A blow to the heart had hit me and all the fans of the series when, like a bolt from the blue, Vigil Games e THQ had declared closure, leaving many titles vacant including those of the Darksiders saga. The adventure of the four knights had interested millions of players with the ending of the first Darksiders, while the second chapter had thrown some light and many doubts on the complete story. Fortunately THQ Nordic, after forming a development team called Gunfire Games (containing most of the ex-Vigil Games employees who had worked on one or both chapters), took over the brand - along with other games from the same company - bringing us today to live the adventures of Furia, Horseman of the Apocalypse, in Darksiders III.
A single moment
As has already happened in the first two chapters, this too takes place in the same time frame: the start of the story will be right in front of War, chained in front of theArso Council. But if Guerra tried to prove his innocence e Death he wanted to find proof, the mission of Furia it is quite different: finding and capturing the seven deadly sins, creatures who have been released back to earth and who, to avoid serious consequences, will have to be re-imprisoned and taken to the Council. If the first time, however, the four knights had completed the mission together, this time Fury - for reasons well known - will have to do it alone, together with her whip of blades and her magic. Accompanying her, again acting as a dialogue shoulder, there will be a Sentinel, sent by the Council precisely to help (or better, control), the work of Furia. If from the narrative side then the formula will be almost similar, especially in the way used to show us the game story, the character of Furia is very different from that of the two brothers we have known: more enterprising and self-confident, she has always had the desire to be in command of the Knights, considering herself better than them. Despite this, in the game the nuances of the character will gradually show themselves, aiming at an ever deeper psychological revelation as the game progresses.
Knight you have, Gameplay you find
We saw the damage resistance of War, which transformed the feel of the game into something more steady, with groups of enemies ready to attack in large numbers, and we saw the customization of the equipment that was in Darksiders II, capable of give a different modus operandi depending on the style of play we wanted to have. Fury in Darksiders III goes back to basics a bit, removing that predominant RPG component, loved / hated by fans, inserting instead new dynamics capable of giving a different color to the adventure.
Unlike her brothers, Furia is a sorceress, and as such she takes power from her magic: for this she does not need special equipment, despite using her whip of blades (and more). The Knight this time will be able to rely on forms, capable of giving new ones ability, new combo and also weaponry different. So here is that the Fire shapewill allow you to enter high-temperature areas without receiving damage, adding combat combinations different from the previous ones and donating a new weapon that will intersect with the use of the whip in the various battles. But their use, fortunately, does not stop there. Too bad for some combos, with an uninteresting result, especially from the main weapon that - God of War teaches - could have had a somewhat more horizontal pattern, but which instead focuses almost totally towards the vertical attack.
In the game the puzzles come back: thanks to a world consistent with itself, this time you will have to find the solutions in the game, as some of these will be environmental. The interesting thing about the forms of Fury is that, if at first overcoming certain obstacles will require objects, unlocking a new form will help to overcome them more easily, changing the resolution mechanics a bit. These challenges - which will also accompany you during the boss fights - are well structured, capable of squeezing your brains a little without, however, blocking you for hours at each of them.
Before going back to talking about the fights, there is a big note to make about the game world: this time Gunfire Games has tried (and succeeded) to create a cohesive world both from a stylistic and structural point of view. In the first case, every single texture this time will be well defined, not too out of place with the context and capable of making everything consistent with the setting. In the second case, however, the structure this time is less cunicular and more open, prompting the player to carry out backtracking - necessary for the advancement of the game and for the discovery of some secrets - without getting bored in the meantime. The passage between the various sections will also be gradual, bringing the environmental elements to fade from one to the other: characterizing for each of them will be the Sin that resides there, which will give color and shape to what will, in effect, be the final location of the battle between Fury and the enemy in question.
With such an open world and a decidedly more slender character than the previous ones, the fighting style and modus operandi in which enemies are encountered has changed. Just to give a sense of life to the world, this time you will not have in front of you groups of enemies with the sole purpose of fighting and killing you: on the contrary, often the groups of mobs you will meet will be busy doing something like praying, eating or guarding. to certain areas, highlighting how it all makes sense and is not put there just to challenge the player. Enemies will be fewer in number than in the previous chapter, but they will certainly be much more difficult to beat: hosting a dynamic closer to soulslike than to classic action RPGs, to defeat them you will have to take advantage of dodges, combos and all kinds of skills, otherwise death will be easy to achieve. The mortality rate, compared to the first Darksiders, is for this reason much higher, as if to engage a trial & error mechanics, however, undermined by very long and distant checkpoints.
By removing much of the RPG content, the game leaves room only for consumables capable of adding momentary upgrades or loading bars, to the main weapon, which can be upgraded by the Creator already known in Darksiders, Ulthane, and to a growth to levels given exclusively by the use of souls: to find you there will be again Vulgrim, which paying it with these souls taken from killing enemies (or found around in the game world), will allow you to choose whether to buy items or level up Fury. The enhancement of the Forms instead will be completely focused on weapons: Ulthane will always help you to enhance them, increasing their damage. This damages the Forms acquired later in the game a little in favor of the first one, that of Flame, who will probably become your friend in fights.
Black and White
Darksiders III in environmental exploration makes great use of the verticality of the levels: often the whip and the skills of Fury will be used to ascend or descend, to discover secret areas or to advance in the game. This makes the use of the horse almost obsolete, which in this chapter loses the importance it had in the first two. Technically the game, strong of a good dubbing in other languages, loses something in terms of graphics, very reminiscent of a style already seen in the previous ones. The artistic choice to focus on cartoonish is functional, but a slight upgrade to the assets would certainly have benefited a title that comes too close in qualitative terms to the previous ones.
We do not want to spoil other things, especially because the previews would spoil the beauty of the discovery, in a game that takes on the ton of question marks of the first two chapters. If there is one thing we have been certain of since the beginning of the first title, it is that nothing is what it seems, and in a game where words like Apocalypse, Angels or Demons acquire different meanings, we are sure that the story of Darksiders III will be to the liking of fans of the series, despite some scattered plot holes and sometimes dubious authorial choices, especially towards the end of the game.
