BlackSite: Area 51 Reviews

Wasted potential is truly a terrible thing. Midway’s "BlackSite: Area 51" isn’t just wasted potential, it’s the very definition of it. To find out exactly where things went awry, take a trip to Google (or your favorite search engine of choice), type in the name “Harvey Smith,” and hit the trusty Enter key. You will find that not only is he the Executive Creative Director of this project, but he also helped create one of the most profoundly enjoyable (and playable) games (ever?) in the classic 2000 PC game, "Deus Ex." With that said, it fervently begs the question as to why and how "BlackSite" came up as short as it did.

The suits at Midway didn’t just bastardize the designers’ - as well as Harvey’s - original vision, but they kept what could have been a memorable first-person shooter from being anything more than a by-the-books, nothing-more-than-average FPS. Granted, "BlackSite" contains a handful of truly spectacular cinematic moments, some intuitive game play, and frenetic action, but as Smith explains in the article you should have read prior to reading this review, Midway’s lack of care and concern for the final product hinders many of the positive aspects that lie buried underneath an otherwise decent action title.

First and foremost, Smith spoke of wanting "BlackSite" to be a biting political satire. Whether or not there’s room in the gaming community for political references and/or satire remains to be seen, but you just don’t get the feeling playing through the game’s six episodes that "BlackSite" is as subversive as Smith would lead you to believe. Is that the development team’s fault? Who knows. But the question needs to be asked; was the game truly going to be an experience that posed questions about our government, its policies, and the way it treated our war veterans, or did Midway dumb it down for the masses? Personally, I feel the game would have been infinitely more playable had these moments been more plentiful, as well as more subversive.

But Midway has been advertising this as straight-forward shooting fare and, at that, it gets the job done. It’s certainly no "Crysis" or "Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare," but the Havok physics and destructible environments do create some memorable sequences. Even with that said I just never got the sensation that I was taking part in anything as epic as those aforementioned games. And when "BlackSite" currently comes with a $49.99 price tag slapped on its ass, I can’t help but feel cheated. There are, however, some noteworthy interactive moments, such as letting a trailer(home) loose and sending it hurtling into a machine gunner on a truck, or setting your squad up to breach and clear rooms in the opening Iraq mission. Set pieces either range from “been there, done that” to “wow, that’s pretty cool,” but nothing is ever awe-inspiring. Disappointingly enough, the destructibility of the environments are never taken full advantage of, either. Few objects are actually fully destructible. As well, too much time is spent gunning down faceless aliens and soldiers and not enough on engrossing the player in the environments or allowing him/her to interact with them more frequently.

The squad control is one of the features of the game that separates it mildly from others, though this feature is too barren to make a difference. Athough the ability to use your squad to focus-fire on enemies, plant C4 charges on doors, break down doors, and send them nearly anywhere you want them on the playing field is interesting, you won’t find yourself using it unless its needed to advance further in the game. Aiding in difficulty a bit is the “morale system.” Your squad – in battle – is measured by this system and, depending on their morale, they will either help you out out more in fights (i.e. take riskier shots, lob more grenades) or cower like a bunch of pansies (i.e. take fewer shots and generally keep their distance from enemies). It sounds good on the box and works decently in-game, but, again, its not as effective as you may think. Score more headshots, grenade kills, etc… and you heighten your morale. “Lose” a squad mate (I say “lose” a squad mate because, as it is described by Midway, they are only temporarily knocked unconscious) or take considerable amounts of damage and squad morale will reduce.

As decidedly average as the rest of the game has been, there’s certainly nothing wrong with "BlackSite’s" beautiful, Unreal 3 Engine-powered visuals. Character models standout with realistic eye, body and mouth movements. Lighting and dynamic shadows are spot-on (though shadows obviously needed to be fine-tuned slightly as well before the game was released) and the post-process FX gives the game a bright, glossy sheen that – if your system can handle it – you will definitely reap the benefits of. While previous Unreal 3 Engine games have lacked environmentally, environmental textures and architecture here are boldly designed and mipmapped highly. Outdoor locales look spectacular with pitch-perfect lighting and shading.

It’s just too bad then that "BlackSite" suffers from numerous graphical bugs and glitches. The first of many is the horrendous framerate. One second the game is running smooth as silk, the next the framerate is somewhere in the low teens, possibly lower. The glitches can be countless at times; re-used textures, disappearing NPCs, floating weapons, massive clipping problems, and no animations for your squad mates getting in and out of the many vehicles you commandeer. It should also be noted that corridors are simply that – corridors. They, too, are barren with very little flair. Decals are practically non-existent and the washed out color scheme in many of the in-door locales is an eyesore.

If you can get past the annoying graphical glitches and one of the worst framerates I’ve ever encountered, you will be treated to some excellent music, sound FX and voice acting. I don’t expect much from first-person shooters in regards to sound, just that the guns sound like big, bad mothers and not pop guns. The weapons here sound nasty and will put your Dolby Digital setup to work if you have one. Music is sparse but befitting to the mood whenever its applied. I was also impressed by the voice acting. For a game that rips its plot out of cheesy B-grade sci-fi/action flicks, the performances were surprisingly believable. Granted, the dialogue wasn’t the sharpest, but I blame a lot of that on the suits at Midway for possibly dumbing down Harvey and company’s initial vision.

I'm not a multi-player gamer by way of choice, but I do make my way to online sessions when coerced by friends (or when the need to review that portion of the game for this very purpose arises). I would be more than happy to jabber on about how "BlackSite's" multi-player component is the singleplayer component's saving grace. I would, might be able to say that if players were ever online. The setup looks decent; a couple of playing modes, varied maps, a respectable number of maximum players able to join any given game, etc... It's just too bad, then, that I wasn't able to find anyone willing to brave it online.

And if that isn't enough mediocrity for you, most gamers will be able to breeze through "BlackSite" with little problem. The easiest difficulty offers nothing in the way of challenge and the AI is incredibly lax. No tactics displayed by way of your foes, no flanking – just run ‘n’ gun. That seems to be the game Midway wanted, but I get the unshakeable feeling that this could have been something more. Perhaps something so much more entertaining, intelligent, and rewarding than your typical shooter.

But what can you do? What’s done is done. All that’s left are some entertaining shootouts, interesting creature designs, a handful of nice cinematic touches, moderately sharp level design, and beautiful graphics. At its core, "BlackSite" is an average first-person shooter. But with a man like Harvey Smith dedicating himself to a project, that’s not what the end result should have been. No, BlackSite should have been – if not remarkable – at least better than a three star FPS with a horrendous framerate and unbelievably glitchy game play. Its unfathomable why Midway would ship a product out like this. For a couple extra dollars to meet the holiday rush? Perhaps. But they’re paying for it now. Is "BlackSite" terrible? Not at all. It’s just unbelievably mediocre. And when games like "Crysis" and "Call of Duty 4" have just been released, mediocrity simply isn’t acceptable.