Aliens vs. Predator

Weyland(Henriksen, entranced, he must have figured third time's the charm for a bad take on this role) is looking into and for something ancient. Again. Oh, it gets worse. A colony on a planet owned by his corporation is attacked... yup. It must be the only story Rebellion knows to tell. At least this time, there's a hint of a plot. A boring, pointless, nothing of one, that flatly ends with a hint for another one, one that we'd rather have seen. Instead of following up on where we left off, because, why would you put creativity, thought and effort in, when the money will roll in regardless? You hear that, fan-boys? They couldn't care less! This is as lazy and phoned in as they come. That's not enough? Wall-Crawling is broken!

This does OK at balancing the three. This time, their meeting doesn't need to happen, and if we didn't want to see them face off – thankfully, not showy and wrestler-y, no, all lethal, no one would show up. They're all enjoyable enough to be. Well, when there's other people involved. Otherwise, it gets old within minutes. And that's in spite of the excessive streamlining, that significantly cuts down the variety from how exotic this is supposed to be, and has you wondering what the point of this even is. Why not Classes, Rules? You don't get to Facehug or Chestburst, and the PredAliens, Praetorians, Queens, etc. are all in the hands of the remarkably stupid AI. The graphics are fine. This does try to look, sound and feel like the films. It desperately wants to get some of the love we have for them. A lot easier than giving us something of its own. "Scrap", not book.

The license is why we're here. Let's be honest. Well, it's what got our attention, anyway. Why this lasts, beyond the hour and a half Xeno campaign, the 160 minute Marine one, and the remaining two hour one, is the multi-player. Ignoring the steep learning curve, that everyone else has it down already, the fact that today, essentially no one plays any other mode than the Species Deathmatch(TDM, with you and your brethren against the rest), you'll find one, maybe two, servers with people on it at any time, and that, even those, are limited to the 6(!) maps that come with this. That's unless you, against all better knowledge, pay for the two DLCs, which add two each, that, with a single exception, I didn't see played in the two weeks I wasted on this. Actually, they do add another two per. Playable only in the Survivor mode, which you can, and almost definitely only will, try yourself. If you don't get your wallet out, there won't be more than 2 for that one. It's v2.0 of their Skirmish. Well, with a lot of the cool stuff removed. Every limit you reach in this, that didn't have to be exactly the way it is, was the wrong place to put it.

If you go for Pyramid, you are in for a treat. The walls move, stairs that go in or back out, every few minutes. Yup, like in the terrible movie that this, for reasons I will never comprehend, fits into its continuity. Then again, I have no clue when this is set, so who knows. Anyway, here, it's great. Of course, it's the only one that has anything to offer. That goes for the six levels that the 3 share. Yup, they couldn't be bothered to do different ones for them. Sure, one might break something another one breaks, that's about it. Oh, and the "story", the entire napkin of it, is told in full only if you subject yourself to them all. Forget compelling characters, fitting themes, nemeses that have amazing boss fights, and not uninspired ones that baffle you with their placement and choice of who or what you take on.

The human weapons are too weak. End of sentence. Oh, unless there are as many of you as of them. That's very rarely the case, and where's the fun in that, anyway, isn't it "me taking down them"? This does go for the modern FPS thing of carrying capacity. Your... *sigh* infinite... ammo... pistol, and either two rifles or a Smartgun, and that's it, so choose wisely. Range, damage, speed, etc. Well, there's only 6. Total. Counting those. You know, because 8, 10, that was just too much content. The Predator has 5, not 6 or 8. Best I can come up with is that it's too even it out. That can be done in far better ways.

The awkward rock-paper-scissors mêlée is how a lot of the one-on-one goes down. You don't put away anything to engage in it, so it's always available. The attacks go as follows: Quick, which can be blocked but stops Heavy, which otherwise hits, and hard, at that. Lunging has you throw yourself before striking, and may knock down your target, opening them up for you to finish them off. One way to do this, leaving you very vulnerable that also instakills, is the Grab. Look on – you can't do anything else until it's done – as you tear out a tongue, snap a spine, penetrate a body or the like. Of course, where the '79 original introduced the rapey imagery, this puts it in the hands of the player. If sexual abuse is in a game, and I'm not saying it shouldn't be, it should be treated with respect. Follow up on it, explore how it affects the victim. Don't reward it, put it up as something cool you get to do.

There is a lot of strong language, and a little gore, that, though brutal, is limited to aforementioned finisher, in spite of it being everywhere else in the franchises in this. If you've already thrown up by now and are back to check, I don't recommend this to anyone. 4/10