Aliens vs. Predator

When it comes to sci-fi few things have made as much of a wake as Aliens and Predator.  The combination of the two has an amazing potential both theatrically and in the world of games.  The real question is does this game deliver is it just one more movie game with a low budget and tight deadline that misses out on the sci-fi goodness.  Read on to find out.

The overall game has one fluid storyline split into three sections.  It's actually three different campaigns that allow you to switch between them after every mission.  I found it to be a great setup since it gives the option to progress the storyline as you wish.  You can play as the Alien the Predator or the Marines.  Although the game doesn't by any means require you to switch it's a more theatric showing if you choose to in my opinion.

Starting out as the Marines you'll find yourself as a rookie fighting off the aliens and trying to complete whatever task is delegated to you by your co.  You'll basically feel like a paper target amongst a see a fire but it's not all bad.  A little tactics changes a lot just make sure your not wasting your ammo.  Not because it's rare but because you don't have time to miss when your being attacked.  There's a small but fairly efficient arsenal on your path that allows you to change tactics to your liking.  Each weapon serves a purpose and they didn't bother giving several different types of any particular weapon for the purpose of flooding the game with options.  Let's face it this game wasn't designed with realistic combat at it's forefront.

As an Alien you play a specific role breaking from captivity in the tutorial and continuing through completing missions for your queen which your linked to by some form of telepathy.  It's an interesting way to give the alien character a way to have missions rather then simply hunt and kill.  The game does have some quirks on this mode though like the need to press a button to allow yourself to craw up on a wall.  I have to assume this was put in to prevent this from happening accidentally but it would have been less annoying to step on the wall at a bad time then to be running from gunfire and hang on the wall because you forgot to hold a trigger.  The storyline here is pretty basic and you get some good ideas of what the Aliens are all about.  You get to hack and slash and darkness is definitely your ally let's face the Aliens just aren't as badass as they once were.

Predators like the other two are given missions as you progress.  This is a more rogue type character of course but he isn't quite as fast as I would have liked.  That's not to say he's slow by any means and the stealth abilities were excellent fun to play with.  You do the majority of your fighting with your wrist claws which have decent power and you'll be fighting both Aliens and humans as you progress.  You do however get to use four special weapons which unlock as you progress through the storyline.  I'm sure you'll have your favorite but I was surprised that the disk wasn't mine.  I got hooked on the spear myself.  The shoulder cannon is the first you unlock and the proximity mine isn't far behind it but I'm not much for waiting for some poor slob to walk into a meticulously placed mine when it's just as fast to sneak up and kill him from behind.  Trophy's are taken and the single button take-downs are very artfully done.

All in all the game has a total of about six maps.  But you'll visit each three times in order to finish up the story on all three characters.  It's an interesting low budget way to elongate the game and focus on other things so I didn't mind it to much.  Especially when you realize it's not the exact same map when you run through it on a different guy.  Different paths and enemies change it quite a bit and keep it from being the typical "OMG I have to play this again?"

The IP for this game has always had and continues to have great potential but with Predators out you may be better off waiting for it's video game counterpart where they can focus a little more about making one character fun and challenging and still feel like a bad ass.  The cinematics have a hard time helping much more then giving you time to see some story.  They don't set much of a mood and the cut-scene one-hit kills take away from whatever rhythm you may have had cool as they may look.  I like them but they shouldn't hijack the camera just to show how cool they look.

Camera angles aren't terrible unless your playing as the Alien the wall and ceiling climbing wasn't bad but having to transition can jar the camera in ways you don't want and a few times I got turned around cause I pulled a complete 180 on corner and never caught it.  Lighting effects actually impressed me quite a bit not seeing anything but a flash of an Alien as the electrical box sparks was a very nice touch but I did fight with the camera a bit.

Multiplayer-I tried to test this but after ten minutes of searching for a game the final verdict is whatever multiplayer this game had it's mostly dead.  I won't say don't bother but I will say don't expect to find a game. Maybe you'll have better luck then I did it was one of the things I was really looking forward to.

Overall even with the three different campaigns it's a fairly short game.  It's a great IP to play with just like I can't pass up the opportunity to play a Superman game no matter how bad I know it will be if AVP is your thing you won't be disappointed.  Don't expect it to replace your favorite Friday night game however cause it's just not up to snuff.  Worth a rent and even possibly a purchase if you can find it used and need to have the geekdom floating with the rest of the fan stuff we've all collected over the years.

I give Aliens vs. Predator 6 out of 10