breaker, there.
It’s my first playthrough of CoR, and I’m enjoying it greatly; ‘Dark Athena’ shall have my money, appalling name be damned!
It seems unusual that it would’ve started simply as a remake though — doesn’t seem to me that Butcher Bay needs remaking even now, let alone when DA was announced about 18 months ago (although I welcome it as a bonus to a new game). It’s like remaking Half-Life 2. But I guess they’ve got their eye on the purses of people who came in with the 360/PS3. And people do prefer getting in on the ground floor, one way or another…