"This is our own little version of the Orange Box," said Ian Stevens, head of game production for Tigon Studios. "We've sort of gotten the whole band back together."
If you're just joining us, Assault on Dark Athena is a special edition of sorts. On one hand, you're getting a recreated version of the critically acclaimed PC/Xbox title The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape From Butcher Bay (every model's been redone, the AI's better, there's a new weapon select system, environments are three times the size they once were, etc.) as well as a brand new story that both star Vin Diesel. It's basically two games, but the second part isn't a sequel -- just the continuation of the original game. Picking up exactly where Butcher Bay left off, the new tale in Dark Athena opens with Riddick going into cryo-sleep only to be rudely awakened when the vessel is jacked by Revas, captain of the Dark Athena. Riddick escapes into the air ducts of the new ship, runs into a kid who lets him know about Revas' slave trade, and then starts his assault on all the bad guys who were dumb enough to get in his way.
Now, thes enemies you'll be gutting in Dark Athena are drones that were once humans but are now ugly cyborgs Revas constructed without the original person's permission. Most of the time, these clad-in-black meanies with a gun for an arm are just brainless obstacles with red lights on their heads that patrol a certain area and are easy enough to outthink and waste. However, when that light turns white, it means the drone is being intelligently controlled by a human from a command station on the ship -- expect it to react and act like it's not a brain-dead cyborg.
It's admittedly awesome to destroy these things as Riddick -- one kill I saw had our hero stab the enemy in the gut, yank out the blade, and deliver a killing blow to the head in a matter of split seconds -- but there are more strategic plans you can devise. If you want, you can sneak through the whole game, but if you'd prefer, you're free to run-and-gun throughout the entire tale. Both strategies make use of the game's new counters, combos, and stealth kills.
Back to the drones, Riddick can grab one of the creatures, hold it close to his body, and have a makeshift shield while using the enemy's arm-gun, but he can also take command of the aforementioned cyborg command stations and use the beasts as his enemies would. Once you enter one of these pods -- which looks similar to climbing onto a motorcycle and putting your head down -- you're transported to a first-person, red-tinted view of the action from the drone's perspective. You can just wander the corridors of Dark Athena taking on bad guys until the drone is a beaten pile of bone and metal. For example, Riddick came to a spinning fan blade he needed to get by. Instead of being dumb, trying to jump through it and getting sliced in half, he took control of a drone and walked the undead beast into the device to break it and allow a normal human to pass unabated.
If you're looking for more visual cues and changes in Dark Athena, there are a few. To begin with, the screen will go blue when Riddick's hidden from the sight of enemies via shadows and whatnot. While the screen's blue, the bad guys can't see or hear our hero. Also, although the game's primarily a first-person affair, the perspective will jump to third-person more than a few times -- when Riddick needs to shimmy across a ledge, climb on a crate, or jumps into the drone control station.
The folks behind the game say that the brand new chapter is about as long as Escape from Butcher Bay, so they're estimating about 20 hours of gameplay (not including multiplayer, which hasn't really been discussed yet). While the Orange Box reference Stevens dropped at the beginning of this article is definitely something to live up to, there's no doubt that The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena has some serious potential heading into its spring release.