This month is the 20th anniversary of Perfect Dark which was released on 22 May 2000 by Rare on the Nintendo 64 (and remastered on Xbox 360 and in Rare Replay).
Despite a troubled development (by the end of 1998, half of the team left to form Free Radical Design), the game is one the ten highest-rated games of all time with a Metacritic of 97 and the highest-rated FPS with Metroid Prime and Halo: Combat Evolved.
It often got nearly-perfect scores: IGN gave it 9,8/10, Gamespot 9,9/10, EGM 29,50/30 and GamesRadar 10/10.
The main flaw of the game being some framerate issues as it pushed to the limits the N64 and the Expansion Pack (these issues have been solved in the remaster as it features higher framerate, better textures, resolution and models and online support).
The game was set in a cyberpunk world and took place in 2023. It follows Joanna Dark, an agent for the Carrington Institute who earned the pseudonyme 'Perfect Dark' after an impressive training, as she uncovers conspiracies involving a megacorporation, the US Government and alien races fighting an interstellar war. The game shares many influences, it was like Blade Runner, X-Files, Deus Ex, James Bond and Ghost in the Shell mixed together.
It's obvious that Perfect Dark was way more ambitious and creative than its predecessor GoldenEye.
It had voice acting in-game and cutscenes and motion capture (it was one of the most cinematic experiences of the generation), a large and varied selection of environments (a futuristic Chicago with flying cars and patroling robots, aboard Air Force One, the bunkers of the Area 51, Alaska, an alien ship in the depths of the Pacific ocean, an alien homeworld with three suns..) and above all a truly impressive enemy AI at this time.
Enemies are working together, take cover around a corner, wait for you to come back in a room instead of chasing after you. Guards shot at their hand would lose their weapon and then run to retrieve it or pull a backup handgun. Other would surrender, attempt to attack the player with martial arts or throw down their weapon after being disarmed or intimidated. And winning against a DarkSim was almost an impossible task.
Some enemies would never accept to surrender and fight you to the death. But Perfect Dark also tried to humanize the enemy as you could sometimes hear from guards terrified by death things like this:
- "Why... me..."
- "Oh, God, I'm dying !"
- "I don't wanna die !"
- "Please, don't kill me !"
- "I'm just doing my job !"
- "I don't like this anymore !"
- "Dont shoot, don't shoot !"
Guards who had found a body could be also heard saying "I never liked him anyway" for instance.
This was a huge improvement from Goldeneye. And all of this was never scripted.
As usual, Rare musicians (Grant Kirkhope, Graeme Nortgate, David Clynick) did a great job with 2 hours and 19 minutes of soundtracks.
Perfect Dark Soundtrack: Skedar Ruins: Battle Shrine (1080p)
Perfect Dark Soundtrack: Skedar Ruins: Battle Shrine (1080p)
youtu.be
Perfect Dark Soundtrack: Chicago: Stealth (1080p)
Perfect Dark Soundtrack: Chicago: Stealth (1080p)
youtu.be
Perfect Dark Soundtrack: dataDyne Central: Defection (1080p)
Perfect Dark Soundtrack: dataDyne Central: Defection (1080p)
youtu.be
Perfect Dark Soundtrack: Pelagic 2: Exploration (1080p)
Perfect Dark Soundtrack: Pelagic 2: Exploration (1080p)
youtu.be
Perfect Dark also had an incredible lineup of 35 inventive and fun weapons with both primary and secondary functions and plenty of gadgets like night vision, flying spy and recording drones, infra-red and X-ray scanners, binoculars, cloaking, shields...
Something very unique in a FPS, the missions would change depending the difficulty you chose.
For instance, in the mission Villa, when playing on the lower levels of difficulties, you were dropped at range and had to save the negociator with a sniper rifle before she gets executed.
On Perfect Agent, YOU are the hostage with no weapon at all as the guards are about to execute you.
You would also get more objectives to complete (5 instead of 3 or 4) and enemies would be smarter and more dangerous.
Easy and normal difficulties :
Perfect Agent difficulty :
In fact, Perfect Dark level-design was full of choices, optionnal content and inter-connectivity between missions.
At the end of the level Area 51: Escape, the base is on full alert and you, Elvis and Jonathan Dark (another undercover agent who helped you in your mission) are rushing to leave the Nevada. Bad news: there is only room for one passenger on board Elvis' flying saucer, and someone will have to stay behind and open the hangar doors so that it may leave.
The game gives you two options:
- to let Jonathan sacrifice himself so you can escape in the flying saucer. Your ally is assumed to be either captured or killed as you never see him again.
- or you can help him escape and try and find your own way out with an hoverbike.
You leave your friend behind and escape with the flying saucer:
You help your friend escape, stay behind and find you own way out of the Area 51:
The former is default and easier. The latter is more difficult but your ally will survive the mission.
And he reappears some missions later when the Carrington Institute is under attack, buying you some precious time while you are breaking into Carrington's safe which contains sensitive data that has to be destroyed at all cost.
As a spiritual successor of GoldenEye, it featured a very strong multiplayer component with 15 maps and 30 challenges against the AI, one of the best split-screen multiplayer ever created. IGN praised it, claiming it was "the most well-rounded multiplayer mode ever to grace Nintendo 64".
There could have up to 12 people (only 4 in Goldeneye) on the map and the number of options was insanely huge: the weapons placement, the musics, the speed, how many teams, etc., and even the appearance and behavior of each bot :
Orders could be given to the bots in your team, asking them to act as your bodyguards, ordering them to hunt a precise player on the map or to defend your base for instance.
Besides the multiplayer and the co-op modes, Perfect Dark also had a neat innovative feature, the Counter-Operative mode. In the campaign missions, Player 2 would play the enemy while Player 1 would play as Joanna Dark.
Player 2, randomly assigned control of one of the existing enemy NPCs, had to prevent Player 1 from accomplishing his mission at any cost. This was a great and fun idea and it's somewhat odd that very few games tried to replicate this.
Even the menu of Perfect Dark was packed with content as you could wander around the Carrington Institute in order to improve you skills. This was like a hub with a firing range, combat training, a gadget lab, computers with informations on characters, the story, locations and vehicles. Sometimes, when starting a new game, your boss (Daniel Carrington) would appear and give you a tour of the building.
Fun fact: Elvis was on the US box art, reflecting in Joanna's eye.
Fun fact 2: the Japanese box art was quite different from the NA and PAL ones (the game was intented to be called "Red and Black" here)
Fun fact 3: A guard as well as a multiplayer character looking like Miyamoto were in the game.
Fun fact 4: Joanna Dark sounds similar to Joan of Arc as "Jeanne d'Arc" and was based on Winona Ryder.
Perfect Dark's Joanna Dark Was Based On Winona Ryder
"She had this great pixie haircut"
www.nintendolife.com
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