‘They mostly come at night… mostly.’

Platform: PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, PC
Publisher: Sega
FingerSports Rating: 3/5

If you’ve read my Universe at War review then you’ll know I’m rather fond of the AvP games, they’re a sci-fi wargasm. Briefly touching on the previous games (well, the Rebellion and Monolith titles anyway), the original now looks really dated, the second one simply looks clumsy and cheap by modern standards. Both games were a right giggle in their day, with AvP 2’s multiplayer spawning quite a dedicated fanbase. These games both managed to capture three styles of first person action, and that’s no mean feat in any game.

So the new one: Aliens vs Predator. On a slight tangent, how do they come up with these names. A quick glance at the interweb has revealed that there were thirteen other Aliens Vs Predator games. Only a handful of AvP titles even have a suffix, and some of those are expansions. Maybe they’re just determined to not have to number their games.

Many years ago:

“Great game guys. Can you do a sequel for us?”
“Yeah, sure.”
“I was thinking; why not call it ‘AvP 3’? Or ‘AvP: Wayland’s a real wanker’?”
“Oh. That’s not really cool with us, we’ll just call it Aliens Vs Predator.”

Anyway: Aliens Vs Predator (the new one) is a horror/shooter, and visually the game is great. Very pretty levels, some lovely lighting effects and particles, the textures are top notch. The actual player models look amazing, just jaw dropping detail. I’m going to say I haven’t seen any characters look as good as these do – but they are not brilliantly animated. The characters faces don’t move as well as they could, the movements aren’t very fluid and it’s just a bit of a distraction from the lovely, lovely detail. The exception to this is the Aliens; their movements are serpentine and fluid, with tails swishing as they crawl along any surface. My favourite thing about the game is probably when the marines’ flashlight just catches the tail of a xeno as it scrambles out of sight – it looks just as you’d imagine it.

The game tells the story of three races brutally murdering each other for various nefarious reasons. There are the Colonial Marines: gun ho squaddies with dim commanders and even dimmer flashlights, coming to answer the distress call of a remote research facility. Then there’s the Xenomorph Aliens that the researchers are studyingl; a hive minded, wall crawling, face eating, parasitic race born of nightmares. They’re pissed because the humans think poking the queen with sticks is fun. Finally there’s the Predators, a race of high tech intergalactic hunters who value the ‘Serpents’ as the most honourable prey in the galaxy. Or something.

Tenuous story aside, the game is split into three (sadly short) single player campaigns each playing through the evens on some random planet from a different viewpoint. The story is quite well told, and the three separate races actions link into the others’ stories.

The Marines story is dark, jumpy and leaves you wishing the atmospheric sounds team wasn’t quite so good (because they evidently were). Every level is creepy, filled with echoing screams and scraping sounds. Great stuff. There some very nice moments during the Marine single player, the ping of the motion tracker making you freak out at opening a door.

The Predator’s story follows a lethal hunter examining the humans and using the chance to hunt some bugs. It’s a very different affair to the Marines, you do feel like a hi tech grim reaper, sitting in trees with your cloaking device on luring marines out individually to be pounced before tearing their spines out is very good fun. Hunting the aliens presents a different style, your adversaries can see you even when cloaked and it’s not till later in the game you acquire the firepower to see them off at a distance without crippling your power reserves.

The Aliens are the stars of the show for me though; their single player follows a specimen from the human labs and charts its escape and return to its queen. As the Alien you get to instil some real terror in the marines, smashing the lights and lurking in shadows before leaping off the ceiling onto their faces is just brilliant.

So I did enjoy the single player campaigns, but (and this is very annoying) they are irritatingly short. I’ve beaten all three over a weekend whilst busying myself with other games and some multiplayer as well (more on that later).

The game has three sets of controls to go with its different species, and this is where another complaint comes in. The predators Olympics winning long jump is quite easy to get used to, before long you will be jumping around a nest of Aliens hacking away like a true nutter. But there’s some strange lock-on combat system that’s just not as intuitive as it could have been, on the PC having to hold shift as you strafe and slash is just annoying. I hardly ever used it. Don’t get me wrong though, the close combat is very well done! Light attack beats heavy attack, heavy attack beats block, block beats light attack. It’s a very easy to use paper-scissor-stone system that can be very rewarding (especially in multiplayer) when you thrash down a cocky predator with your tail. However, the marines on the other hand can block melee attacks and feature an instant knock down ability that leaves whoever got hit vulnerable to fire for exactly long enough to be shot to death. Um, excuse me, why does that make marines better than the Aliens in close combat? That aside, you can still vivisect a marine if you creep up behind him, the grab moves look great and the splatter of various organs always puts a smile on your face. Finally, the Aliens spiderman wall-crawling ability is clumsy, and you’ll end up just jumping around from wall to wall because actually trying to wall climb causes you to stop for a second each time you change surface. And who’s the eejit that thinks spinning the camera around as you do this is a good idea. All it does is discourage you from using this mechanic. It’s a shame because they seemed to have cracked this in the previous games…

The multiplayer is good fun, with a fair selection of game modes to choose from. There are a few imbalances as far as I’m concerned, but on the whole it’s definitely worth a go. Definitely more fun with friends. The one hit kills from behind are just as satisfying to pull off as they are annoying when someone does it to you – but I think this feature will destroy the multiplayer for some. I think the game would really benefit from a ‘killcam’, just because it’s a feature that takes some of the frustration out of some deaths (you know: ‘Hey! WTF no one could see me you hacking noob… oh wait. I didn’t know you could do that. Ah’). Unfortunately, there aren’t very many weapons in the game and they are scattered around quite thinly, whilst this isn’t too bad for the Predator players (who can cloak and go for a proper looksie) or the Aliens (guns?) it means the Marines will inevitably just stick to the pulse rifle. But why wouldn’t they? The semi-auto rifle has such limited use on the cramped levels that it’s largely ignored, and the flamethrower does such pitiful damage that to get a kill with it means you will probably die in the process. Same goes for the shotgun, it’s really not powerful enough to justify using it over the pulse rifle. That only leaves the smartgun as an option, and every marine on the level will be fighting for that baby. But I will say it again, it is good fun. Watching unsuspecting marines run right past you as a cloaked Predator is great, as is pouncing on them from the ceiling as the Alien, whilst blasting the evil buggers off walls with the grenade launcher feels satisfying!

So, the verdict? Aliens Vs Predator is a good game, well delivered and full of eye candy. It’s flaws are few and mostly forgivable, but the short lived single player will irritate many gamers. I think the game will have a certain degree of replay to it, but in the end you will put this down within a month. I’d advise picking it up as it’s good fun – but make sure you get it as cheaply as possible, it doesn’t last.

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• February 26, 2010 — Aliens vs Predator
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• April 18, 2011 — Dukes Does The Gadget Show
• April 14, 2011 — BulletStorm – Review
• November 4, 2010 — Fallout: New Vegas – Review