The Collection Chamber: ALIENS VERSUS PREDATOR 2: GOLD EDITION

3 LEGENDARY WARRIORS
2 TERRIFYING GAMES
1 ADRENALINE OVERDOSE

ALIENS VS. PREDATOR 2
Hailed as 2001's "Action Game of the Year" and "Multiplayer Game of the Year" by Computer Gaming World, AVP2 weaves together the fate of three species with the heart-stopping action of the blockbuster films on which it is based.

ALIENS VS. PREDATOR 2 PRIMAL HUNT
This expansion to the award-winning AVP2 takes you back to never-before-seen Predator ruins on a hunt to find a mysterious artifact that holds legendary power. Get acquainted with new breeds of vile creatures on a mission to stop you dead in your tracks.
Become one of these three deadly species: the vicious Alien, stealthy Predator or combat-hardened Marine.
Wage epic multiplayer battles via LAN or the Internet across 10 unique game types, including Deathmatch, Hunt and Evac.
Raise your heart rate with 30 intense single-player missions, each woven together to make one frightening story.
Unleash a devastating arsenal, including the Marine's flame thrower, the Predator's energy flechette and the Alien's pounce-and-slash attack.

~ from the back of the box

Like any kid who grew up in the 80s and 90s, both the Alien and Predator franchises were like the crack of popular culture. They were iconic and its adult-only aging rating made them a tad forbidden. That kid who had seen them all was treated like royalty. And since then, both movie monsters have rarely left public consciousness. I'm always excited to see each new movie in their respective franchises and proudly exclaim the contrarian belief that Alien3 is more in keeping with what the franchise actually is than Aliens (that's a discussion for another day - love them both though). Their lore was eventually combined and expanded upon in the Dark Horse comics, which promised something great that neither of the films tapped into. The games, however, did. Rebellion made console gamers envious when they released 1999's Aliens versus Predator on PCs, itself harking back to the often overlooked Atari Jaguar game. You can still play the Classic 2000 re-release on its new home at GOG. Its sequel, however - Monolith’s superb Aliens versus Predator 2 - remains trapped in licensing hell, the kind of legal quagmire that makes fans take the initiative and release patches galore to run it on modern hardware. They do what the multiple rights owners won't.

Monolith built the sequel using its ever-evolving Lithtech engine, which in the early 2000s was starting to hit its stride. While no one would mistake it for an evergreen graphical powerhouse like Doom 3 or Half-Life 2 (both of which came out five years later), there's a character to Lithtech's output that's aged remarkably well. Clean geometry, moody lighting, and prop-laden corridors evoke that late-90s/early-2000s PC aesthetic I personally find irresistible. Every hiss of steam, every flicker of fluorescence, every distant thump in a ventilation duct works together to deliver atmosphere in the same way the movies did the previous decades. Few engines of the era captured the grime of industrial sci-fi quite like this one.

The Marine campaign is where most players begin, and it's easy to see why. It's the most traditional FPS of the three, but that doesn't mean it's predictable. You play as Corporal Harrison, trudging through deserted corridors and malfunctioning outposts with only your flashlight's feeble glow to reassure you. Monolith shows admirable restraint here. Your first proper alien encounter doesn't happen until the second level, yet your pulse will already be pounding thanks to some tension-filled set pieces and that iconic motion tracker whose beeps pierce the silence like needles on skin.

Marines can hack broken panels, though you are left vulnerable when you do so (left).
Much of the lore and back story can is depicted through notes and writing scattering the levels (right).

Weapons feel satisfyingly meaty, though there isn't much that's unique about them. You have a pistol, a pulse rifle and shotgun to go along with the fantasy-fulfilling flamethrower or the smartgun's auto-tracking. You won't just be shooting. The presence of a hacking tool switches up the action as you bypass locked doors while nervously glancing over your shoulder for moving shadows. And that's real star of the show; the interplay of light and shadow. Darkness becomes a mechanic in itself, as it hides xenomorphs who lay ready to pounce the moment your flashlight flickers. At times, it's closer to survival horror, but before long you will be back to racking up a massive body count of acid-blooded aliens or imposing predators.

You don't just play as a hum. The Predator campaign has you prowling the otherworldly jungle like a space-age big-game hunter with a full arsenal of alien toys. There's very little that goes bump in the night here, putting you more in a hunting role. And you have all the weapons to eviscerate anything that moves. Wristblades are your basic melee attack, which can be charged up for greater damage if you hold down the right mouse button. The iconic flying disc returns in all its decapitation-friendly glory, and the basic plasma pistol and sniper-friendly spear-gun add to your long-range capabilities. These all use up valuable energy to use, as does many other abilities, so I found it best in most instances to rely in the many close-combat weapons. The Predator's agility helps in this regard; he is fast and nimble and has quite the jump on him with the excellent Crouch Leap turning arenas into jungle-gym playgrounds.

If you've seen any of the Predator films, you'll be familiar with all of his gadgets. Cloaking turns you into a shimmering invisible man letting you stalk your prey with minimal detection (though firing a weapon gives you away, and swimming in water drops it entirely). Also aiding you are three Vision modes. Thermal highlights warm human prey, Electromagnet illuminates chitinous aliens, while PredTech mode marks Predators while also acting as night vision. The long-range zoom lets you pick off distant foes like some interstellar birdwatcher with violent hobbies. And in a darkly humorous flourish, the Predator collects heads as trophies. Tallied on the bottom left of the screen, it serves no gameplay purposes beyond level objectives, but it is a faithfully preserved if grisly Predator tradition.

Medkits (left) heal marines, but they are useless for more unearthly creatures.
Predators siphon energy from the land ready to transform into medicine (right).

Lastly, there's the Alien campaign. Wildly different to the other two, it's a bizarre yet brilliant departure from standard FPS design. You don't begin as one of H.R. Giger's towering xenomorphs but as the humble facehugger, scuttling through vents and avoiding boots in search of the perfect isolated host. It's a stealth section unlike anything else from the period. Choosing the wrong host or alerting nearby guards leads to immediate pancaking, making it the hardest opening level of the three campaigns.

Once metamorphosis completes, however, you become a nightmare. Wall-walking is implemented with impressive smoothness, turning levels into disorienting mazes. Handy arrows unobtrusively swivel the edges of the screen to help you decipher which way is up, but you will inevitably get turned around at least a couple of teach per stage. Your basic eyesight is called Hunt Mode. It lets you see the pheromones of other living creatures by assigning them coloured auras. Blue means human, green predators, and red are aliens (who are not always allies). These can be seen in the dark, even if the bodies themselves cannot be, making for an ingenious interpretation of a creature sensing the living world on a chemical level. But you also have another view called Navigate Mode which basically sacrifices pheromones for night-vision.

No matter how you view this world, combat is exclusively up-close. Claws hack at victims with intense energy, tail lashes stuns them allowing you to bite off their heads more easily, and pounces let you jump at them from a afar leaving nothing behind but a bloody, gory mess. Aliens have no guns. No HUD clutter. No capacity to open doors. Beyond its early stage of metamorphosis, the Alien campaign is the simplest being more about navigation and instinctual death than any type of story progression. Incredibly fun still, but my lest favourite of the three.

The game's true genius is how thoroughly the three campaigns diverge. They might share environments and lore, but mechanically they're worlds apart. Even healing is species-specific. Marines root around for traditional medkits like good little soldiers like any other first-person-shooter. Predators make use of futuristic technology by convert energy into health using their medicomp. Don't worry if you run out, you can syphon energy by using your Energy Sift though it will leave you temporarily vulnerable. Aliens are more basic. Simply chomp on the brains of the living - or the deceased, if you’re not fussy. These differences make each campaign feel like its own game, and yet together, they still make a beautifully cohesive whole.

An Alien poised for head-eating. It has healing properties after all (left).
Their tail whip isn't as deadly as their claws. It will only stun enemies (right).

A year after its release, Aliens Versus Predator 2 got an addon. Primal Hunt, as the 2002 expansion was called, didn't quite garner the same excitement as the base game, but it's far from the disaster some make it out to be. Acting as both prequel and epilogue, it introduces new gadgets like motions trackers and dual pistols as the Corporate mercenary takes the place of the marine. The predator plays much the same but, taking place 500 years prior, they've changed the hud a bit and added a new weapon called the Energy Flechette. Aliens, on the other hand, have been spliced with Predator DNA to form the Predalien. It plays much the same, but headbite is much more... vaginal(?). With a story involving ancient Predator ruins and corporate Weyland-Yutani labs, it has a distinctly pulpier tone. Reviewers at the time bemoaned its shorter runtime and occasional rough edges, but there's no mistaking its quality and ambition. More AvP2 is hardly something to complain about.

I haven't played the multiplayer - deathmatches were never my thing, but I'd be remiss if I didn't mention it as a popular gameplay feature. From Survivor to Hunt to the chaotic species-versus-species carnage of standard deathmatch, AvP2's multiplayer modes were legendary to those who lived for LAN parties. Thanks to the heroic efforts behind the Master Server patches, those modes are still alive, letting players shoot, stab and bite each other as they would have done back in 2001. The fact that a community still keeps it thriving today is testament to just how good these mechanics are. It almost tempts me to try it.

Aliens versus Predator 2 and its addon that makes up the Gold Edition stands as one of the great forgotten triumphs of early-millennium PC gaming. It's a game bursting with ideas, atmosphere, and originality that perfectly captures the essence of both franchises while still pushes them down bold, experimental territory. Licensing hell may keep it out of storefronts, but it deserves to be preserved and re-released if not there, then here. By my estimation, it's better than the original in every regard. A PC classic.

To download the game, follow the link below. This custom installer exclusive to The Collection Chamber uses dgVoodoo with the Master Server Patch for online multiplayer. Primal Hunt addon Manuals and Strategy GHuide included. Read the ChamberNotes.txt for more detailed information. Tested on Windows 10.

File Size: 834 Mb. Install Size: 1.91 Gb. Need help? Consult the Collection Chamber FAQ

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ALIENS VERSUS PREDATOR 2

PRIMAL HUNT

ALIENS VERSUS PREDATOR 2