Game #921: Darksiders - Warmastered Edition(Switch)

  Warmastered, sure, let's go with that.

 I'm always scared before replaying any of my favorite games. What if it ain't as good as I thought? What if it doesn't hold up? Well, most of the time I've worried about nothing, and such holds true for Darksiders: Warmastered Edition.

 There's not much left to add to the original blog entry, this is The Legend of Zelda but gritty and dark and violent and incredibly cool. It also fixes one of my biggest issues with most Zelda games: Worthless combat, because slaying enemies rewards you with souls that you can then spend on upgrades.

 This Switch port looks better than the PS3 original, and it can be played in two different ways: Performance, which tries to maintain 60fps or Quality, which tries to maintain 30fps while boasting a better resolution. I played in both modes and both are pretty good, eventually I settled for 60fps because it felt better.

 The game crashed on me one time, which is acceptable, and for whatever reason, when I was nearing the end of the game, during the backtracking quest to complete the Armageddon Sword the game started stuttering pretty often. Maybe it was because I had the Abyssal Armor and the Mask of Truth equipped? I dunno, but the game had played perfectly up until then. Maybe memory was leaking and I should've turned off the game? Maybe, since I was running as quickly as possible from place to place the game didn't have enough time to load? It wasn't a deal breaker by any means, just very weird.

 On another note, I had a few issues with the game that returned from the very original release. Firstly, input delay. You'll notice that War takes a fraction of a second after you press a button before attacking or jumping, which can make you fall and take damage a few times. And.... the beam puzzle. The puzzles in the game are pretty easy and fun... but the Beam-puzzle near the end of the game is a bit too boring and long-winded. It goes on and on and on and you just want to get on with it. Lastly, finding all 8 pieces of the Armageddon Blade, while it is needless backtracking fluff, wasn't too bad, most pieces are out in the open and you can pick them up without much hassle.

 What can I say? Darksiders is still one of my favorite games ever made. It's a fantastic blend of fun combat mechanics, interesting puzzles, competent platforming and a very captivating lore and setting... and it works really well. I just wish that Strife will get his proper solo outing as well as a new game that finally pushes the story forward, it's amazing how we're 4 games and 2 remasters deep and no game has moved the story forward.

9.5