Blacksite: Area 51 is the latest first person shooter from Midway, publishers of the acclaimed Unreal games and also the forgettable Hour of Victory. I’d love to tell you that Blacksite would tide you over until UT3 graces Xbox 360 systems everywhere, but unfortunately its worth not much more than one play through, if that. Bogged down by technical glitches, frame rate problems, predictable game play and unwanted satire, Area 51 will not be a destination for the discerning gamer.
In Blacksite you play the role of the speechless Aeran Pierce, quasi-commander of an ever-changing cast of Delta Force soldiers (“quasi” meaning your subordinates tell you what to do throughout the game). Your mission begins at a weapons factory in Iraq that produces extraterrestrial-like creatures of war, and ultimately ends at a US research facility in the Nevada desert. Along the way you fight a small variety of creatures and human mutants that pop out at you in predictable fashion throughout the 6-8 hour campaign. The mundane weapons set contains 6 ordinary hand carried weapons including a pistol, an assault rifle, a plasma rifle, an anti-tank launcher, a sniper rifle and an unwieldy and ineffective shotgun weapon called a scattergun. There are 50 dossiers to collect that are, for the most part, not too hard to find.
The characters are stereotypes and not easy to identify with, and the plot does not really flesh out that well. The characters are all to eager to change allegiances multiple times throughout the campaign, and the manner in which the antagonist becomes the game’s ultimate bad guy is not supported very well. Most of the missions do not have a real objective other than get to where you going, and fight the enemies that will pop up in easily predictable locations. In many missions you’ll drive along until you hit a roadblock, fight your way to the other side, then just like magic there is a brand spanking new Hummer waiting for you on the other side. In one scene you have to take down a turtle-like creature that is vulnerable only in the back. Your subordinates “order” you to shoot it in the back while they create a distraction, yet the creature stays focused on you the entire time. It seems like Midway had a beginning and an end in mind, then dropped 5 hours of filler in between without showing any true creativity or planning. The conclusion of the game makes it obvious that a sequel is planned that I hope never materializes.
The controller is set up much like the typical first person shooter. The right bumper issues commands to your squad, such as open doors or man turrets. The gamer can also point to an area and order the squad there, but I found this to be futile most of the time. Typically once they got to the location, they turned around and came right back to me. The only time I truly found this command to be useful was when I needed to move a squad member that was blocking a door or hall. I liked having the two-level weapon zoom mapped to the left trigger, which made it easy to zoom in and out as dictated by the action.
Another dynamic of Blacksite’s squad system revolves around morale. As squad morale gets low your fellow fighters will tend to be less aggressive and seek cover more often. Morale falls when a team member is killed or you take a lot of damage, but increases with enemy kills as well as headshots. The effects of morale are much more pronounced and noticeable as you play the higher difficulty levels, but overall it does not add much to game play. There are some battles where there is simply too much going on to think about squad morale, so I found myself ignoring this feature for the most part.
About 35% of the campaign will be spent in a vehicle, usually a military Hummer or a Helicopter. Typically you will be in the driver’s seat, but in the second mission you man the turret as an NPC drives through a maze-like refinery. Most annoyingly, the turret remains oriented to the horizon and not the vehicle, so unless you can predict where your comrade is going to turn you’ll suddenly find your machine gun facing the wrong direction with every corner and U-turn. Your squad mates are generally ineffective manning the turret, so in other missions you’ll have to stop the vehicle and climb on the machine gun yourself, only to get back in the Humvee and drive 50 yards to repeat the process. This constant stop and go game play makes most of the driving missions seem like a chore. The Helo missions play out a little better, but can get frustrating with the pilot following a predefined path, rather than taking evasive action when needed.
