Publisher: SEGA
Developer: Rebellion
Released: 19th February 2010
Platforms: PC (reviewed), PS3 & Xbox360

Working at Alien War back in the nineties, I've lived and breathed being a Colonial Marine - it was tiring, poorly paid and even the smart guns didn't keep the tourists at bay.

So as you'd expect from such a grade-A fanboy, in the past I've wrapped my spidery legs around the head of the original Aliens versus Predator (1999) and stuck my impregnating proboscis down the throat of Aliens versus Predator 2 (and Primal Hunt) (2001/2) and loved every minute of it.

So my mandibles were all a-quiver when I heard that the developers of the original AvP, Rebellion, were working on a 'next gen' reboot. But I've just set my wrist-comp to self-destruct because (to paraphrase the Aliens film poster) "This time... it's snore".

"Did IQs just drop sharply while I was away?" - Ripley

While the graphical leaps forward are obvious - particularly with Direct X 11 compatible graphics cards on PC - the gameplay is still firmly routed in the Oxford developer's 1999 tour-de-force.

Back at the turn-of-the-century, corridor shooters¹ were the norm and perfectly suited the as yet unmarried² Alien and Predator franchises where claustrophobia and paranoia were strong contributors to the appeal.

Star Trek Voyager: Elite Force, Deus Ex, Medal of Honor: Underground, No One Lives Forever (The Operative), Half-Life: Counter Strike and Soldier of Fortune all battled for shelf space back in 1999/2000. In this environment, Rebellion's AvP delivered atmosphere, suspense and a kick-ass setting rivalled only by the less-action focused Deus Ex.

But a decade on, we suck far harder on the videogame teat and demand more for our hard earned cash than just four walls and a crosshair.Nowadays we have concepts such as sandbox gaming, advanced AI, player-controlled vehicles, customisable characters, branching storylines, physics puzzles and emotive characters that can carry a story into the heart of the noisiest shoot 'em up (I'm looking at you Alyx Vance).

While any new game doesn't need all of these, the fact that AvP has none of them or any other innovations to set it apart, you can't help but feel you're playing AvP 2000: Redux.

"I dunno. Is there anything you can do?" - Sgt Apone

Playing as the marine, you get the best of the disjointed trio of stories. But this is relative, as there is little in the way of plot to get excited about. What's more, there are no memorable characters to speak of (including yourself), and only a few characters you even encounter more than once (one of which being Lance "Bishop" Henrickson, phoning in a 'Mr. Weyland' performance).

A major part of the appeal of Cameron's Aliens and Schwarzenegger's Predator is the interplay between the besieged squads. Here we get nothing (most people are dead to be honest). C'mon Rebellion! Even the laughably populated Gears of War had a bit of friendly banter to add an extra dimension to the carnage.

As the Alien, the extra dimension (as before) is the ability to crawl along any surface to reach your prey. Apart from making your brain melt as you try to stay orientated with your heavily armed intended victim while your wobbling over a corrugated ceiling panel, this does elevate the gameplay above the predictable FPS action of the Marine and Predator campaigns.

But this freedom is extremely limited. There are invisible barriers stopping you going where you shouldn't such climbing up an otherwise perfectly scalable cliff face or leaping a barbed wire fence your Granny could vault. Even the 1999 outing (if memory serves) had a logical reason why you couldn't go a certain way. Pfft!

Perhaps the player controlled Alien is taking a leaf out of the AI aliens and wandering around, bouncing off the environment like Lady Di's Mercedes. They won't be getting their pathfinding badges anytime soon, that's for sure.

"She says the jungle... it just came alive and took him." - Poncho

The power of these sci-fi monsters continues to wane when you try any stealth kills. Creep up on an unsuspecting human or android (I prefer the term 'Artificial Person' myself) and you can dispatch them effortlessly. But not quickly. Or quietly. In fact they scream like the front row of a JLS concert, and take about as long for the pain to be over.

All the while, you're locked in to one of a handful of drawn-out, deliciously gory executions; defenceless as the victim's buddies wander over to see what all the fuss is about, finish their sandwiches, reload their weapons, put out their cigarettes and blow the crap out of you. The same is true for any finishing moves during melee.

This forces you to keep your distance as the Predator (you'll use the thrown Combi Stick a lot), and as the Alien you descend in to panicked 'girl-slapping', hoping to take the bloke down with a flurry of attacks before his mates arrive. 'Invisible, silent, deadly'³ this is not.

"So you cooked up a story and dropped the six of us in a meat grinder?" - Dutch

The multiplayer remains fun, particularly the out-numbering joy of the Aliens versus Marines 'Infestation' mode. But at time of writing (a week after release) things are a bit broken on the PC online side of things (I can't comment on the console versions). Dedicated server support is still listed as 'In Beta' and the other options are clumsy to enter, and often sparsely populated when you do (but you can't blame Rebellion for that, I suppose).

When I did get in a game - a random ranked game to earn XP to unlock other stuff (a bit like Modern Warfare) - I enjoyed it while it lasted, but it was over too soon and I was instantly booted back to the menu (sounds like my sex life). I wanted to play with these guys again, or at the very least not have to hunt for more active servers and sparse players to play against. It just seemed an awful lot of effort, for a very brief reward (there's that sex analogy again).

I really didn't want to be overly negative about AvP - what it does, it does solidly and with obvious love of the source material - but I can't hide my disappointment at the game's apparent lack of ambition. With 21st Century FPS competition from 'ultimate badasses' such as Left4Dead 2 (fear, AI and co-op), Bioshock 2 (suspense, setting and story) and Bad Company 2 and Modern Warfare 2 (spectacle and multiplayer), Aliens versus Predator is in a world of hurt.

 

¹  Corridor shooters, are run-and-gun combat games, usually from a first-person perspective, based in some sort of rigid maze-like map. This could be anything from a space ship or a field of wheat, the key point is you go where the game corrals you, nowhere else.
²  I'm referring to movies and games here. They had met in comics with the excellent initial series a particular gem and one that influenced the first AvP film and these games.
³  I remain convinced this is a Predator-related phrase despite evidence to the contrary that it is either the tagline to 'Cabin Fever' (2002) or my warped memories of the tagline to 'Hunt for Red October' (1990). Whatever!