Aliens vs. Predator review

There’s nothing like a gory videogame fatality to get gamers giggling with sadistic delight. After all, spine-ripping punchlines have kept Mortal Kombat going for nearly 20 years! Aliens vs. Predator knows this tactic full well, too.
Us human meatbags get caught in the middle of a sci-fi adversarial tag-team, and AvP captures the ensuing carnage from a delicious first-person perspective. When you’re playing as an Alien or a Predator, the game’s up-close-and-personal approach lets you press X when behind an unsuspecting enemy to perform an impale, decapitation, throat slash, face bite, or something else equally gruesome and meaty.

This intensity is the shooter’s strength. Across three short intertwining campaigns — from the Marine, Alien, and Predator viewpoints — on a distant colony, you’ll engage in white-knuckle boss fights, dodge annoying Facehuggers, and hoof it through dark corridors. But an unfortunate result of the overlapping stories is that you pass through the exact same areas three times, making the environments feel recycled and stale by the end. The game also relies heavily on melee combat: holding RB and LB together blocks while the individual buttons perform light and heavy melee attacks, respectively. This setup may force you to get face-to-face with these scary creatures, but it ends up making the game too easy because you can simply block and then counter with RB when the screen prompts you to.
Worse, the emphasis on, and ease, of the melee combat — maybe a concession to the controller’s less-precise-than-a-mouse aiming when you’re trying to quickly shoot an Alien racing down a wall or ceiling? — is a design decision that hurts a lot more than it helps. It has the unfortunate side effect of completely removing any and all fear from the experience — something earlier games in the series thrived on. The Marine campaign suffers most. You should be wetting your pants when your motion tracker is beeping like crazy and you hear Aliens hissing all around you. But why waste a perfectly good pair of pants when you know you can just block and retaliate, punching the Xenomorph to the ground for a quick, easy kill? Gameplay aside, just the idea of a human punching an Alien in the face with any success is an absolute crime against the laws of this long-established universe.


The Predator campaign lets you pull the same trick against the Aliens. In fact, only the Alien portion doesn’t feel like it was nerfed for the gamepad, as the Xenomorphs don’t wield guns. They do skitter along any surface, however, allowing you to stalk your prey from the ceiling and even press Y to hiss and lure individuals away from a group for easy devouring. It’s occasionally disorienting to navigate the environment as the acid-blooded baddie, but the experience is refreshingly unique, and as an Alien, fewer of the levels feel recycled.
And AvP largely redeems itself in its multi-species multiplayer mode. Not only do all of the classes feel balanced against the others, but the action is both engaging and party-friendly. Pulling off a fatality move on an unsuspecting buddy is a gift-wrapped invitation for trash talk. Deathmatch free-for-alls that seem vanilla in other games are a treat here, as 18 Marines, Aliens, or Predators all running around trying to slaughter each other is gleeful, controlled chaos. The Firefight/Horde-style Survival mode also stands out.

On the other hand, the humans-versus-a-lone-Predator multiplayer mode — in which the player who successfully offs the Dreadlocked One then becomes him — reads great on paper but is a bore in practice. The designed-for-18-players maps are just too big when everyone’s trying to hunt down one player, leaving most participants out of the action for much of the round. And ironically, AvP lacks a similar “Aliens vs. Predator” mode that probably would’ve played a bit better due to the Xenomorphs’ ability to jet around the map with added haste.

A few more maps, a few more multiplayer modes, a few more unique areas in the campaign, and a few more fear-inducing moments would’ve gone a long way toward making Aliens vs. Predator set off gamers’ motion trackers. Instead, it registers as simply a medium blip on the radar — a second-shelf shooter that falls just short of fulfilling the incredible potential of its license. But hey, those fatalities never get old!
On Xbox 360
+ Engaging multiplayer...mostly.
+ Unique Alien gameplay.
- Emphasis on melee removes fear in single-player mode.
? Would you really, truly punch an Alien if you already had a loaded gun in your hand? Or ever, for that matter?


7.0
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alosa
March 24, 2011 at 10:21pm
Innovation of this type of high definition games though interesting for viewers but for developers its quite dangerous and risky . The way you animated and presented its really look like alien vs predator film which is only controlled by viewers. I have already watched the alien vs predator but its just terrific for me..charleston search engine marketing
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Ibiza
March 23, 2011 at 6:55pm
This post has been extremely insightful and useful to increase my knowledge in the field of knowledge and its many facets. Thank you very much, I will certainly come back to visit often and definitely tell some of my internet-inclined friends to visit this site. Keep posting and expressing your knowledge and opinions strong! posiedon 3 ibiza
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landoncorton
November 15, 2010 at 1:15pm
I have always loved this series and the game is pretty cool to play. Only did the rental as I couldn't see spending the full amount for the game.
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Carld
November 09, 2010 at 2:56pm
Because I have watched all the Alien vs Predator films I think that this game is interesting. On the other hand, video games that are based on movies are usually not that good.
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Carsoniem101
March 14, 2010 at 9:28pm
Carson Abbott I Really Liked This Game, I Thought The Alien Gameplay Was A Bit Hard But My Favourite Was A Tie Between Predator And Human. Overall I Agree With A 7/10 Rating And I Thought This Games Multiplayer Is Great :)
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rk1studley
March 07, 2010 at 3:06pm
i really like the game the MP needs some work but single player is solid human plays well so does alien and predator all in all it is a good game maybe a good weekend rent for the SP www.rk1gaming.net
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theory_of_madness
March 02, 2010 at 12:54pm
I recently purchased AvP at a reduced price due to it being a preowned game within the first week and a half of release. I payed 40 dollars for it and i am almost done with it completely. I do agree that a lot of the game is repetitive thru the Marine and Predator missions. I think that there should have been new scenarios for each character. The dialogue between the marines is repetitive also. I cant stand hearing the say thing said over and over again. The fatalities for the Aliens is another thing that got old after 5 kills. The facehugger fatatlities were the worse. I mean no matter where you are, when you press X when prompted, there is a facehugger nearby to finish the job. Over all i give the game the same rating, 7.5. Graphics are great, gameplay is fluent, except the "hard attacks", which are slow and for the price at which i payed it was worth it.
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Spybreak
February 24, 2010 at 9:19pm
Wow, maybe AVP2 just set the bar higher than what they could envision. That game was great and like you said it made you crap your pants, a pivotal design for any shooter that deals with numerous Aliens/ head hunting Predators. It's ironic that so many design features of games came from the movie Aliens yet this game couldn't pull em off even with the help of the license. Seems like a good rental, the demo didn't really thrill me.
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blackbydeath
February 21, 2010 at 2:54am
I thought it was a great game mainly for infestation in pyramid

















