The best Aliens game yet even with its flaws.
I want to state that this is a detailed unbiased look at the game. Yes, I do like the Aliens series and games. This does not mean I'm going to say this game is perfect or hype it up. There are flaws and there are positives and I will be reviewing both. If your biased against anything that is not COD or MW or Borderlands and such please do not bother to read this.
Note- I will not go too deep into things since I don't want to spoil the game for anyone.
-Single Player-
After watching the review given for this game I decided to start the single player on Hardened, which is just below the hardest setting. I have a 1.30 k/d on the new COD and MW games. The reason I say this is because I died over 25 times during the campaign. This was not easy in the least and if it was as easy as Gamespot said it was then I should have had a relatively easy time. I did not. The first half of the campaign your up in space fighting and its good. The game goes from good to fantastic once you get down onto the planet. On the planet was the first time I got really really scared. The dialogue in the single player is pretty good. There were three times I scoffed at the dialogue for being stupid, but there was also moments where I laughed cause that's how my friends and I talk to each other. The voice acting is great and voices are seriously recognizable.
Enemy AI-
The AI tends to be kinda dumb at the early stages of the game, but later they seem to scale up and start using the walls better, lunging at you more instead of just running at you, and will easily kill you if your careless. I actually started watching my back constantly once I reached the planet. The human AI does a decent job using cover and killing you if your not using cover and being smart about your movements. I saw only two times where they were just completely stupid and were hugging the rail right in front of me out in the open since there was no cover near the rail itself. I got a free kill out of it. They will throw grenades at you that will kill you instantly and they will shoot rockets that can kill you instantly. Try to avoid these. As far as Gamespot saying it was obvious when the next wave or the attack was gonna happen was not the same for me. Sometimes you thought there would be Aliens, but there weren't and sometimes there were. The only thing that made me angry was every time enemies were about to appear the sound from your motion detector would go off without having it out. It's a quick sound and spoiled being attacked and thus took some of the scare out of it. This does go through the whole game. The length of the campaign is good and the mini bosses are okay. I liked some, didn't care for some, and some scared me.
Friendly AI-
These guys are great! I let them tank or be in front sometimes and they do kill enemies for you. Not the point of being annoying at all either. Sometimes they take forever to kill stuff and sometimes its right away. As far as "jocking for space" as Gamespot said, I didn't see how since I could move through the friendly AI players and never got stuck or anything. There was one issue I saw with the AI. When your down in a tunnel at a certain part of the game "Nugget" gets stuck on a piece of the wall thats extended. At first I was angry cause you need him badly on this part. Good news is if you just push foward enough he will spawn near you and will help you out. I about freaked out about this when it happened, but I''m glad it fixed itself.
Scenery-
Die hard Aliens fans are going to freak out like i did going through the world and seeing all the old stuff from the movies and being there. This was a fantastic experience and will do it again on the hardest setting. Also the graphics are on par with the new COD and MW games. Don't know why people said they were bad, they need to have their eyes checked.
Story Line-
The story line actually does tie into Aliens 3 from Aliens and makes sense. Like I said I'm not spoiling anything. Also you seriously need to follow along and listen to what everyone says and find the message computers to really get the story line.
Music-
This was good and bad. There were times where the music was spot on and helped with the atmosphere, while other times I wondered why it was so upbeat. I think it created a scary atmosphere 80% of the time. The rest was just bad timing and bad usage of it. I would have preferred the slower scary music through most of the game, while the upbeat parts on the more intense areas.
Find stuff-
You can find legendary weapons, dialogue computers, dog tags. AI drops ammo and armor sometimes when you kill them. I really liked this about the game as well.
-Multiplayer-
Weapons-
Guns, guns, and oh yea more guns. The fact that Gamespot said the amount of guns was bad is just proof that this was a biased review. This is the Aliens universe. Sorry to let you know, but the only weapons in that universe is the pulse rifle, shotgun, smart gun, flamethrower and pistol. You should not have expected more since this is NOT COD! Wait? There are more weapons though? Yes, there are more weapons than that. They decided to introduce a SMG, Battle rifle, and Assault rifle. Not only that, but there are multiple types of pistols and shotguns and even specific weapons from certain people in the movies. Like Hick's shotgun or Hudson's Pulse rifle. There are even legendary guns, which I found one in the campaign. Not only did they add new weapons, but you can customize them! You can put a red dot site on one or a better scope or use different underslung weapon types. Shotgun, grenade launcher, flame rounds, and much more. The weapons are balanced and have strength and weaknesses. The fact there are claymores in the game just makes Gamespot look even worse. Aliens actually get to choose and buy new attacks and customize their Aliens how they want for their playstyle of attack. You have to level and get points to unlock them, but its great to see that people will be different and play their Aliens differently. With different skills and customizing its fun to play the Aliens because its not just a I kill you with these three attacks over and over and thats it. Now I can choose different skills and upgrades to make my alien faster, have more health, take less damage or whatever I want him to do. You also get to choose from three different alien types who all have difference skills and such to choose from.
Appearance-
Finally! A multiplayer FPS that lets you customize your look. This is pretty extensive and it goes for the Marines and the Aliens. You can change colors, head looks, camo types, tatoos and even put on symbols and emblems on your armor and uniform. Change your voice too while your at it. Same goes for the aliens. You can change colors and head types.
Maps-
There are five maps and four multiplayer types. This is a good mix to me and they are all fun. I'm more of a Team deathmatch person, but this game actually makes me want to play the other ones. Some maps are better for team deathmatch than others since aliens kinda have a disadvantage on the big open ones. Not huge, but its there. My main issue with the maps is that most of them have too much lighting and you can't destroy the lights as a Alien. There are dark maps, but I feel they should all be pretty dark or really dark to give it a scary feel and make it harder for the Marines. Not to mention it gives Aliens more hiding places.
Play-
This launch is better than any other online multiplayer FPS I have played. No issues getting people in a group, no internet issues, no bugs that I have seen that push you out of lobbies or don't allow you to join one. The Marines and Aliens are pretty balanced. It might not seem like it sometimes, but you need to play and get used to both sides and get good with both sides since you have to play both sides every time you play. At first I had a hard time killing people with the Aliens, but once you figure out how to utilize their special attacks its actually easy to get kills as long as your patient or find someone alone. Killing a Marine is just as satisfying if not more as shooting a Alien down. Only gripe I have is that they are still making players the host and this can have a effect on the gameplay. Although I haven't seen any big issues even with this yet. Even with low bars I still get kills like I should.
Bugs-
I only saw three bugs the entire time I played. None were on multiplayer. The three are Nugget getting stuck, falling through the stairs when I meleed a Alien at start of campaign, and friendly AI flicking in place three times in one certain spot on one specific chapter of campaign. To me this will all get patched. If not, who cares it doesn't detract from the gameplay and it doesn't stop you from playing. These things only happened one time each so Gamespot saying it was riddled with bugs make me sick to my stomach for such a big exaggeration.
This really is the best Aliens yet. It has been morphed into the new age FPS type, while still keeping its roots in movies. The flaws of this game do not bring it down to a 4.5. The positives are more than enough for me to give it a 8.5 or at least a 8.0. I think the biggest problem is everyone tries to compare these games to COD and MW which have been just slightly upgraded and slapped a new name on over and over again. This game is completely alone in what its doing and what its based around. You might as well start comparing RTS to FPS because Aliens is a different beast from COD. This game is ORIGINAL and they did a amazing job making this as close to the movies as possible. Sorry, this isn't COD and sorry there is no predators. This game makes me jump, scares me, and is what I expected and wanted. I did 15 months in Iraq and don't scare easy. Hope that gives you perspective on it.
I hope this review helps people really see how this game is and I hope you all enjoy it as much as I do.
Update-
I have found that since whoever becomes host of the lobby stays the host until he leaves actually helps work against cheaters. If you or your buddy has good internet and you can host it, then keep it and have a great game. Also this is a tremendous help in finding someone whos internet is good for you. If you join a lobby and your internet sucks then leave after the game and get into a new lobby. Eventually you will find a host that gives you 4 bars and you can stay as long as the host stays. When I get host it takes a minute, but people leave and come in and it usually ends up with everyone on the lobby having at least 4 bars of internet. This is because the people with 2-3 bars will just leave and new people will come in and stay when they see they have 4 bars+. I think this is just a awsome function and am glad they did it.
Also the way the game is even with hacks your not gonna do good unless your a good player. The pulse rifle doesnt shoot stright on and has a small group it shoots in a circle. This actually eleminates aim bot to a degree since even if they do shoot at you they can miss if they dont pulse the gun. Also aliens are able to jump so far and fast that aim botters wont have much of a chance to instantly turn around on you when your side stepping fast as well. I have been doing amazing in this game do to these facts and love that I dont have hackers keeping my k/d down.