Alien Breed Evolution – Episode 1 (Xbox 360) Review
A BrutalGamer.com review.
I loved me some Alien Breed back in the day. Full disclaimer here guys and girls – Alien Breed, Alien Breed – Tower Assault, Alien Breed 3d, Alien Breed 3D2: The Killing Grounds… all of them – LOVED THEM! That said I hated this update… naaah, only joking, it’s fucking awesome!
Team 17 first created Alien Breed back in the 90′s for the Amiga 500. This was a Gauntlet inspired top down shooter set aboard a dark, atmospheric space station where you fought for your survival. Well fans have begged Team 17′s Martyn Brown for a sequel for years and the announcement earlier in 2009 that this would finally happen was met with great frenzied excitement.
Alien Breed back on the Amiga 1200
There is a story of sorts that accompanies the game but it really is not that compelling and serves more as a gameplay mechanic to serve up your next set of objectives. Your ship has collided with another ancient space vessel just after coming out of hyperspace. The vessel appears to be full of hostile life forms and is now pulling you and itself towards a planet. You, as the chief engineer, must get the ship back working, stop the reactor leaks and bring the systems back on line before the whole place goes boom.
Graphically this game amazes me for a download title. Sure it’s not at the same level as Shadow Complex but man they have thrown a load of effects and lighting in to a little download game. Using the muscle of the Unreal 3 engine the effects and environments, although at stages a touch dark, are the games biggest asset. The corridors are moody and lit with busted strip lighting. The glow from your torch barely lights more than a few feet in front of you and the effect of unleashing the flamethrower in a dark corridor is most pleasing. Animation at times is a little stilted but still manages to be of a consistently good level. The action is viewed from one of several angles that you can rotate around using the two shoulder buttons. This allows you to view the full 3D world from whatever angle you deem best. It give the game that authentic top down/isometric look but puts it slap in teh middle of a modern 3D world. Honestly, apart from Shadow Complex and Battlefield 1943 I have not seen a better looking Xbox Live Arcade title.
Alien Breed Evolution uses a full 3D enviroment
Audio wise things are a little more mixed. The games score is well done and fits the mood and action perfectly. Where the game stumbles is the voice acting. Mia, the female quest giver character, vocals are seriously stilted and offer very little depth. Thankfully you only really deal with this at the start and end of levels. The gun fire is also mixed. The machine gun and flame thrower are great but the laser rifle lacks a little something.
Following firmly in the footsteps of the original games, Alien Breed Evolution doesn’t really evolve the original gameplay in any real manner. That said there are some noticeable differences that embrace the more modern method of making this type of Commando/Gauntlet style game. Namely using Dual-Stick shooting. In the original game you had eight way firing but it was dependant on the direction you faced. This is still possible in the update but you also have the ability to use the right stick to direct your aim. This makes the game even better than before offering you the ability to run like mad and try and cut down the alien horde approaching behind you. As with the first game exploration is the key factor. You really need to seek out each area of the ship to find all the weapons, health packs, grenades etc hidden in lockers or on dead crew members. This take an almost survival horror stance on ammo and game pace. If you just go wading in you will die pretty quickly – especially on one of later levels or if you play on Elite difficulty. Much like in Left4Dead you need to clear an area as best you can before moving on to the next as if you don’t aliens will come out of the floors or walls and take you down from behind whilst you are dealing with the next room of head-on creatures.
Nothing like raiding the dead for goodies eh!
There really is a sense of living from moment to moment as you progress to the later of the 5 levels. If you notch up the difficulty then the creatures come in waves, take more damage and display more cunning strategies to take you down. You will find yourself clinging on to the last few grains of life, frantically searching rooms for health packs and praying to your own person god that nothing attacks you. A real great selling point but also a source of some frustration as at times the game just seems to overrun you and before you know it your dead meat.
Longevity is pretty damn good. You might be thinking “Oh crap episodic content” but at around £6 (800MSP) for 5 hours gameplay on first play through you are doing damn well for the cash! Add to that 3 co-op play maps and you extend things once more by a couple of hours. You can also try your luck at racking up some of the top scores on the worldwide leaderboards. All in all you are getting a big chunk of game for your 800 points. Sure you will have to fork out another 1600 points over teh next year to pick up the second and third installments but you really get a lot for it.
Co-Op in full swing!
If I had to lay some issues at ABE’s door step it would be that the “collect A to unlock B – Oh no A is damaged goto C, then D to fix it before doing B” is a little old before it begins and by the time the credits roll you are done with that whole structure. Also at times the controls seems to just not respond fast enough, the use of the D pad for weapon toggles is frustratingly awkward as you frantically try and get the fun you need whilst being mawled by the alien horde. Oh and I got stuck in geometry at least five times – once so bad on the first level I had to restart after about thirty minutes of gameplay.
Ummmmm Flamethrower......
Final Thoughts:
Alien Breed is a great game. Damaged a little by sloppy voice work, the odd technical glitch & repetitive elements which are forgiveable now but I think might grate over a total 15+hrs of campaign when episodes 2 and 3 are released. If you ever liked Gauntlet or the original Alien Breed grab this now. If you like tense action shooters with a slight survival horror element then grab this game. Team 17 have updated a classic and made it relevant for the player of today. We can’t wait for the next one.
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