Aliens: Colonial Marines Review - Game Over, Man
- Thread starter MikeWehner
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In some ways, a 3 star rating is its own punishment. I know the Escapist sees 3 stars as being better than most reviewers, but 3 stars tends to imply an utterly mediocre, insipid, boilerplate, painfully average game. A bland average game is probably worse than a game that's so bad you can end up laughing at it, or a game you outright hatr. In the former case it becomes fun again, and in the latter case you can easily stop playing. If something is unobtrusively average though, it not only takes more of your life away, but it also leaves you feeling unfulfilled.Furioso said:
i skimmed through the comments and couldnt see it, could anyone share "the alteration of one particularly popular character's personal storyline"?
Mr Ink 5000 said:
hino77 said:
Hicks survived and appears in game, even joins your squad at one point. Sadly, he isnt even that interesting in the game, hudson would have been more fun if they truly wanted to bring back a supposedly dead character xP Also when you ask him whose body is it that is went with ripley and newt he simply says "its a long story" as convenient way of not explaining 
The fact that you can level up in the single-player campaign is the only thing that catches my eye about this game. I don't know much about the Aliens movies (and have fallen asleep during two of them) but I'm willing to give this game a try
thanks for the info. sounds awful and pointless.Frankster said:Hicks survived and appears in game, even joins your squad at one point. Sadly, he isnt even that interesting in the game, hudson would have been more fun if they truly wanted to bring back a supposedly dead character xP Also when you ask him whose body is it that is went with ripley and newt he simply says "its a long story" as convenient way of not explaining
OT: I'll probably wait until this is on sale on Steam, I'm not a big multi-player fan and the solo doesn't seem worth the price tag
I played through it all last night and enjoyed it for the most part. It was way buggy and needed 3 months more dev time but I bet it was pushed out etc.
At no point was the game ruined though. The story was predictable and in places silly but it was an action movie story so I took it with a pinch of salt.
The cameo character was a poor choice and they explained it away poorly.
So yes it had deep flaws but I had a decent amount of fun with it, wouldn't say it was worth full price but defo a reduced price.
The voices and sounds and atmos where decent enough, the guns were fun enough, The missions were pretty cool, graphics weren't that bad but were sloppy in places.
overall though I think I'll play it again and try the MP out etc, defo not the worst game I have bought. That was probably Wet.
At no point was the game ruined though. The story was predictable and in places silly but it was an action movie story so I took it with a pinch of salt.
The cameo character was a poor choice and they explained it away poorly.
So yes it had deep flaws but I had a decent amount of fun with it, wouldn't say it was worth full price but defo a reduced price.
The voices and sounds and atmos where decent enough, the guns were fun enough, The missions were pretty cool, graphics weren't that bad but were sloppy in places.
overall though I think I'll play it again and try the MP out etc, defo not the worst game I have bought. That was probably Wet.
3 out of 5 stars suggests that this game is average. That this is an acceptable, average, release worth being on the shelves - neither terribly good or terribly bad. And that is absolutely wrong. This is not an average game. In an average game the AI enemies would function, at all. In an average game the AI squad mates would function, at all. There are times when you're fighting xenomorphs that your squadmates will literally STAND THERE DOING NOTHING. Sometimes your squad mates will block off a path, THE ONLY PATH, to where you need to go and WILL NOT MOVE. The aliens have no AI other than rush head on at you, if, and I mean IF, their AI functions at all. I've had hordes of Xenomorphs just standing there while I walk by, and other stuck in the terrain unable to move at all.
The large assortment of weapons would be a plus, if any of them outside of a very few were actually worthwhile. The smartgun is something all of us wanted to use and you end up using it for the barest miniscule amount of time possible.
The graphics go between decently impressive, usually the background, to little bits of black and alien sludge that have terrible modeling and texturing - all the way to black holes in the terrain that aliens pop out of that have NO TEXTURING OR DEPTH AT ALL.
Crashes. A multitude of glitches too numerous to properly recount. Terribly character models, bad texturing, faces on your squadmates that look like plastic dolls virtually no lipsyncing in a game that comes YEARS and YEARS after Half Life 2 got lipsyncing right, and had facial expression that were actually Human. The gameplay could have been saved with several months more of development time, in theory, but after the development hell that produced this nonsense I highly doubt it.
We were lied to. The promised features, the supposed "demos" the shown graphical complexity and more were all shown and promised to us . . . and a great mass of them are not here, at all. Not just in lesser forms, but in many cases these things are outright NOT IN THE FINAL GAME AT ALL. When you show a several minute long demo of a game that has visual complexity not in the final release, enemy AI that is not in the final release, squadmate interactions and character building that are not in the final release and more . . . then there is no other conclusion than what was shown to us was a lie.
This waste of time and money doesn't even deserve one star. Let alone three. It's an outrage, and every person that was sad and sorry enough to pay for this fecal matter should be reimbursed, especially if it kills the studio that thought this was an acceptable release.
The large assortment of weapons would be a plus, if any of them outside of a very few were actually worthwhile. The smartgun is something all of us wanted to use and you end up using it for the barest miniscule amount of time possible.
The graphics go between decently impressive, usually the background, to little bits of black and alien sludge that have terrible modeling and texturing - all the way to black holes in the terrain that aliens pop out of that have NO TEXTURING OR DEPTH AT ALL.
Crashes. A multitude of glitches too numerous to properly recount. Terribly character models, bad texturing, faces on your squadmates that look like plastic dolls virtually no lipsyncing in a game that comes YEARS and YEARS after Half Life 2 got lipsyncing right, and had facial expression that were actually Human. The gameplay could have been saved with several months more of development time, in theory, but after the development hell that produced this nonsense I highly doubt it.
We were lied to. The promised features, the supposed "demos" the shown graphical complexity and more were all shown and promised to us . . . and a great mass of them are not here, at all. Not just in lesser forms, but in many cases these things are outright NOT IN THE FINAL GAME AT ALL. When you show a several minute long demo of a game that has visual complexity not in the final release, enemy AI that is not in the final release, squadmate interactions and character building that are not in the final release and more . . . then there is no other conclusion than what was shown to us was a lie.
This waste of time and money doesn't even deserve one star. Let alone three. It's an outrage, and every person that was sad and sorry enough to pay for this fecal matter should be reimbursed, especially if it kills the studio that thought this was an acceptable release.