PC Review
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First off, I want to say that I liked the first two AVP games. The first one I liked more than the second because I thought it had a better atmosphere.
Second... I think a lot of people expect too much from games these days. If they're not a totally new look at a genre of a game type (like 1st Person Shooter), then people automatically think "I've seen stuff similar to this... lame..."
I admit I've only mostly played the demo, and then about an hour into the Marine Campaign... and one online game in a Team Deathmatch right before I had to leave for work. I got stuck playing a marine (I prefer to be an alien) because the menu is a tad different than the demo and I didn't know where to click to change it... or Team DM automatically selects a race for you, but I think everyone else just knew what was going on and chose quicker.
(I'm playing only in the DirectX 9 version, I think. I have a GTX 260 video card... and not the most beastly PC ever, but it runs it very nicely with high settings.)
Gameplay
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Since I've only played roughly an hour into the Marine campaign, I can't speak much for story development, but I can say I was surprised with how much talking there is from fellow marines.
The main female character, I forget her name, moves around & talks about as much as Alyx from Half-Life 2... when she's around that is. When she's not around, she's helping you out through radio chat. I definately wasn't expecting that kind of cinematic feeling and depth from this game. I was thinking that the characters wouldn't be so well animated.
The first marine areas do feel linear, but there isn't a whole lot you can do in games like this. I mean, there are little side rooms that you can go into, but there's nothing really interesting to find besides maybe an occasional hidden Audio Journal or Health stuff. It looks just like the movies though, I think... but they gave it a little bit of their own feel, and I love it so far.
The AI of the aliens has been impressive. I keep hearing people mention bad AI in this game, but I can't imagine why... so far anyway.
Aliens will lean away from gunfire while running on walls... I've had one run at me down a hall way, jump on the side wall, then actually run 15 feet past me along the wall in order to swing around and try to get me from the side... instead of just attacking me as soon as it got within melee range.
They'll stop in dark places as well. I've had 2 aliens coming from different directions, one stopped... so I turned to look for the other, I killed it, and by that time the one behind me had snuck up on me. XD Pretty scary and cool.
They also remind me of zombies from Left 4 Dead, as they rarely run straight at you. They kinda run in a curve around your side sometimes, then step in to claw you.
The only downside I've seen is that they sometimes jump from wall to wall too much when you use little burst fires against them... like, they'll be in one spot, you'll fire, they jump to a side wall... you fire again, and they hop back right where they were to start with.
And... I think it's too easy to knock aliens away. That's fine though, you get overrun pretty easily, so without that knockback you'd die pretty frequently.
Anyway, that's pretty much it... I'm pleasantly surprised so far. (I might add more later)
-= Jaermal
