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Opposable Thumbs / Gaming & Entertainment

Damnation: punishing in all the wrong ways

Sometimes, you can judge a book by its cover, or a video game by its title. …

Damnation must have been one of those games that looked great on paper, mainly because no one would actually want to make something this rotten. Somewhere during its execution something went terribly, terribly wrong. A steampunk action/platformer set in an alternate United States where the Civil War still hasn't ended certainly sounds exciting, but the problem is that Blue Omega Entertainment released a game that not only fails to take advantage of such a unique premise, but it's also ugly, marred with poor design decisions, and rather broken in certain areas.

As soon as the game's first cut scene is over, it's easy to tell that Damnation will not provide players with an enjoyable experience. Players are dropped into a battle against a wealthy industrialist who is bent on conquering both halves of the warring United States; his immense army consists of steam-powered robots, drug-addled super soldiers, and legions of brainwashed citizens. That might sound interesting, but there's little actual backstory provided about the game's world, and things stay vague-at-best all the way through. It's a shame, too, because the ruined cities, steam-driven technology, and existence of magic all seem like interesting plot points that are just never capitalized on.

Title Damnation
Developer Blue Omega Entertainment
Publisher Codemasters
Price $59.99 Shop.ars
Platform Xbox 360 (reviewed), PlayStation 3, PC

The game's production values aren't endearing, either. While the concept art was probably amazing, based on often-interesting character and environment designs, Damnation's graphics are about as ugly as you're likely to find on the current generation of consoles. Even though the Unreal Engine was used, character models look like something you'd find on a previous-generation title, and it isn't entirely uncommon to have textures constantly pop up and disappear in certain parts of levels.

On top of that, there is not a single redeeming feature to the game's dialogue: hearing lines like "See to it that his death does not come easily; I want him to remember it," is bad enough, hearing it delivered with the always terrible voice-acting is just painful.

Of course, the game's play mechanics are no better. Shooting sequences are rarely fun, as your party members often get taken out quickly and require you to frequently revive them, enemy AI is atrociously weak, and the vehicle sequences are absolutely unremarkable. There is one thing done somewhat right, and that's the platforming sequences. Many of the large environments present multiple paths for players to take, which requires a kind of slow-paced free-running to navigate through. It's rather interesting to see what different routes can be taken, and it's often gratifying to pan the camera around and realize just how far you've progressed, but then you'll have to engage in some more obnoxious combat in order to keep on going.

There are many more problems with Damnation, including a wonky camera, poorly-placed save points, and load sequences that inconveniently interrupt action-heavy portions of the game. If you couldn't tell, this game feels like an incredible waste of a premise with a great deal of promise, and it should be avoided in stores.

Verdict: Skip

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