The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay

I hardly write game reviews, as I prefer to get literally EVERYthing from a game (beat it, unlock everything, etc...) before I even attempt to share my feelings of said game. With that said, I can give Escape From Butcher Bay a very good score. This FPS prequel to the events in the movie "Pitch Black" may be the best X-box exclusive game since Ninja Gaiden. Reason enough to buy an X-box? That's debatable, if you liked Pitch Black then YES. If you like First person shooters? YES. If you're one of those fools who blindly hates everything Microsoft? Then you're missing out on one of the better movie-tie in/spin off games out there. Oh yea and the graphics are great too. a tad on the easy side brings it down half a point.

My Game Grade: A-

The Chronicles of Riddick:Escape from Butcher Bay must be one of my favourite games for the Xbox. I think that Riddick's great anyway, so when I saw this I just had to have it. This game explains two things:1)how Riddick got his 'eyeshine' in the first place, and 2)how he escaped from one of the toughest slams in the Universe. The game has excellent graphics due to the motion capturing performed by the developers, which makes it seem very authentic. Riddick and Johns are voiced by their counterparts from the movies, and a lot of new characters are introduced, many who are irrelevant to the story overall but a few who might make the difference between Riddick living and dying. There is a huge amount of replay value, just to collect every feature and fully complete the game. This isn't a game for young children though, as it contains a lot of swearing and violence(just what you'd expect from Riddick). Verdict:10/10!

And I got to say, this is the best console port to PC ever made. The game played really smoothly provided I had the most high end computer parts and sound, the graphic was very beautiful and rivaled both Doom 3 and Far Cry by miles. The storyline was brutally cold as you play as Riddick, the prisoner who seems to just wanna be left alone. The voice acting and music was just perfect exactly like the movie. And for 30 bucks this game is not a sure miss at all. However, there was some strange crashes like having 3d sound and EAX can sometimes give you the blue of death, another annoying problem that hit me was I had to install the monitor driver instead of using Microsoft's default plug and play in order to get the resolution beyond 800x600 but I think Starbreeze is making a patch for it. Other then that, playing at 1600x1024(I have widescreen 16:10 monitor) the game looked just beautiful and really puts the Xbox's version to bad shame. Even for those who hate the movie should give this game a try and you shall see why everything is afraid of Riddick. 9 out of 10.

Anyone with a remote interest in video games have probably noticed that, with a few exceptions, games based on movies tend to be, well... crap (and vice versa for that matter). The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay is however both an exception to this rule and in some ways a milestone when it comes to collaboration between the video gaming industry and Hollywood.

Everything in this game just resonates quality. From the highly impressive graphics to the story to the voice acting and enemy AI. From the moment you slip the disc into your Xbox it's obvious that some real talent and hard work went into this product. TCoR: EfBB also blends shooting, hand-to-hand fighting and stealth elements all in a first person perspective in a very clever way, with the shooting portion being the meat and potatoes of the game. There's been a few games that has tried to pull off this variety of elements before, but Escape from Butcher Bay is the only one so far that has implemented it properly.

The only real downside to the game that I found was that it was a bit on the short side. Depending on which difficulty you choose and how much you are into exploring the surroundings and such, you should be looking at the region of 9-16 hours of game play (I recommend you play this game on hard difficulty!). This is certainly a game you would want to come back and play again though, first and foremost since it's so damn fun and secondly since there's plenty of unlockable extras scattered around the game in terms of trailers, concept art etc.

I give it a well deserved 9/10.

This is a game set before the Riddick films and is a unique and interesting game in its own right , it's a bit Thief and a lot Aliens Colonial Marines and a lot brilliant. This game is so good I have forgiven Starbreeze for the butchering and lack of love in their Syndicate remake. It's a bit challenging to find as it isn't commercially available anymore but does come free with Riddick Dark Athena on GOG. Buy this game is you love Riddick, hate Riddick or just don't care as it's an amazing game in its own right.