The Evil Within, whilst not what you’d consider a “surprise” hit, bearing in mind the game’s genealogy, was a game that I didn’t expect to make the impact with me that it did (it eventually took its place at number 2 on my personal list of 2014, and I probably scored it slightly too low at the time). Successfully marrying the intense action of his magnus opus, Resident Evil 4, with solid stealth mechanics and an intriguing storyline, Shinji Mikami produced an excellent overall package. As a result, I was over the moon upon the announcement of two pieces of DLC that would contribute to the storyline by filling in the blanks that made up the story of Sebastien Castellanos’ shadowy sidekick, Julie Kidman. The Assignment is the first of those two pieces of DLC, which – from a storyline point of view – does a decent job of extending the lore, both for Kidman herself and the backstory that led to the events of the game itself. Unfortunately, despite what the makers of The Order: 1886 might have you believe, story alone doth not a good game make, and The Assignment is a crushing disappointment from a gameplay standpoint. What made the full game work so well was that successful blend of different game mechanics. As a result, practically every encounter had a certain open-endedness to it. If you wanted to go in, all guns blazing, you could do so, as long as you had enough ammo and accuracy. If you wanted to be a little sneakier, you could do that too, crouching in the shadows, laying traps and executing silent takedowns. The Assignment frankly ruins that by stripping away basically all of those mechanics and leaving the weakest of them – namely the extreme stealth. This means that you’ll spend the entirety of the DLC’s 4-hour run time, crouch-sneaking and hiding behind any available surfaces, because there is literally not a single weapon in the game. Stealth always works best when you can approach it aggressively – look at the likes of the Arkham series, Dishonored or Mark of the Ninja. In those games, stealth is a power. In The Assignment, stealth is a direct result of having that power taken away from you. There are moments during those four hours where it does work. Being able to use distractions like ringing phones are a nice deviation from throwing bottles, and some of the more open areas allow for pattern recognition and a little bit of experimentation. The game does other things well too. As mentioned before, it does a good job of expanding the story, primarily through some pretty decent cutscenes. The flashlight is also a nice introduction, serving as more than just a tool for illuminating dark hallways. Lastly, the new enemies added to the game are generally successful additions, serving their purposes effectively, although I would only consider one to be memorable. However, those simply aren’t enough to save The Assignment from being overly slow and extremely repetitive. Hopefully, upcoming part two, The Consequence, can reintroduce some of the full game’s tension, flow and openness. As it stands at the moment, you’re better served by reading a wiki for the story beats, and praying that it gets better from here. Shame…
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