Before attending the brief demo of Pandemic Studios’ and Electronic Arts’ open-world action title The Saboteur at E3, I heard the word “color” used as a descriptor for the game several times. That always struck me as odd considering its genre. But after seeing the game for the first time — I’ve somehow managed to allow this game to slip absolutely under my radar — I absolutely comprehend why people speak color.

Color can tell a story.

The Saboteur’s setting is Nazi occupied Paris (for the most part). In the game, you’ll play as a rough-necked protagonist named Sean Devlin. He’s a bruiser with a bit of finesse and a knack for driving fast. At first, Sean doesn’t particularly care that the country is occupied — he’s only interested in racing. This attitude changes when his buddy gets toasted by a Nazi. Sean (naturally) begins a vengeance quest and inadvertently inspires rebellion.

So, let’s talk color. The Saboteur’s scheme is split between monochrome and full-fledged glorious reds, blues, and greens. The slices of Paris occupied heavily by Nazis are painted monochrome. This includes everything touching it — some vehicles, Sean, and whatever else. Like Sin City, Pandemic illuminates certain objects in the ink. Nazi badges and flags are a bright and vibrant red.

Here’s the deal: as you progress through the game and take out Nazis, you literally put color back into the world. You’re the catalyst to change and the color acts as the narrative device. During the demo I watched the demonstrator drive down a wonderfully colored Northern France road into the Nazi darkness. I wanted him to win, to put the color back.

In that sense, the color is a wonderful device. I never care about an open-world action title’s atmosphere and Pandemic finally made me stop and look around. Totally awesome.

Via Destructoid

Dark Void offers a few different gameplay styles with the main element consisting of the jetpack gameplay. For most of the game, you’ll have a jetpack that you can use whenever you’d like. You’ll be able to fly Superman style and also hover horizontally.

Capcom and Airtight Studios have spent a lot of time making sure the flight mechanics are … airtight. It takes a tiny while to get the hang of and after a while, flying feels pretty natural. You’ll be able to do barrel rolls and 180 degree flips with the thumbstick buttons easily too.

While the controls are good, it was hard flying around sometimes. I would get lost in my loops while engaging enemies in the air and couldn’t figure out which way was up. While I was trying to correct myself, I started getting really dizzy. The dizziness went away after I figured what direction the sky was again, but the dizzy feeling happened every time I lost my sense of direction.

I’m hoping I have the ability to get myself used to the game’s flying mechanic as Dark Void is Chad-fuls of fun. I really do want to go through the campaign but the dizzy feeling may cut my time with Dark Void. I’ve a feeling that I wouldn’t suffer any dizzyness if there was a arrow indicator showing the player which way was up. It should be noted that this has never happened to me from any other flight game before.

For a more in-depth preview, check out Nick’s preview from earlier in the year.