Alien Vs Predator !

[Taisenki]

Demo is up on steam. As freebies go its worth a shot but you'll find this annoying and this cool. Its a multiplayer death match for upto 8 players.



Annoying

-Lobbdy screen, open microphone. No toggle button. So you'll hear alot of people with their kids whilst waiting in the lobby screen. This won't be in the final game though, So we are told...


-Small map, and only 8 player. Not the most exciting map. Even for 8 people. This isn't very scary at all


-Lopped off graphics. I'm running the game on super mega ultra high and i'm just not getting the shadows.

-sloppy animations in area. Aliens like to warp a bit between their animations of jumping around.

-Auto aim melee attack (This might be toggle off/on). But yes. If you are close enough to someone and you press the melee button you turn into a homeing missile.

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But lets get to the good bits

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-My favourite, The melee counter. If you hold block and counter a melee attack. Then instantly melee attack back. you will knock your opponent back. This has an awesomely nice animation too especially if your the one being knocked back.

-But this will only work if your opponent, alien or predator, has figured out never to use this primary attack and only his secondary melee heavier attack which is unblockable =)

-Lots of buttons! Hell yeah. I feel dumb for playing other games. You will find it interesting to learn how to play at the start or perhaps frustrating. Who knows.

-Kill animations. Quite a variety of them. They take quite a while to do which is plenty of time for someone to sneak behind you and execute it one on you. Yup, theres nothing you can do about it.

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Thats all I can say. Perhaps many of you will enjoy it! The demo is definetly...definetly not a good example of the game. They should of picked a better map with a different game play mode.

[Denny Lindberg]

My experience is a little disappointing. Mouse sensitivity is relative to framerate, so the sensitivity jumps up and down between rooms constantly, even when you have high enough framerate to not have been bothered otherwise. The lobby system is pretty horrible with the forced mic stuff going on and the match never starts unless it's a full game, we were 6 friends trying to start a game and had to wait for 10-15 minutes because we needed a full game...... For some reason the input feels worse than the older games, running around as an Alien feels non-responsive, I don't know how many times I got stuck in the ceiling which never happened in the old games. Doing the wall crawl sometimes fail too for some odd reason which never happened to me in AvP2. The insta-kill takedowns are a bit useless too if you use it, you're essentially standing there for 5-10 seconds simply saying I'm a free kill while executing your opponent. Best is that you seem to be invulnerable until the split second you're done, then you're insta-killed by next guy. Like a crude game of tag.

I'm still looking forward to the single player though! I bet a lot of this feels wrong because of the deathmatch aspect, another game mode would have been a lot better.

I'm still buying it despite the bad MP experience.

[Reinholt]

I´ll have the demo soon so i can judge the game is it worthy of my attention. 15 minutes to be exact.

[MNOVICI]

It's an Xbox port. What can you expect.

[Kakaff]

I don't get any text when i try to play. Otherwise everything is fine.

Except all the menu text is gone, the loading text isnt there and i even tried it after reinstalling all drivers/updating to latest.

Tried compability mode and everything i could possibly do.

Going to wait untill the game is released before i try it again.

[Taisenki]

Single player marines will be interesting yes! Hopefully, Alien : Colonial Marines and its 4 player co-op campaign will go ahead and be interesting.

[Reinholt]

I really wish there would´ve been an team deathmatch mode in the demo aswell... Everyone killing everyone gets kinda chaotic in a small map.

[Kiev]

wow pretty fun game, definitely getting this for multilayer aspect. For me it ran great on max setting. Connected to a game within seconds each time I pressed play, never waited even more than 1 minute. Didn't have to wait for full room either to start the game.

Also, you can turn off microphones in Steam if you got it through there.

Just had to up mouse sensitivity and remap some keys and was good to go!

seemed pretty balanced so far as well: Marines have killer rifle, Aliens are very fast and Predators have the different visions to easily see opponents and that stealth is ok as well.

[Denny Lindberg]

Originally Posted by Taisenki

Single player marines will be interesting yes! Hopefully, Alien : Colonial Marines and its 4 player co-op campaign will go ahead and be interesting.

I'm more interested in that game as I've always been a fanboy in the Marine campaigns, coop is the icing on the cake.

[Taisenki]

Originally Posted by Denny Lindberg

I'm more interested in that game as I've always been a fanboy in the Marine campaigns, coop is the icing on the cake.

Starship Troopers has a pretty good marine feeling too but they arn't remaking one of those!

In colonial marines they said you can block doors or something along those lines. Hopefully, it will look like you guy is barricading the door rather than whipping out a magic welder =p

[Denny Lindberg]

Starship Troopers, as in the movie? Did that get a game?

[Reinholt]

Originally Posted by Denny Lindberg

Starship Troopers, as in the movie? Did that get a game?

Yes it did and it got an awesome score of 3.8 at Gamestop. =P

[Wargasm]

this is gonna be in dx11? h0lly sh!t!

[Kakaff]

Originally Posted by Wargasm

this is gonna be in dx11? h0lly sh!t!

Yes it is!

Just played little of the demo, it felt awesome! Really loved it and the graphics are WIN. Maxed all the settings and had a stable 100fps.

Sad thing however was that it was only deathmatch Would have preffered a team deathmatch mode....

[Reinholt]

Originally Posted by Kakaff

Yes it is!

Just played little of the demo, it felt awesome! Really loved it and the graphics are WIN. Maxed all the settings and had a stable 100fps.

Sad thing however was that it was only deathmatch Would have preffered a team deathmatch mode....

Yeah i´d much rather see an marines vs aliens showdown. Add in one predator for teh lulz.

[Denny Lindberg]

I just want to point out that the demo does not support DirectX11. So wait for the full game to see if it makes a difference.

[Tonkpilz]

Originally Posted by Denny Lindberg

My experience is a little disappointing. Mouse sensitivity is relative to framerate, so the sensitivity jumps up and down between rooms constantly, even when you have high enough framerate to not have been bothered otherwise.

naw man i hate that crap. some thing that may help is if you turn off Vsync it helps in some games but not always.

[Kiev]

Originally Posted by Tonkpilz

naw man i hate that crap. some thing that may help is if you turn off Vsync it helps in some games but not always.

ah yes, first thing that I disabled in AVP demo!

[Denny Lindberg]

Originally Posted by Tonkpilz

naw man i hate that crap. some thing that may help is if you turn off Vsync it helps in some games but not always.

I turned off everything in the game, Vsync is always the first thing I turn off.

[Tonkpilz]

Originally Posted by Denny Lindberg

I turned off everything in the game, Vsync is always the first thing I turn off.

im guessing it had no effect then ?
il wait for the full game and hope its fixed by then...
the demo build is probably a few moths old anyway

[Kakaff]

Originally Posted by Denny Lindberg

I turned off everything in the game, Vsync is always the first thing I turn off.

I had the same sensitivity all the time even when my framerates dropped.

Sure it isnt your mouse that's bugging? ^^

[Sabbathius]

Horrible console port, which broke my heart because I was very much looking forward to a new AVP game.

My main gripe has been with matchmaking, waiting 10 mins for a game only to have the host quit is just dull. I realize full game is supposed to have dedicated servers, but I sure as hell will wait for player reviews after release before I even consider buying it.

[Artorius]

Just played the demo a little.

Entertaining.

Sure, it's a console port, mics in the lobby are annoying and there is too many loading but omg, the gameplay is exciting to say the least!

I havn't figured out the controls for aliens and predator yet therefore I find it easier to play as a Marine (already won 2 games) but I think this is gonna be a good game. Especially in team, I am not a big fan of deathmatch.

[Taisenki]

They have fixed the waiting times in the demo!

Yes, DirectX11 i guess is very important to see the new graphics =) Good point, I didn't think about it.

Originally Posted by Denny Lindberg

Starship Troopers, as in the movie? Did that get a game?

The game was pretty good at the time =) It had co-op. It had lots of bugs. It actually kinda played like Left 4 Dead only with Intelligent bugs that didn't run through each other! lol

[Denny Lindberg]

Originally Posted by Kakaff

I had the same sensitivity all the time even when my framerates dropped.

Sure it isnt your mouse that's bugging? ^^

I saw that my nVidia settings had some weird pre-render feature on which had a 3 frames buffer, even stated that some games could suffer input delays. I have sadly not had the time to test the game again with this turned off. (Why the hell was it even on in the first place?.....)

[Kiev]

Originally Posted by Denny Lindberg

I saw that my nVidia settings had some weird pre-render feature on which had a 3 frames buffer, even stated that some games could suffer input delays. I have sadly not had the time to test the game again with this turned off. (Why the hell was it even on in the first place?.....)

nVidia is evil, go with ATI, a brand that you can trust.

[killing karma]

Originally Posted by Kiev

nVidia is evil, go with ATI, a brand that you can trust.

Beg to differ :P

[uniqueuser]

Originally Posted by Denny Lindberg

I saw that my nVidia settings had some weird pre-render feature on which had a 3 frames buffer, even stated that some games could suffer input delays. I have sadly not had the time to test the game again with this turned off. (Why the hell was it even on in the first place?.....)

Yeah, that render-ahead queue forces old frames to be displayed (the more frames in the queue, the older they are by the time they're displayed), which makes input lag more conspicuous when FPS is greater than refresh rate.

Even when FPS is consistently less than refresh rate, I don't believe there's a strong justification for a queue of more than 1 frame.

AnandTech ran a pretty thorough article on input lag last year.

[Flaringo]

I didn't like the "press E to win"-thing.

Also, like Denny mentioned, you're a free kill for a good 5 seconds. Anyone can casually just walk up to you and press E to snap your neck. I about someone being part of congo line of 6 people snapping eachothers necks.


EDIT: The demo is DM only, though. No teams. Everyone kills everyone. The other modes might be better. I hope so at least. And I think they stated that they will have dedicated servers and a proper server list in release.

[Sabbathius]

The queue times are a bit better.

Mics in the lobby are not great, reminds me of my brief experience on XBox 360 Live, and the reason why I'll never go back to that.

Having had a better look at the game, graphically it is very badly dated. I almost feel like I'm playing a reskinned AVP2. Take the flashlight, for example. In some games the light circle actually looks like a flashlight, games like Crysis, Fear or even Doom 3. In this game, the flashlight is just a spotlight coming from your rifle and that's it. So very, very cheap.

The level design is as primitive as it gets, and as a Marine you feel like you're "glued" to the ground, which makes the whole game feel like something out of 1996.

I don't know, maybe it's because I'm simultaneously playing Battlefield Bad Company 2, but AVP made me laugh out loud at how primitive it is. The insta-kill thing, BF:BC2 also has that if you kill someone in melee with a knife, but it takes under 2 seconds and you can keep doing it while moving, and it feels much more natural.

Uninstalled the demo already, chuckling to myself. If it was a free to play game like BF: Heroes, yeah, I'd play it. But paying $49.99 for THIS? Even thinking about that makes me smile. No way, no how.

[Reinholt]

Half the people say graphics look great and the other half bashes them. Again, i shall wait for Destructoid to review the game before i judge is it worth my money. Personally i think the graphics look ok but deathmatch isnt my thing.

[kio1992]

played it last night, really did not like the guns or the aiming, But playing as an alien was really fun, slit some peoples throats, bit a guys head off and stuck my tail through a predators head.

[Reinholt]

Originally Posted by kio1992

played it last night, really did not like the guns or the aiming, But playing as an alien was really fun, slit some peoples throats, bit a guys head off and stuck my tail through a predators head.

I personally love the marine. I shat bricks first time i was chased by alien player.

[Artorius]

I think AVP3 look good, not state of the art but it look good, they probably decided to go for performance instead of state of the art graphics and don't forget the demo is DX9... The retail version will support DX11 wich should make a big difference.

Isn't the E attack working only if you attack from behind ? I don't see the problem with a game in wich you respawn after what, 5 seconds... Just keep good situational awareness .

[kio1992]

would be good if their was a 3 way multiplayer campaign ^^

each race - human, predator and alien had their own objectives which oppose the other races and all 3 have to fight each other to complete them.

[Taisenki]

I didn't play Stalker, Dead Space or to a certain extend some tomb raider games because they were scary...

I was expecting this game to be scary, just a tiny bit, but I think small map sizes with a small amount of players isn't scary or action packed. Its not enough to hold my attention there are plenty of games that give me the same feeling as AVP will. Barstuards!

[Kiev]

Originally Posted by Taisenki

I didn't play Stalker, Dead Space or to a certain extend some tomb raider games because they were scary...

I was expecting this game to be scary, just a tiny bit, but I think small map sizes with a small amount of players isn't scary or action packed. Its not enough to hold my attention there are plenty of games that give me the same feeling as AVP will. Barstuards!

wait...you haven't played those games because you are scared?!
what happened to your balls man!?!

[Taisenki]

Originally Posted by Kiev

wait...you haven't played those games because you are scared?!
what happened to your balls man!?!

xD I know! But you can see my point. I get told by people that AVP is scary and it just isn't! Coming from someone that didn't even do them games listed...thats bad!

I will try the new stalker expansion soon. Hopefully, Stalker 2 will be co-op and it will still be scary...so long as nothing changes. Just graphical enhancement will do =)

[Reinholt]

Originally Posted by Taisenki

xD I know! But you can see my point. I get told by people that AVP is scary and it just isn't! Coming from someone that didn't even do them games listed...thats bad!

I will try the new stalker expansion soon. Hopefully, Stalker 2 will be co-op and it will still be scary...so long as nothing changes. Just graphical enhancement will do =)

Theres going to be an Stalker 2?! Why have I not heard of this...

[Sabbathius]

Originally Posted by Reinholt

Half the people say graphics look great and the other half bashes them. Again, i shall wait for Destructoid to review the game before i judge is it worth my money. Personally i think the graphics look ok but deathmatch isnt my thing.

Good plan.

I'll clarify a bit on the graphics thing. Graphics aren't BAD, they're by no means horrible. The demo is also DX9 only, while the full game is supposedly DX11 (which looks much better).

But I will tell you this. In the demo, you join as a Marine and go. You are indoors, just corridors. Those corridors could have been detailed, with pipes and protrusions in them for aliens to hide behind, stuff like that. Instead, the corridors are in the form of an octagon, with no pipes, no protrusions. The pipes are on the texture, which is pasted flat on the flat ceiling. For me, this kind of crap became outdated almost a decade ago. No amount of DX11 or anything else will remedy this. The graphics, mostly meaning the geometry, is very, very weak. Very flat.

I followed a few corridors, shot some aliens and one predator. How? They had nothing to hide behind! Aside from some crates here and there and a sharp corner here and there, there's nothing that they can duck behind to escape gunfire. If I can keep them in my sights as they come at me, they die, it's that simple, their only advantage is speed. While in the movies, they hit behind and between pipes, behind lockers or boxes or tables or anything. But in the DM map in the demo, there's none of it. Open corridors with flat sides and pipes painted on them. That's it. Fine for a free-to-play game, but for a game with asking price of $49.99 released in 2010 this is LAUGHABLE.

Maybe I'm spoiled. I'm currently playing Battlefield: Bad Company 2 PC beta, and that game has good graphics, guns that sound like guns (in AVP the gun sound is weak, like a popgun, they couldn't even copy it from the movie with proper volume), destructible environments, tons of cover, interesting classes that aren't one-dimensional.

By all means, check out the reviews when the game comes out, just don't expect much.

Also keep in mind that since the demo released Wednesday night, it's been patched at least 2 times. What kind of company releases a DEMO that needs patching twice? Also they chose the most horrible gameplay mode: DM, to show off the game, when Species DM would have been infinitely better for people coming into the game based on movies alone. A company that does that is a few cans short of a sixpack.