Dark Sector puts you in the shoes of Hayden Tenno, a CIA cleaner sent into a former Soviet republic to assassinate Mezner, a rogue agent who's planning to unleash biological warfare. Hayden is infected with a virus that has turned the nation's civilians into ravaging mutants. Hayden's right arm reacts by turning metallic and growing a glaive.
The glaive is a marvellous invention. It's not only a long-distance weapon, it's vital for the majority of the puzzle solving and nearly all of the boss battles. It's a brutal weapon though and you frequently sever limbs or send heads flying in all directions (thus the 18 rating.) It can also aquire certain properties too such as when being thrown into electricity or fire it catches fire or charges with electricity this feature is used for a lot of the problem solving such as needing a charged glaive to give power to open a door etc. With the glaive you can also use 'Aftertouch' where the camera zooms into the glaive and you direct it with your right stick this is really useful and you will find yourself keeping cover while aftertouching the glaive around corners to clear a path or going over a wall to flick a switch and open the way forward. The best part about the glaive is that you'll use its every ability throughout Dark Sector, with most of its features proving genuinely useful.
Dark Sectors visuals are quite stunning its right up there with Gears Of War (a praise I do not dish out lightly). The enviroments are very detailed and the outdoor ambience goes a long way in establishing the post-plague dread that has engulfed the city that Hayden's traversing. The character models are also richly detailed and varied in their design even after you have sliced and diced a few hundred of them. One visual feature that deserves particular mention is the lack of a HUD, there is no need for one as when your health is in trouble the screen reddens and your heartbeat goes crazy this sounds minimal but it really does help the atmosphere of the game along a treat.
Multiplayer's split up into two modes and five maps, and up to ten people can play. Infection is a sort of Fox Hunt, in which one person plays as Hayden, and others take on the role of soldiers sent to hunt him down. In Epidemic, a sort of five-on-five "double VIP," two teams conspire to kill the other team's Hayden. The multiplayer's not really Dark Sector's strong suit although its ok but there are plenty of games that do it better. A multiplayer co-op mission would have been nice.
Dark Sector is a fantastic game easily in this years top five best games so far. The glaive is wonderful rewarding weapon and the story is so absorbing that you want to push on till its conclusion. Great stuff.
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