Perfect Dark Nintendo Retrospective

Flawless first-person gameplay to die for.

Rare flips the script on the predictable plots of first-person shooters, with a twisting storyline where aliens are allies and trust is a luxury which you can’t afford.

Players control special operative Joanna Dark, who earned the nickname Perfect after graduating with top honors from the Carrington Institute. The action begins in the year 2023, when Joanna receives a distress signal from a troubled scientist held hostage in the heart of a monolithic corporation called dataDyne.

Joanna’s first mission is to infiltrate the heavily guarded corporate headquarters, and soon she finds herself in the epicenter of an intergalactic conspiracy set to explode. We don’t want to spoil the surprises that pop up along the way, but it’s safe to say that throughout her adventure Joanna discovers the corrosive effect power and greed have on the human psyche. As an extra bonus, she’s also a crucial player in a massive war between two alien species.

One of the most appealing aspects of GoldenEye 007 was the great challenge provided by the game’s various difficulty settings. According to Rare, that idea came late in the game’s development, and as a result it was unable to fully incorporate this idea into gameplay. With Perfect Dark, Rare has been able to make its original vision a reality.

Each stage of Perfect Dark can be played in one of three difficulty levels: Agent, Secret Agent or Perfect Agent. In addition to pumping up enemy AI in higher difficulty levels, players have to complete increasingly complex tasks.

Like GoldenEye, players will be able to earn cheat codes by completing the missions within a specific amount of time. Only the most skilled gamers will be able to earn all the available cheats.

Friends are few when you’re in Joanna’s line of work, but Rare has created a new feature which provides some friendly faces when you need them most. Once you’ve proven yourself by beating the game on Agent Mode, you’ll gain access to a computer-controlled buddy who helps you as you progress through the game in Secret Agent Mode.

There’s a reason that GoldenEye 007 has continued to be a top-selling title since 1997, and it’s not Pierce Brosnan’s good looks. It’s a great multiplayer mode. Perfect Dark goes above and beyond the call of duty when it comes to multiplayer gaming, offering an unbelievable amount of variety and complete control of every conceivable variable. When four friends get together for a night of perfect fun, dawn can easily creep up before you know it.

Perfect Dark offers a traditional two-to-four-player Deathmatch Mode, which allows players to select weapon types, fighting arenas, time limits, frag limits, character appearance and many other tweakable details. As
players progress in the single-player game, new weapons and arenas are unlocked in the multiplayer mode.

A great feature of Perfect Dark is that players can opt to activate up to eight computer-controlled simulants and assign each an individual skill level which ranges from Meat to Perfect Sim. Meat Sims are basically moving targets, but Perfect Sims are insanely good players that score head shots every time they pull the trigger. Players can team up against a group of sims or create mixed teams of humans and sims.

We found it fun to pit four humans against a single Perfect Sim. Impressively, it took a great deal of strategic planning to figure out how to dispose of the pesky character. Amazingly, players can actually command simulants to hunt down specific competitors during gameplay.

Demonstrating its incredible depth, Perfect Dark’s Challenge Mode is rich enough to stand on its own even without the awesome single-player game. Challenge Mode presents 30 unique trials which pit one to four human players against computer-controlled simulants. The simulants are pretty easy to waste in the first few levels, but things get extremely tough very quickly. In addition to straight frag fests, the Challenges also consist of King of the Hill matches and other variations.
Adding to the fun, each Challenge must be completed four times: once with one player, once with two players and so on up to four players. Using the Challenge Editor, players can set up their own unique Challenges.

Using a split screen, two players can play through the entire game together in a Cooperative Mode. If you’re not one to share the glory with a friend, Perfect Dark’s Counter Operative Mode is guaranteed to get your juices flowing. This unique features allows one player to progress through the normal game as Joanna Dark, while the other player controls an enemy character normally controlled by the computer.

Perfect Dark is a shooting game, and since it’s a good shooting game, it showcases a jaw-dropping amount of destructive weapons to wreak havoc on your enemies. The game features over 40 unique weapons, each of which contains a secondary function. A discreet laptop gun, for example, functions either as a hand-held machine gun or a stationary gun turret.

Many weapons feature sniper scopes, and most can be doubled up for dual firepower. Every level holds at least one secret weapon, which you have to find if you want to use it in the multiplayer mode. Hand guns, automatic power weapons, mines and grenades are all represented in a wide variety of shapes and sizes.
Even when you’re unarmed, a secondary “Disarm” function allows you to grab a foe’s gun and hold him or her hostage. What you choose to do at that point depends on your disposition.

Based on her physical attributes, we’re guessing that Joanna’s test scores weren’t the only factor leading to her flattering nickname. She’s aided, of course, by her creator’s firm grip on great graphics. Rare lives up to its reputation for slick presentation with astonishing visuals and special effects like dynamic lighting, explosions, dust, steam, and sun glare that will knock you off the couch. Rare has obviously taken advantage of its in-house motion-capture studio, creating enemies with eerily realistic animations.

In Joanna’s line of work, the slightest slip can result in the loss of innocent lives. Not surprisingly, Rare has fine-tuned the play control to remove the slightest possibility of such foul-ups. The basic feel of the game is very similar to GoldenEye 007. Players have the option to choose a preferred Controller configuration.

Perfect Dark features a new weapon selection system that’s similar to Turok 2. If you hold the A Button, you’re given an on-screen list of every weapon available. All you have to do is move the Control Stick to the desired weapon, then release the A Button. If you prefer, though, it is still possible to scroll through the weapons by tapping the A Button.

As in GoldenEye, the B Button is used to reload your weapon, activate switches and open doors. If the B Button is held down, it will activate the secondary function of your current weapon.

The play control of Perfect Dark will feel completely natural to GoldenEye vets, leaving you free to concentrate on the game and not the Controller.

Due to the sprawling size and scope of the game, Perfect Dark will require the use of the N64 Expansion Pak for the solo missions and 3-4 player multiplayer modes. Only 1-2 player deathmatch-style gameplay and the Challenge Mode will be available without the Expansion Pak.

Living up to its name, Perfect Dark is available now — exclusively for Nintendo 64.