First Impressions of Darksiders Genesis

Developed by Airship Syndicate
Available for PS4, XB1, Switch and PC.

Darksiders Genesis takes place prior to the events of the previous 3 games, following War and Strife, 2 of the 4 Horsemen of the Apocolypse. The story opens up with War and Strife being instructed by “The Council”, who are the keepers of balance between all the realms, to go in Hell and find out who has started a surprise war on the Warlord Samuel. This is the first time in the series where we are able to play as Strife, He is a rogue like character who is witty and full of smart alec remarks , paired with the seriousness of his brother War, Strife provides some well delivered comic relief and puns throughtout the game. With 16 chapters, collectibles, chapter specific challenges and a New Game Plus mode expect to put in roughly 15-16 hours of play out of this title.

Combat is fast paced, intuitive and satisfying. Strife and War play fairly different from each other, Strife mainly uses his pistols to attack from a distance, he is also more agile being able to dash around enemies with more ease but he cannot take as much damage compared to his brother War. Different types of Ammo are used to perform unique attacks using his pistols, as you continually attack enemies with Strifes pistols he will begin to fill his burst meter, once full, Strife attacks become a lot faster and do more damage.

War on the other hand is more of a melee fighter and is able to dispatch groups of smaller enemies with ease, using his greatsword, he also has the ability to block and parry attacks based on a timing window, which seems pretty forgiving. A lot of the abilities War uses will be familar to fans of the original Darksiders series. Solo players have the ability to change between either Horseman at any point, while in co-op each player controls one or the other Horsemen.

Leveling is handled a bit differently compared to your traditional Roleplaying game. The player uses what are called creature cores. These cores are dropped by enemies after their demise, each core will give you increased Attack, Wrath or Health depending on the type of core. Cores can be upgraded to produce a stronger effect by finding similar cores dropped by specific enemy types. In each socket of the grid there is a corresponding symbol that will match up with certain cores, if you pair up a socket and core of the same affinity it will provide a significant boost to the cores unique buff. Once a core is added into the grid, adjacent pathways will open up to allow more cores to be applied, expanding outwards to larger boss cores, which provide unique abilities and status effects . This makes players want to go back and grind out past levels to make their cores stronger.

Traversal gameplay is abound in Darksiders Genesis, from scaling walls to timing long double jumps and grapling points, you will find yourself scowering each chapter in search of collectibles, treasure chests and challenge objectives. Though with the isometric view, it can be hard sometimes to see over high terrain or the angle required to make certain jumps, resulting in your demise or being stuck behind environments very regularly, even with the assistence of a blue silhouette around your character when they are behind terrain or objects.

Also returning are environmental puzzles, such as using Wars Vaporal Blade to hit switches and ignite torches to timed lever pulls to get past a obstacle.