If you tried, do you think you could imagine a fantasy world that relied on the magic of Skittles, you know, the candy? Darkened Skye is a third-person action game that does its best to show the grandeur of these little trinkets. The game recently got published in Europe, so that’s why it was reviewed now, instead of when it hit the US shelves – January 2002.

The story revolves around a place called Lynora, where things definitely aren’t what they used to be. You see, back in the good old days there used to be a rainbow that dropped skittles onto the happy inhabitants. Things were great, and I’m guessing they learned to really appreciate the 'sweeter’ things in life. But then, who else than the nefarious and ultra-mean Lord Necroth shows up and ruins things for everyone. This evil being snatched the rainbow, and used his magic to keep it in his dark dominion until it had produced its very last Skittles, and ultimately destroying it. By doing so Lord Necroth got the vast majority of all Skittles, naturally upsetting everyone else.



One day at work the shepherdess Skye chases some odd creature, when she stumbles across a strange yellow thing. She picks it up, and before she knows it her staff is transmuted into some stick with a devilish figure on top! It also seems like Skye now got a companion – a flying, seemingly evil, yet mostly harmless creature by the name of Draak. Linda Larkin, who has been the voice for Princess Jasmine in Aladdin, and has starred in a few movies voices Skye. Draak, your very amusing companion is voiced by Robb Pruitt, a surprisingly talented guy. These two do their best to keep you laughing throughout the game’s 25-30 puzzle-filled levels, which are split into five fairly unique worlds.

When playing the game you pretty much move the perky miss Skye around, pushing buttons in stones, jumping from stone to stone, throwing stones with catapults, speaking with some peculiar looking creatures, and whacking her magical staff. Each of the levels are filled with more or less pesky creatures, ranging from big butterfly-like beings, to huge tentacle creatures of the sea. The artificial intelligence isn’t much to brag about, but at least the creatures don’t get stuck all that much, and when they usually just walk in a straight line towards you while whacking their weapon you merely have to dodge, and whack 'em first. The combat system isn’t exactly great either, because Skye, this athletic heroine who sets out to save the Skittles, can’t do all that much – at least not at first. Combat is essentially divided into melee and magic, and for one thing the melee fighting is far from as fun as that in for instance Rune or Severance: Blade of Darkness, and the magic combat is made less fun by making you use a pretty annoying interface. At certain points in the game you pick up new Skittles, which are required to unlock new skills and abilities, so you can be sure some of the time in the game is just spent pulling your hair trying to figure out where that last Skittle is at.



To be perfectly honest I think the levels and the puzzles could’ve gone through some pretty major adjustments. The levels are often cluttered with maze-like roads, and with no map or arrows to show you the way. You’re also not really given any good objectives, so you really do have to figure out a lot on your own – to the frustration of some I’m sure. One thing that’s for sure is that you’re not going to finish this game over the weekend, unless you really find the puzzles easy, which at least I didn’t – so you do at least get a lot of game-time for your money.

Darkened Skye’s graphics aren’t much to brag about though, sporting relatively nicely done characters, in an environment that just doesn’t look very good at all. The texturing ranges from okay to somewhat bad, and the lighting is also far from realistic, so I’m assuming the developers went for a bright and reasonably colorful appearance.

I introduced you to the two main voice actors in the game, but even as a whole the people responsible for the audio did a great job. The script is surprisingly funny, and filled with jokes that you really wouldn’t expect. The sound effects are decent, and fulfill their purpose, but don’t expect too much. It seems like a good load of work and creativity has also been put into the musical score, which features a pretty nice and varied selection of music that could just as well have been played in a cartoon.

There is no multiplayer mode in this game, but even if there were one I doubt it’d compete much with the current major online games...


Conclusion:

Actually, in my opinion the voice artists, the scriptwriters, and the cut-scene animators saved this game from being an utter rehash of a game formula that we’ve seen much better examples of before. My first impressions weren’t exactly great, but as you play the game more, and give it time, the game sort of gets a heart, with the witty commentary and weird characters. A marketing game for Skittles might seem like a strange idea, but I can say for sure that playing the game definitely didn’t make me want to buy Skittles any less, if only they too were sold in Norway.

Graphically the game isn’t very good at all, and the same can be said for the gameplay, at least during the first few hours of the game, when Skye doesn’t have many abilities at all, but it does improve somewhat. Is this a memorable game? Not really, but if you happen to like Skittles and get a good deal on this game, then you just might have some entertainment for a little while.