The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena

The new contents are not as good as the original games, and the enemy AI could have been improved, but without doubt this is one of the most interesting launches of recent months.

Players looking for a pure stealth game will be disappointed, but everyone else will find in Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena a healthy mix of action, stealth and heavy weapon gameplay.

Solid mechanics, lavish presentation, and strong audio all combine for one great gaming value.

An excellent game that would have breached the 90% barrier had it been a little bit more substantial and erred less on the combat side of things. [June 2009, p.62]

With the economy on the ropes and gamers finding it harder to purchase game, you will not find a better deal than Assault on Dark Athena, which gives you two single player campaigns and a multiplayer component for one price.

For fans of the Original (TCoR:EfBB), this is nothing but a "must have". But everybody else, who's simply looking for a good, brutal shooter with stealth-elements and a cool main character, should definitely have a look too! Personally, I'm sure you won't regret it.

While all of the work that went into Dark Athena is appreciated it doesn’t change the fact that the pacing and level design in the original game far outshines that of anything that the expansion really brings to the table.

A brutally enjoyable stealth shooter that revisits and builds on the success of the original Escape from Butcher Bay. [May 2009, p.84]

Not in any way groundbreaking, but two games in one and hugely entertaining nonetheless. [Issue#18, p.52]

With two great games that will take somewhere in the region of 15-20 hours to complete, superb presentation and a sense that you're playing something different to the norm, The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena comes highly recommended. If it weren't for a few unfortunate bugs and the odd strange design decision that score below this paragraph might even have been a notch higher.

The news of Riddick's comeback made my subwoofer purr with delight. The rough Vin Diesel adds a truckload of mood to this excellent and diverse game. And when I finally reclined in my armchair after five solid hours of action, I was in for a surprise - the end was not yet in sight! [May 2009]

The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault On Dark Athena is a well made action title.

There are many reasons to dislike Diesel, this isn't one of them. [May 2009, p.92]

It may not be as good as the predecessor, but it's still a good game that can glue you to your chair for more than 10 hours. Vin Diesels voice is a bit over the top this time, there's only so much coolness one can bear.

The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena has a lot of content to shuffle through, especially if you’ve never played Escape, so it’s totally worth getting.

Unfortunately Riddick hasn't evolved much in the years since Escape from Butcher Bay, while the genre definitely has. Five year old gameplay doesn't compete well with next gen games, though Riddick still copes well.

Pain needs a mate and finds it in two grim dark tales of outlandish brutality. Escape from Butcher Bay gets a facelift and expands with the more versatile Assault on Dark Athena. The devil is in the details, and this devil is named Riddick.

The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena gets stuck in one gear for too long. Even though the game has many same aspects as the great Escape from Butcher Bay, the pacing is bad and the action forces you to run through the same corridors over and over again. The included Escape from Butcher Bay is still a masterpiece, however. [Mar 2009]

The Chronicles of Riddick: AODA tries to combine several genres into one single game. The result: an average game with nothing but mediocre aspects. Vin Diesel's presence and the Riddick-license make the game enjoyable nonetheless and additional to the Assault on Dark Athena campaign, there is a full next-gen version of the original Escape from Butcher Bay game. Sadly though, this remake does not live up to modern day standards.

The experiences of "Butcher Bay" are superior to the new chapter in playability, level designs and possibilities of game.

The first half of the game, Escape from Butcher Bay, certain shows its age, but is still an innovative game. The sequel, however, comes off as a poor imitation. It's far more frustrating and seems more shooter than anything else. It's not a terrible game for a sequel, but it's inferior to Butcher Bay.

At the end of the day Dark Athena doesn't stand next to the original title. It lacks the innovation, and on top of that, the new campaign missed much of what made Escape from Butcher Bay so grand.

A remade classic and a passable sequel meet in this fun but inconsistent package.

New revelation of “sighted” hero brings more action and less stealth than its predecessor but keeps gameplay still enjoyable. When the dark atmosphere is gone we are thankful for multiplayer. [Apr 2009]