Imagenes y Preview de Clive Barkers Jericho

An army of black flies swarm angrily around a pulsating pile of rotting flesh as ominous music plays in the background. Fear surrounds your every decision, and a not-so-pleasant-death can be at any turn. You're utterly and completely screwed.

And that's just the menu screen.

Thus you enter the twisted mind of horror writer supreme, Clive Barker. If you don't happen to read fine tales of the warped and grotesque, the name may still sound familiar: his last videogame collaboration was the surprisingly solid The Undying. His latest endeavor is with Spanish developer MercurySteam for the aptly named Clive Barker's Jericho (coming out PS3, 360, and PC). Barker's involvement isn't just to add more syllables to the title either: he was heavily involved in all aspects of the project. Everything from the highly atmospheric story to working with artists on the character designs, Mr. Barker made sure to imprint his special brand of insanity on the project.

The game starts during present-day, out in the not-so-safe streets of Al-Khali. Apparently, every thousands of years an unspeakable evil (that everyone always speaks about anyway) comes around to muck everything up and a group of talented individuals named "Jerichos" must fight it back. The story focuses on a squad of seven such paranormally-powered Jerichos. For instance, there's a telekinetic who can open up passageways (with her mind!), a healer who can, uh, heal, an exorcist who can enchant weapons, and a blood-mage type girl who cuts herself to unleash spells and immobilize enemies with giant tendrils (obviously).

This team dynamic is the bread and butter of this FPS: although you start out as one particular character, you will later gain the ability to switch to any of the seven characters on the fly. This is where strategy and forethought comes in. For example, only two of the Jerichos can actually raise characters who die ("die" is relative here... think Gears of War's teammate system where one is immobilized until you go and help him out). Hence, you want to keep these characters alive at all costs and should probably relegate them to the back. Likewise, you want to position the sniper farther away so she can take out enemies from a distance, and keep the guy with the huge "kill everything" chain-gun in the thick of things. Keep in mind that the only commands you can issue teammates are along the lines of the "Hold here, Move forward," and "Form up" variety. You can't actually control their special abilities remotely (although they will automatically do their special attacks based on the situation), so if you want more control, you're going to have to jump in their shoes.

If this sounds a little complicated to you, don't worry. The system is pretty streamlined and easy to play. Switching characters is as easy as two button presses. Later on in the game, you'll also be able to "thread" attacks. That's fancy Clive Barker-speak for "combining abilities." Not much was revealed about this aspect, but we were assured that being able to throw things with your mind and then light said things on fire before they connect with a demon's head will be satisfying.

The level we saw was looking quite sharp. Crisp textures, flaming rubble, and beautifully-destroyed buildings populate the city of Al-Khali. There are also nice little touches such a swarm of black flies that descend on dead bodies to take them away. Sure, it's a trick to keep the framerate running smoothly, but hey- it's a neat trick. The levels will also be quite varied. As the Jerichos corner the ancient evil, layers of time start to peel off (described to us like an onion...Shrek style). This results in a sprawling adventure to perfectly safe places like Ancient Rome, WWII-era Europe, Ancient Sumeria, an area during the Crusades...you get the idea. Kind of like the time jumping/ unspeakable evil-killing of Eternal Darkness.

The baddies you meet are also as diverse as the areas. Expect skinless, twisted legions of the damned hounding you at every moment. Take the ghoul of choice in the first level: a bandaged, blade wielding creep who probably went to the same high school as Voldo from Soul Calibur. Sometimes these cretins will latch onto you and you'll have to fend them off with a short, interactive button-pressing cutscene that is all the rage these days. These interactive segments also happen during the normal scripted cutscenes, so don't be foolish enough to put down the controller...lest you want a face full of rusted, pointy things.

Clive Barker's Jericho is looking quite promising right now, but the real test is how the character switching is handled throughout the game. It can either be a very refreshing, strategic take on FPSs that offer interesting Lost Vikings-style puzzles, or an angry descent into frustrating micromanagement. At any rate, the production values and use of Clive Barker's style is undeniably strong so we can hope for the best. The game is scheduled to come out this September.