The Top 10 Games of 2K Games
02. The Darkness 2 (Digital Extremes)
February 2012 - PC, OSX, PS3, X360, OnLive
It is fair to say that, in the world of the video gamer, more often than not a sequel turns out to be better than the original game that starts a series. That is not always true mind you - it's not like it is a hard and fast rule - but it is true often enough so that we can say it and people won't laugh at us or throw things.
In the case of The Darkness 2 this phenomenon happens to be true. And when you pause to consider that the original game that established the series also made this list (in the Number Six Slot) it should be pretty obvious to you that the sequel is genuinely something special.
And it is!Two years have passed since that low-level Mafia hitman and enforcer, Jackie Estacado, began his rise through the ranks (in no small way due to the demonic powers that he inherited on his birthday).
The thing is, he is now Don of the Franchetti family, and while he has used the powers of The Darkness to kill the men responsible for his girlfriend’s murder - a tick on the karmic balance sheets that needed to be made - he is plagued by both her memory and the heart-breaking regrets that were caused by her death.
It is fair to say that Jackie never quite got over Jenny.
Now that is bad enough to be sure, but when you add the burden of dominating his demonic powers and forcing it into a dark empty corner of his mind in order to prevent it from taking over his life, we are talking serious mind-numbing pressure!
The success that he enjoyed for the past two years is now unfortunately nearing an end... Because that power - The Darkness? It wants out, and it's no longer willing to listen to Jackie and his reasoning.
As the story resumes Jackie is thrust into an unexpected and deadly attack on his life in teh form of what he can only view as an unprovoked attempted assassination.
Caught unaware, and with his body guards wiped out, Jackie has no choice but to unleash those dark abilities to save his own life, once the power us released it is nearly impossible to force back into its mental cage inside his head.
And even if he could somehow accomplish that, the attack that released The Darkness was not a lone event, rather it was the opening salvo in what clearly turns out to be a full-scale mob war, one in which Jackie is the target and his death the intended ends.
Who orchestrated this new threat? Just how much do they know about his powers? How far are they willing to go to attain the ends that they seek? Perhaps being a member of the Franchetti crime family is no longer a position to be envied after all!
This is the situation that the player finds themselves in as they pick up the pieces of the family and seek to solve the mystery of the source of the attack and its real goals. We can't tell you more than that because if we did it would constitute the sort of spoiler info that would make breaking our legs a justifiable act of self-defense...
What we can tell you is this: The Darkness 2 did not find itself occupying the Number Two Slot in our list randomly.
Out of all of the games that 2K released in the past few seasons, this one numbers among the best, and we are not just saying that because we were serious fans of the original Darkness either. We are saying it because it is one of the games we strongly recommend you add to your game collection - and your game play rotation - if you have not done so already.
No Spec Ops: The Line? What is WRONG with you?!
I am surprise that Skyrim: elder scroll isn't on there but hey it your top 10 not mine :P