If “The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena” leaves any impression on the player, it’s a newfound respect for Vin Diesel. But not much else.

“Dark Athena” is an adventure that starts where “Escape from Butcher Bay” left off. Spoiler alert: Riddick escaped from Butcher Bay.

The game tries to differentiate itself by adding platforming gameplay. It can sometimes get tedious, but it’s a nice way of breaking the monotony of a first-person shooter.

That element has a huge execution flaw, though. Every time Riddick climbs a box, ladder or basically does anything that isn’t killing people, it goes to a third-person animation.

During the animation, enemies can still hurt you, even though you can’t move. Even without that problem, it is unnecessary to make the player watch a long animation of Riddick climbing a ladder.

Gunplay is average, but “Chronicles of Riddick” games aren’t about shooting at all. Stealth and strategy are emphasized above the gun combat.

And for those who most value the shooter aspect of a first-person-shooter, this game is not for you. Riddick doesn’t even have a gun for about half of the game. Most of the shooting in the game’s first half is done by the use of drones.

When they start out, players will quickly notice that they cannot grab their enemies’ weapons. That’s because drones, which are slaves-turned-cyborgs, have their guns attached to their arms.

While you can pick up their bodies and use their weapons, moving around with them is nearly impossible. Instead, use the drones’ — and eventually your own — weapons to take out the lights and slash enemies with night vision.

It’s less efficient to be sure, but it’s much more rewarding. Turning out the lights also eliminates another flaw in the game: fancy kill animations.

Almost every time Riddick kills somebody with a melee weapon, he has to do it in a fancy way that takes a few seconds.

“Dark Athena” has a multiplayer aspect to it, but it’s hard to imagine anybody who would want to play this online. With games like “Left 4 Dead,” the “Call of Duty” series and “Team Fortress 2,” playing online would seem like a waste of time. More so than video games already are.

The story is underwhelming. It’s not bad, but it’s not good. The voice acting is decent, but it’s clear that they were recording without hearing Vin Diesel’s dialogue. If they heard Riddick’s lines, they wouldn’t have put so much effort into it.

Riddick’s dialogue makes it clear that he spends most of his time either alone or by killing the people around him. His lines are equal parts crazy and lame, with a splash of “sounds-like-it-was-translated-from-Zulu.”

In one scene, a female prisoner hysterically asks Riddick if her daughter is safe. Having seen her hiding in the vents, his answer is “The darkness keeps her safe.”

Considering that, Diesel does great job voice acting. The stupidity of the dialogue is only apparent after the player leaves the game — if the player thinks about the game at all.

Reach the reporter at cogino@asu.edu.