If you’re a bit curious about what MacPlay’s new first-person shooter action game Aliens vs. Predator Gold Edition (AvP) looks like, here is a gallery of screenshots culled from the game. MacPlay announced late yesterday that AvP is shipping and should be in stores within the next couple of weeks.
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In AvP, you can assume the role of one of three different characters — a jaw-snapping Alien, a stealthy and strong Predator or a firepower-equipped Colonial Marine. Each character has unique strengths and weaknesses. And as you have probably figured out, each character has been seen in the movies.
The Alien, for example, can crawl up walls and ceilings, dropping on foes and quickly lashing out with deadly jaws, claws and tail. Melee combat is its strength, but because it needs to be in close quarters to for maximum effectiveness, the Alien can be mortally wounded quickly.
The Predator, meanwhile, sports an array of sophisticated weapons, and has various defensive capabilities including the ability to view surroundings in different spectra and cloak himself to partial invisibility. His weapons are powerful too and they’re precise. To play the Predator well, you’ll need to adapt to more strategic thinking.
The Colonial Marine, while neither as strong as the Predator or as fast as the Alien, sports firepower and other technological enhancements. When he’s not blowing stuff up, he can use night vision to help see in the dark or a motion sensor to detect what’s moving up ahead.
One thing that AvP excels at is atmosphere. If you’re at all a fan of the Alien or Predator movies, you’ll recognize many of the sites and sounds. In particular, playing the single player levels as the Colonial Marine puts you in the same sort of claustrophobic, terrifying settings that you saw Sigourney Weaver’s Ripley character fight her way out of time and again. Blasting steam vents and dimly lit, angular corridors give Aliens more than enough cover to jump out at you from the shadows, and we can almost guarantee that you’ll be startled the first few times it happens.
AvP features multiplayer action, also. While the AvP games you find played on GameRanger today consist exclusively of the demo version of the game, there’s no doubt that in the coming weeks and months you’ll see many more online battles featuring the game’s full version, too.