You know what AvP2 *really* needed? No, I don't know, either... but we shouldn't feel bad, because clearly the people behind this were equally, if not more, in the dark. My theory is, they took a long(speaking of which, know what isn't? ...get your mind out of the gutter, I'm referring to the single player of this) look at it, and a sentence was spoken: "Well, if we can't do better, we can at least do different". And that was the first step in creating this, and going by the minimal nature of almost everything found in this, it was probably not very far from the last step(please, no AA jokes). I'm not sure I can think of any other production within gaming which so aptly could be described as simultaneously phoning it in and trying too hard. This really shouldn't cost money. It adds basically the handful(if even that) of stuff having to do with the races not in the former title, and some other things, as well as tweaking one or two such, of what was already there. Two new weapons... dual pistols for the human(because if there's one thing that really makes sense to put into this, it's something out of a Woo flick... come on, what next, throwing knives, slow-motion, stunt moves?), and the equally out of place Energy Flechette(fast-shooting... do I need to say more?) for the Ancient version of the more humanoid of the other two. Oh, and Face-Huggers now harm what they hit... because that was totally necessary. MP gets additions, but they really aren't that fair(well, there are also some that are just useless). There don't seem to be very many maps that weren't already there, for that matter. Level design in general is rushed, and usually, quite frankly, ugly. They tried to make this challenging, which is fine, really, the issue is the way they did it... primarily through simply sending hordes of foes at you(going so far as to them appearing literally out of nowhere), entirely disregarding the masterful atmosphere of what this is an expansion to(and they don't even provide a final fight(or that cool of one) for each). Not all the game-play is easy, but most of it is poor. The AI is worse, this saddens me to say, but at times less impressive than even that of the '99 title(no, I'm serious, and I'm not exaggerating). The scripting is not of the quality that it was in the second. Nothing in this makes as much sense, either. The direction in it needs some logic injected into it(at times pretty badly). The story isn't as interesting, and the three aren't even all(at the very least, not particularly so) active in it. It does fill gaps(though I can't claim I ever found them to be gaping, certainly not enough to justify *this*), in it being a prequel(not sure even Lucas could mess one up like this), but it really does little good apart from that. This being so short means that the guns are collected at such a ludicrous pace that it stands out like a pink elephant doing river-dancing whilst performing opera-singing in German. On the subject of foreign languages... the Russian accents get old *real* fast(remarkable, really, considering how quick this passes), which they didn't in that which came before this. The voices are largely the same, if the voice acting is almost invariably unsatisfying. The races don't get to do what they're good at, and aren't in situations that compliment them, or not enough so. In the campaigns, you now control others than that of its predecessor... a Corporate, a PredAlien, and the already-mentioned old guy Predator(yeah, they ran out of ideas almost immediately on this thing). Changes are made for this reason, but hardly any of them go beyond the HUD color scheme, least of which the last-mentioned species, which just has red on both sides now... yeah. The first-mentioned also has another variant of Motion Tracker, but it's a 360 degree, 15 meter version... so essentially, they doubled one and cut the other in half, and this really isn't as much of a lazy edit as it takes away from it(and there's barely any use for it, well, in SP, anyway). The one left over has an altered display for the Headbite, which actually is decent enough. New material is added, including effects/designs/textures not seen in the others. There could be more, and, as pointed out on Wiki, it is hopelessly clumsy in its implementation(granted, some of that was my opinion). There just really isn't much at all to find in the films that isn't already in the VGs, and what of it this does have is either not that fun or important ones, or they're not done right. Sentry Guns, Turrets and Exo-Suits for multi-player(and the first two in both, the last one was already there before this) could surely be a truly great thing... but here it's just not. Maybe they're too easy(and would it maybe be nice if there was at least one for the other two? Acid spit, maybe? Honestly, the self-destruct isn't *that* big an advantage, and it could be considerably more awesomely done, did these guys *watch* the movies?) to get, to use, and it could be that they are more difficult to fight than they should be. I can't say. The result is the same, no matter what. It's uneven, and battles aren't as engaging or involving. All in all... this just isn't worth much, if any, time, and definitely no money(I'm grateful the copy I'm playing belongs to someone else, and was lent to me) on, unless you're a stubborn completist(even more so than I am, and that would be a lot... ask those that know me). I recommend this to the people I've just mentioned, and I sincerely suggest that anyone else, and those who risk their memories of the other entries in this series being ruined, especially so... should consider if they need this. 6/10
Aliens vs. Predator 2: Primal Hunt
(2002 Video Game)
Well, if nothing else, it is *consistently* disappointing...
14 May 2008