Blood, Gore, Guns, Magic
Clive Barker's Jericho is the 2nd game that has been developed from an idea from the man who is known for his horror films such as Hell raiser. This gives the game a promising start as Barkers horror Stories are well written and intriguing the question is does this translate well into a videogame.
The game takes place through 5 different times from modern day to the crusaders as god's first creation the Firstborn who is trying to destroy everything that has been created. The Jericho squad have been tasked with destroying the firstborn and saving the world. The team is formed of a 7 man group of Psychics / Witches / and Pyromaniacs who are deemed expendable and are the only people for the job. Early on in the game the main character Cpt. Devin Ross is killed by a servant of the firstborn. However instead of dying Ross remains as a ghost and is able to Posses the other 6 members of the Jericho squad and carry on their mission to Defeat the Firstborn.
From this point it is just a dungeon crawler with guns and fancy powers which are both positive and negative as the powers show to the character that Jericho squad is a strong team able to fight off anything but this then subtracts from the idea of the game being horror the team just take it within their stride and make wisecracks and cheesy one-liners This makes the characters feel too overpowered and the story does becomes somewhat overlooked as the player is just testing out all the 6 characters special abilities while going through the different timelines to reach the firstborn.
The game has a habit of holding the players hand too much during the game as the other characters in the team will tell you what needs to be done during a puzzle to progress with a level and if you don't do it quickly you are often left with a the same sentence being said over and over. Which happened to me a couple of times as to get through some puzzles you need to use a specific character, for example rubble blocks the path and you need to use Black the teams telekinetic to move the rubble but the game calls the characters by their first names and the character swap screen is all second names so unless you learn all of the 6 team members first and second names you will be consulting the manual frequently.
The AI in the game has a few major flaws the enemies stand still a lot during fire fights and just take damage but on occasion they will try to take cover using a random script they have been written which doesn't work properly as they would just stand by an object and still be in plain view and easy to kill. Squad commands could be polished as well they are very simple Attack and Hold Position and at time the Team just ignore these commands and fight regardless which takes away from the squad command side completely.
The blood and gore in this game is brilliant when an enemy is blown up with a grenade it is very satisfying as the limbs and chunks of enemies fly in all direction and the sound effects found in this game sound too good as if the development team took swords to flesh to get the right sound. The graphics are also very good the character design shines on the enemies with pieces missing and parts of the bodies exposed this becomes apparent during the games quick-time events which show close ups of enemies and bosses and some of the twisted detail gone into their design.
The levels themselves are good the lighting of the levels makes you wonder what vile monster you are going to find around the corner or in a tomb or graveyard and the blood in the game is found everywhere from dripping from enemies to being soaked into the soil which helps make the game feel more visceral.
Clive Barker's Jericho is a visceral first person shooter with some big flaws but has great presentation and sets a good tone unfortunately the characters don't suit their surroundings. If you just want some satisfying bloodshed then Jericho is for you.