Since EA is being lame and only letting people with a beta key into their exciting war shooter Battlefield: Bad Company 2, I sulked by playing SEGA's Aliens versus Predator reboot demo instead.
If there's one thing I learnt from my time with this three-way galactic deathmatch, its that being human sucks.
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I'm always surprised to hear that people are split in opinion about the ol' Aliens versus Predator. The one for the PC released in 1999 by devs Rebellion, that is. Some people said it captured the horrific atmosphere and tension of the Aliens and Predator movies perfectly (the original movies. Not to be confused with the puke-fest Aliens versus Predator movie tie-ins) and I am of this sentiment too, whilst others just said the game was crap; either they didn't like the graphics, or the gameplay, or god-knows-what. A bunch of fools, the lot of 'em, I say.
When SEGA announced last year that they were doing a remake of this classic, I got very excited indeed. There's been little in the way of true scare-your-pants-off shooters in awhile, Bioshock hardly counts, FEAR: Origins was horrendous, and Dead Space was not that scary. But more importantly, SEGA is bringing to the table something fresh with this new AvP, and that is three-way deathmatches. Just think about the chaotic possibilities. If they get the three races balanced right, looking good, and playing well then this may be a stellar hit. I'm hoping the AvP franchise could also redeem themselves in the eyes of those who poo-pooed the original game, because seriously, the franchise kicks ass.
But that's enough preamble, how did the multiplayer demo stack up?
It's a limited demo: You can play all three races, but only in an 8-player deathmatch, which is fine as it still gives you a chance to kill things. Multiplayer uses a lobby-matchmaking service similar to Modern Warfare 2's, except the latter's presentation and stability of it is a lot more polished. But this is only a pre-release so we may see improvements in connectivity when the game goes gold. No complains so far though, I've been able to join games without a hitch.
Once the deathmatch started, it was a no-brainer affair. Run around and kill anything else that moved. But before I get to the juicy details about how each race played, I'll get other important stuff out of the way. First, the graphics. Good. Not sharp, nor the most detailed but the style was grungy, dark and dripping with fear, and the environment was totally immersive. SEGA has to be commended for getting it spot-on with the mood, it's so reminiscent of the first game way back in '99, and yet can still be called a next-gen game with its updated graphics. It's got DX-11 support but that was not featured in the demo, which only ran DX-9. So all those lovely screenshots you see, well, that's only for the full game.
The design for the included map is horrific though, and I don't mean in a good way. Boring, totally uninspired, the layout was just a bunch of corridors connected in a large network that appeared to be some tech lab or hangar bay infested by the Alien's hive nest. It was all run and gun through these corridors, with little in the way of hiding spots, places to take cover behind, or vantage points to snipe down from. The game may sustain interest for its faithful revival of the franchise, but as far as good multiplayer gaming goes, the included map is an example of what devs should bold not do. It's too basic, something you'd expect from a game 5 years ago, or Unreal Tournament, which is meant to be a no-brainer shooter. I'm hoping the other maps are much better because I can see this one being avoided like the plague by players.
Now to talk about the races. I played an Alien first and this is probably the most fun you'll ever get with the game. If you can handle the vomit-inducing turns, jumps and twists. True to the Alien's nature, you can run along walls at break-neck speeds, transition between them, and pounce down on unsuspecting prey. It's real hard to get used to the disorientation of perspective as up becomes down, and left becomes right whilst scaling ceilings or on the side of walls. But once you do, the freedom of movement is such a joy, and you feel a sense of invincibility as neither the Predators nor Humans can match your speed and agility.
Killing is a simple case of getting close enough to the enemy and dispatching them with either claws or tail. It's fun to hang upside down on the ceiling above a Marine and impale them with your long tail. Or get up to their face and even bite it off.
If there's one flaw with the combat mechanics already, its that it feels a little repetitive. Once you've got an enemy in your sights, it's literally a case of clicking at them till they die. If fighting a Marine, there's some strategic evasion required to get out of their line of fire, but when you're close enough, it's button mashing till their dead. If fighting a Predator, there may be some claw-to-claw combat, with timed counter-attacks, but really its still a case of being the fastest to get the most blows in to kill. Besides how can you beat an Alien when it has the ability to see through walls and Predator cloaks? No one's safe from an Alien.
I await the full game with team deathmatch so I can coordinate Alien attacks with buddies, raining down vicious fury on a hapless victim. In fact, I became that victim once, when I played a Marine, had my full attention on a creepy crawly on the ceiling and got impaled through the gut by another Alien from behind.
Which brings me to playing the Marines. Humans really do suck. We think we're the most intelligent beings out there, but really the Aliens and Predators have got us beat. We're not as fast or as technologically-advanced. But playing Marines is exactly the same as it was in the movies/original game. The constant fear of being alone and vulnerable to faster, more deadlier beings; waving your torch manically around a dimly lit corridor, at shadows that seem to dance. And your radar that goes Beepppp .... Beeepppp as you get closer and closer to an enemy, and then suddenly, the sound stops. You think it's safe, and the next thing you know, your head and spinal cord is being removed from the rest of your body. Scary as hell but fun - I can't wait to play the Marines single-player campaign.
Be prepared to die a lot, Marines are really just pincushions for the other species. Why do you think the franchise is called Aliens versus Predator, and not Aliens versus Humans versus Predator? A lot of screaming can be heard in the hallways as humans get decapitated or mauled to death.
But in their defense, the Marines' guns do pack some power. If you manage to spot an enemy at a distance, have decent accuracy and reflexes, all foes will fall under your rapid-fire pulse gun. Or flamethrower. Or shotgun. Aliens are pesky when moving around and hiding in shadows, but in the open, they are easily dispatched of. Predators even more so as they are less agile and bigger sized targets. Keep at a safe distance is the best tactic, and strength in numbers even more so.
Finally, the Predator. This one is the class for the pros. He (or she) is like the Swiss-Army knife of killing, requiring a little more brainpower to perform than the frenetic attacking of the Alien and quick-reflex shooting of the Marine. You can cloak, use thermal or Alien vision to see your foes much easier in dark environments, and have some kind of lock-on assist for when using projectiles like the shoulder-cannon or shurikens. A focus ability also makes spotting mines easier.
But despite this range of killing tools, Predators are not the uber invincible monsters I expected them to be. They go down just as easy in a fisticuffs with Aliens, and a Marine shooting enough times will take them out just like the next species. In fact, since Predators don't have speed like Aliens, closing in on a prey for melee attacks is quite a challenge. But the trick to playing a Pred is, catching an opponent unaware, either cloaked or sneaking from behind. Then when you're close enough, press spacebar and watch the most awesome trophy kills ever. Get an alien and rip out its tongue, smoosh its face, or poke some Marine in the neck with your really sharp claws.
Though, I've still not figured out how to do the Predator long/high jumps. In some demo videos online, I saw a marker which allows you to pin-point where exactly you want to jump and the Predator will automatically leap to that location. Provided it's not too high and not too far. I couldn't figure out which button to press to do that, and the Predator's standard jump is horribly low. I couldn't even get on top of a friggin' crate.
All in all though, a pretty fun time being a Predator.
Just last bits and pieces to comment on before I wrap up this preview of the game. About the gameplay overall, I would have to say, it needs work. The first-person perspective feels clunky, less smooth than other shooters, and when you're engaged in a melee fight with an enemy, especially with the Alien or Predator, your screen shakes a heck load. This makes it real hard to keep sights trained on the enemy as much as the player actually wants to. Stop making the screen shake so much and I might just be able to kill an enemy.
I don't know if this is the case in any other multiplayer modes, but all races (except for Aliens) have to pick up weapons, ammo, health drops scattered throughout the map. That's fine with me, but when you have to "hold" the Use button instead of just pressing it once, it's rather counter-productive to a fast-paced death-match. What if you're holding the Use button to pick up a weapon and get killed in the process? In Modern Warfare 2, simply press Use once to pick up dropped weapons and you're back in the fight.
Also, there's a persistent-levelling system, which is pretty much the most popular thing devs are employing nowadays to keep fans coming back to their multiplayer games. Modern Warfare started it, Battlefield Bad Company 2's got it, Team Fortress 2's got it, Bioshock 2's got it, and now AvP. But I didn't see any of that in the demo, and I'm still skeptical as to how it would be a useful system for this game at all. You get extra XP for making trophy kills, doing this special thing or that, but what could you possibly unlock? Honestly, some people just want to kill things, so SEGA should focus on streamlining that as much as possible.
Finally, no crouch. This is not a shooter if you can't crouch. That is all.
In conclusion, don't get the game just yet. It appears complete, nary a bug in sight, but the actual multiplayer gameplay could be refined. I didn't get the same satisfaction as I do in Modern Warfare 2 or Left 4 Dead's Versus mode when killing an enemy. I'm not really sure why that is, but it could have something to do with how repetitive and simplistic the multiplayer experience actually is. You spawn, seek out enemies scurrying about the boring map and kill them or be killed. Then respawn and do it all over again. Even the addition of a three-way fight fest isn't enough of a competitive edge to vault this game into the Halls of Awesome just yet. We'll see what else SEGA has in store.
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