Aliens Vs. Predator Multiplayer Hands-On

Having already developed two first-person shooters under the Aliens Vs. Predator name--once on the Atari Jaguar, and once on the PC--UK developer Rebellion Games has a well-established history with this movie monster mash-up franchise. So who better to spearhead another revival than a developer that obviously understands the importance of both balancing and differentiating Aliens, Predators, and the seemingly hapless space marines stuck in betwixt? Sega, which is publishing Rebellion's next AVP title, held an Xbox 360 multiplayer event earlier this week where we were able to refamiliarize ourselves with the three iconic factions and check out some of the gameplay modes that capitalize on their uniqueness.
 
If you're familiar with Rebellion's previous forays into the realm of Alien-on-Predator-on-Space-Marine violence, you probably already have at least some sense of the rock-paper-scissors dynamic inherent to AVP, and it seems to still be one of the defining characteristics here. When playing as a Predator, you've got a menagerie of gadgets to fell your enemies with, including a cloaking device that makes it easy to get the drop and a shoulder-mounted plasma cannon that packs a lot of punch, though at the cost of a relatively slow firing rate. As such, I found that, when playing as a Predator, the regular and heavy melee attacks were the most effective way to take down an enemy, particularly when the cloaking device is active. There were several other gadgets that I didn't manage to figure out how to use during my time with the game, leaving me with the impression that this is the most technically complicated class of the three.
 
Predators have the freshest gear, but it's the Aliens that boast the best mobility in the game. The default movement speed is impressive, and since they don't use any conventional weapons, it's also critical in getting up close to your enemies for claw swipe and tail attacks. Both the Alien and the Predator have suitably grisly execution moves they can perform on enemies caught unawares. Aliens can also prove difficult to draw a bead on, since they can effortlessly climb on virtually any surface in the game, transitioning from one surface to another with a quick tug on the right trigger. Since they play so fast and loose with gravity, I found it easy to get disoriented when playing as the Alien, though if you get too turned around, you can reorient yourself to the ground, also performed with the right trigger. It felt like Aliens really excelled when operating in small, loosely organized packs, swarming on enemies like the horrible space insects they are.
 
The big surprise for me was how enjoyable the space marine ended up being, and not just because the default player model looks like a lean and grizzled Brian Doyle Murray. Within the Aliens universe, being a space marine is tantamount to being hamburger ceviche, but they can hold their own quite well in AVP. He plays like a pretty standard, armed with an assault rifle and a pistol by default, and he can also pick up other Earth-man weapons like shotguns and flamethrowers. (Quick aside: flamethrowers in games are never as much fun to use as you'd hope, and this one still suffers from reach issues, but it's undeniably satisfying to watch an Alien writhe and scream while engulfed in flames.) Even though the marine represents the most traditional first-person shooter experience, the bizarre abilities of his enemies gives it enough of a twist. Also, the assault rifle holds massive 100-bullet clips, which really facilitates some proper Bill-Paxton-style space marine freak-outs.
 

We played a few rounds of standard deathmatch, team deathmatch, and control-point modes before jumping into some of the gameplay types that more specifically capitalize on the factions of AVP. In one mode, everyone starts as a space marine, and then one player is picked at random to play as the Predator. The goals are to kill as many marines as you can when you're the Predator, and to hunt down the Predator when playing as a marine, which will then turn you into the Predator. Similarly, there's another mode where everyone starts as a marine, and one player is chosen to play as an Alien. In this mode, though, any marines felled by the Alien are then turned into Aliens themselves the next time they spawn, with the overall goal of surviving as a marine for as long as you can. These modes might sound pretty familiar in description, but the actual dynamics give each their own distinct feel.
 
The game seems to be doing a good job of capturing the little touches associated with the franchise--the look of the Predator's heads-up display, the wall-eyed perspective of the Alien, and the compressed sound of the space marine's assault rifle. After spending a few hours murdering other members of the press, we got to spend some time chatting with Rebellion's Tim Jones, project lead for Aliens Vs. Predator, about the game, Rebellion's history with the franchise, and his own extraterrestrial exterminating prowess.