Beware this may get a little hate but we’ll take it. Here we go with another episode of hidden gems that really weren’t. Today we’re covering one of the games everyone felt needed a sequel and that is Black.

The game was almost like Black Ops before Black Ops. The missions are told through flashbacks during which the main character is being interviewed. The story isn’t nearly as good.

Now as much as I love destructible environments, it’s just ok. Yes you can destroy things but it felt basic. The first mission you take the shotgun and blow open the door. I was like why don’t you just open it> I remember back in the day, even from the commercials it looked ok. I thought maybe one day I would try it. The shooting is decent and weapons are highly detailed, but the guns took up a bit too much of the screen.

The game’s level design is also meh. I’ve played better elsewhere. The bridge level, MOH: Frontline did better as an example. The apartment building section has been done better in so many other games and it wasn’t clear what you were supposed to do. The levels tend to blend together and feel very generic. The lighting in this game wasn’t even that good for the time, maybe on PS2. A lot of times it’s just very yellow god rays coming from very yellow windows. On Xbox you had games like Splinter Cell, which had dynamic shadows. One random thing I like about black is the depth of field effect when you reload.

Black had some cool ideas for guns but is held back by generic level design, enemies and gunplay with destruction that could’ve been better. There was a spiritual sequel in BodyCount but that was worse. This and KillSwitch had cool ideas that would later be adopted and made better in better games.  Black is back compat on Xbox, try it yourself.