Joanna Dark, that Rare heroine who raised the bar for console shooters with her near-perfect 2000 debut on Nintendo 64, returns to her past with new purpose (and on a new platform), in this 2005 launch title for the Xbox 360. As the title implies, this game is a prequel to the N64 game, set before the original's twisted story of corporate conspiracy. Gamers are challenged to guide Joanna through training as a rookie operative, and help her earn the "perfect" test scores that inspired her ominous nickname.

The earlier setting should not imply that all has been said and done, however; while the game's storyline may answer old questions about Joanna and her background, it also poses plenty of new questions of its own. In addition to its story-driven single-player mode, as Xbox aficionados and fans of the series might expect, Perfect Dark Zero features a variety of cooperative and competitive multiplayer modes, including split-screen shooting for up to four, and online action through the Xbox Live subscription service, capable of hosting more than 50 human players in a single map.