Aliens versus Predator 2
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| Aliens versus Predator 2 | |
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| Developer(s) | Monolith Productions, Third Law Interactive |
| Publisher(s) | Sierra Entertainment, Fox Interactive |
| Engine | Lithtech |
| Latest version | 1.0.9.6 |
| Release date(s) | October 30, 2001 |
| Genre(s) | First-person shooter |
| Mode(s) | Single player, multiplayer |
| Rating(s) | ESRB: M (Mature) USK: 16+ ELSPA: 15+ OFLC: MA15+ |
| Platform(s) | Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X |
| Media | 2 CD-ROMs |
| System requirements | 450 MHz CPU, 128 MB RAM, 16 MB video card RAM, 4X CD-ROM drive, DirectX 8.0, 750 MB available hard disk space, Windows 98 |
| Input | Keyboard, mouse |
- For the upcoming film, see Alien vs. Predator: Survival of the Fittest.
Aliens versus Predator 2 is a video game developed by Monolith Productions and published by Sierra Entertainment, which was released through Fox Interactive in 2001. The game is a sequel to Aliens versus Predator, which is based loosely on the movies of the Alien and Predator series. Similarly to the previous game, it is a first person shooter (FPS) that uniquely gives the player a choice of three characters/species, each with their own distinct set of weapons and abilities.
Sierra released an expansion to the game titled Aliens versus Predator 2: Primal Hunt in 2002.
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[edit] Setting
Almost half a century after the events of Aliens and Alien³, the Weyland Yutani Corporation followed the flight telemetry of the derelict spacecraft found on LV-1201 and discovered a world full of life and dotted with the ruins of an extraterrestrial civilization—and infested with Xenomorphs.
The Company establishes a long-term research facility under Dr. Eisenberg to study the planet, the ruins, and the aliens. The facility consists of a Primary Operations Complex and a network of five massive Forward Observation Pods suspended over a canyon.
[edit] Characters
[edit] Player characters
- Corporal Andrew "Frosty" Harrison is the main human character in the game. A USCM Marine, he is not given much background, but is characterized by a refusal to abandon his fellow marines. It is also mentioned in the game by other marines that Harrison is nicknamed 'Frosty' for being 'cool' in very hot engagements (e.g. attempting a solo rescue while being chased by a large swarm of Xenomorphs). It is also given that Frosty has low luck with women (when trying to hit on Dunya and Tomiko)
- Predator Prince is the main Predator character in the game. 19 years before, he and his clan attacked a Weyland-Yutani outpost, where he chased and downed a Colonial Marine known as Rykov. Now, knowing he is still alive, has come to LV-1201 to finish the job. It is implied he is a prince by the conversations of human scientists studying his mask after he is captured.
- The Alien is the main Xenomorph character in the game. An unusually intelligent and aggressive drone, it caused the incident in attempting to escape from the Primary Operations Complex back to the hive.
[edit] Major characters
- Dr. Eisenberg is the head researcher in charge of the LV-1201 facility. He was the only survivor of a disastrous first expedition; when a massive storm cut off his outpost's security systems and communications, he was forced to kill and eat his colleagues. He suffered severe acid burns during a rescue attempt; as the game progresses, it is revealed that he only "survived" because his father, a major figure in the synthetic human research industry, was able to port his consciousness into an identical android body. Because of that event, Eisenberg harbors a deep hatred—and a paralyzing fear—of Xenomorphs.
- General Vasili Rykov is the head of the Iron Bears, a group of mercenaries hired to assist operations on LV-1201. Years ago, he was a colonial marine stationed at a Weyland-Yutani bio-weapons facility on the planet Korari when it was attacked by the same Predator whom the player controls. Rykov was severely injured; he was paralyzed until he underwent an experimental procedure which replaced his spinal column with its synthetic equivalent. The treatment was only partially successful; Rykov must take powerful black-market narcotics in order to function. Rykov has since become obsessed with wiping out the Predator race.
- The Empress is the name given to the Xenomorph Queen by Eisenberg. He wants to capture and control her, but she is more than willing to send all of her minions to wipe out the human presence on LV-1201.
- Major McCain is the commanding officer of the Marines dispatched to LV-1201 under Weyland-Yutani's request. He is a fine leader, but is oblivious to what Rykov and Eisenberg have in store for him and his men.
[edit] Supporting Characters
- Duke is a Latino-American marine under the command of Major McCain. Both sarcastic and relatively cowardly, he is considered an annoyance by the other marines (easily comparable to Hudson from Aliens). He is Corporal Harrison's friend.
- Johnson is the premier dropship pilot aboard the Verloc. Carries out the marines' dropship missions, and rescues Harrison in the end. Has a strong-willed personality as shown in her response to Major McCain's question, "Where did you learn to fly?": "Flight school, the same place where I learned not to fly blind in hurricane winds."
- Decker is a marine private in Sergeant Hall's team. He is badly burnt in an alien ambush and is put in an APC to heal. He heals quickly, however, and is later seen guarding McCain and the APCs.
- Jones is an African-American marine under the command of Major McCain. A heavy weapons guru, his weapon of choice is the Smartgun. He also pilots an Exosuit, lovingly named "Alice", which he never got to use (to the deadly misfortune of the Marines).
- Sergeant Hall is an African American marine. She is second-in-command to Major McCain. During the raid on the POC, her squad is ambushed and she is captured and impregnated by the Xenomorphs. She dies when Harrison finds her.
- Sergeant Blackwell is a marine under the command of Major McCain. He is head of Harrison's squad until they were separated. He and Shugi retreat back to McCain and guard him for the rest of the game.
- Shugi is a marine under the command of Major McCain. He is part of Harrison's squad until they were separated. He and Blackwell retreat to Major McCain and stay in a marine APC or Dropship for the majority of the game.
- Tomiko is an assemblyman's daughter who signed up for an internship on LV-1201 to find out what had happened to her brother, Kenji, who she suspects was murdered. She blackmails Harrison into finding a disk with evidence on it and later helps him out. She willingly sacrifices her life at the end of the Marine campaign to ensure the total destruction of the site and, with it, the genetic experimentation and research that the corporation had been conducting.
- Major Dunya is a member of the Iron Bears. When Corporal Harrison disabled the security network in the tunnels connecting the POC to the Pods, he inadvertently disabled the security at the Pods themselves as well. Dunya's fiancé Dimitri was killed when Harrison shut off the security grid that was connecting the POC to the Pods and the Xenomorphs swarmed in and attacked. As a result, Dunya blamed Harrison for his death.
- Ivan is General Rykov's right hand man, who sees to it that all of the general's orders are followed. He is killed by Andrew Harrison when Harrison was trying to escape the Pods after being framed by Dunya.
Note: Strangely, Ivan is encountered in Alien campaign at a point when he's supposed to be already dead. It is believed that the designers simply re-used Ivan's skin for another Iron Bear just as they did with Dimitri's. - Chekov is one of General Rykov's henchmen. While returning from escorting his superior to the Hive, he is killed by The Alien.
- Dimitri is a foot soldier in the Iron Bears and is Dunya's fiancé. He is killed when out guarding a scientist outside the pod when Harrison shuts off the security grid. He makes his appearance in the Alien single-player campaign when he's guarding a technician who is fixing a generator powering an electrical laser fence, and getting swarmed by a bunch of Xenomorphs, which leads to his horrible death. He's also a playable character for the Corporate team in multiplayer.
[edit] Plot summaries
In AvP2, the storyline is considerably more developed and much tighter than the original AvP, with each level following sensibly on from the last. The three plotlines interleave with each other, making it impossible to learn the entire story without playing all three campaigns to conclusion. Also, at one point in AvP2, the three strands (Alien, Predator and human) are brought together at a particular location. One particularly notable extension in AvP2 is that Alien players begin the game as a facehugger, then develop into a chestburster before finally reaching adulthood as a drone. In both games, the storylines put the player in situations familiar to those who have seen the films.
[edit] Human plot
The human story begins aboard the Conestoga-class USS Verloc, carrying a small contingent of U.S. Colonial Marines to planet LV-1201. The Weyland-Yutani facility there has not been heard from in six weeks, and the marines are to rescue survivors and secure the facility until the 6th Battalion arrives.
Two dropships are deployed to the Primary Operations Complex (POC), but they are separated by hurricane winds and one is damaged. It falls to Harrison to restore power and activate the landing beacon. When he tries to restore the local security grid, he awakens the Xenomorphs which had lain dormant following their conquest of the POC. Most of the marines are able to evacuate, but Sergeant Hall is captured by the aliens. Harrison tracks her to a part of the POC which has been converted to an alien hive, but he finds that Hall has been impregnated with an alien. She dies as Harrison finds her.
The marines then attempt to reach the Pods via the tunnel network connecting them to the POC. Harrison is sent ahead to deactivate tunnel security so the marines' APCs can proceed through. In the process, he cuts the security to the Pods themselves.
When the marines reach the Pods, Eisenberg and Rykov inform them of the security breach and claim that three archaeological teams have been stranded within a massive nearby hive. The marines volunteer to rescue the teams—but the "rescue mission" is actually part of an elaborate plot by Rykov and Eisenberg to kill the marines themselves.
As Harrison tries to establish a communication link with the POC and the Verloc, Major Dunya knocks him out and throws him in a prison cell within the Pods, used to hold convict laborers. The marines are told that Harrison was killed in a confrontation with an escaped convict. Harrison escapes, and during his flight he kills an escaped predator-alien hybrid and unknowingly releases a captive Predator. Later, Harrison is contacted by a mysterious person using a voice scrambler. This person instructs him to pick up a data disk hidden in one of the labs in exchange for help returning to his team. He reluctantly complies.
As Harrison reaches the Pod's lowest levels, he sees the Predator he'd freed escape rather dramatically. Harrisons pick up new gear and kills Rykov's 3 Iron Bear mercenaries that were sent to see what happened. Harrison takes out Ivan, Rykov's right hand man that was mounted in an "Exosuit," a bipedal armored combat vehicle, before escaping the Pods.
As Harrison returns to the POC to find White Team, who had been stationed behind, he learns that the mysterious person who contacted him is Tomiko, an assemblyman's daughter who signed up for an internship on LV-1201 to find out what had happened to her brother, who she suspects was murdered. The data disk contains records of all the illegal activities taking place on the planet, which Tomiko wants to present to her father in an attempt to hold Weyland Yutani accountable for its crimes.
Harrison finds several members of White Team, but they are all killed by aliens and Predators before Harrison can activate the landing beacon for an incoming dropship. Harrison manages to kill a predator himself before reaching the dropship. Tomiko transmits the coordinates of an old entry site to the hive, and Harrison, now in his own Exosuit, proceeds after his fellow marines whom Rykov has stranded. Along the way, he must clear an infestation from some ancient extraterrestrial technology. His exosuit is damaged during a fall, and he must proceed the rest of the way on foot. He locates his team, subdues an alien queen, and manages to evacuate via dropship. The queen, which apparently survived, follows him, but she is killed by a barrage of missiles from the dropship.
As the dropship puts distance between itself and the hive, Tomiko overloads the fusion reactors in the Pods, destroying them and killing herself. When the marines return to the Verloc, Major McCain recommends abandoning any further rescue or salvage attempts on LV-1201.
[edit] Predator plot
The Predator arrives on LV-1201 with two clan members for a 'hunt'. It is gradually revealed that your Predator is a high ranking clan member, possibly a prince, with better armor, helmet and weapons than your clan mates. After a quick human slaughter and a meeting with some of your other clan mates, who provide you with new weaponry, the Predator discovers his two clan mates have been captured by the Iron Bears. Pursuing the mercenaries into the facility, the Predator eventually succumbs to experimental electro-magnetic pulse grenades which render his equipment useless and result in his capture.
Rykov, with his hatred for the Predators, places the third and final Predator in a lab where it remains in stasis for over six weeks. It is revealed that this Predator is responsible for Rykov's injuries and his burning desire for revenge. Saved from being implanted by the alien and inadvertently released by Corporal Harrison, the Predator, despite being infected with several diseases, powers through a horde of humans, reclaims his equipment and sets off in pursuit of General Rykov.
After a dramatic escape aboard a dropship, the Predator fights through the alien infested caves and tunnels beneath the pods and eventually manages to signal his clan using human technology. The Predator clan promptly arrive and re-arm the Predator, who then sets off to finish Rykov, the man who escaped his wrist blades twenty years ago.
Following Rykov, now encased in an 'Alice' exosuit, deep into the Alien Hive, the Predator fights his way into the heart of the Hive for a climactic battle with General Rykov. Overcoming his enemy, the Predator claims Rykov's synthetic spine as his trophy after twenty years of chase.
In a final cut scene (which is accessible after completing all three campaigns in no specific order), the USS Verloc is seen departing LV-1201 with the US Colonial Marines. As it heads into deep space, the Predators can be seen stalking the ship in their own sleek battleship, appearing to chase their next 'hunt'.
[edit] Alien plot
In an introductory flashback, we learn that Dr. Eisenberg is the only survivor of one of the first expeditions on LV-1201. It's heavily implied that he ate his colleagues to survive.
Cutting back to the timeframe of the game itself, Dr. Eisenberg is discussing some of the facility's problems with a Company auditor. Those problems include the loss of Pod 5 (how it was lost was mentioned in the expansion, Primal Hunt), missing artifacts, and unauthorized research, and the oversight committee is getting worried. Eisenberg dismisses all the company's accusations, and ends his meeting with the auditor.
Meanwhile, Major Dunya delivers a large container to Captain Richter, operator of the cargo vessel Aurora. He has apparently been smuggling artifacts stolen by the Iron Bears, but this crate is larger than normal. He attempts to scan it, but the container is shielded against scanning. Richter is called away to a meeting with Rykov by a security guard, Lloyd, shortly before liftoff. The crate is knocked over and opened when the ship is bumped during the refueling process, revealing the egg within. The egg opens and the player-controlled facehugger emerges. The facehugger leaves the ship through umbilical ductwork and begins to track an irritable guard through the POC. When the guard retires to his quarters for a nap, the facehugger springs on him and impregnates him.
In due time, a player-controlled chestburster hatches, killing the guard. It flees through an open window and proceeds through the POC until it finds nourishment—cats apparently kept for research purposes. (There is a loose reference to this in the Marine campaign. One of the readable notes in the pod's crew quarters is a message from an employee, asking if anyone had seen their cat, and 'there'll be hell to pay if I find her in one of those animal cages.') It molts, and when it is next seen, it is a full-grown drone.
The drone fights its way through the POC, releasing other Xenomorphs being kept as test subjects along the way. It reaches the lower levels, finally encountering a Predator that has been stalking it, probably believing it would make a suitable challenge. It fatally wounds the Predator, which activates its self-destruct mechanism, thus blasting a hole into the POC's drainage system and allowing the alien to escape. Incidentally, the hole also allows thousands of Xenomorphs into the POC, thus causing the Incident to which the marines respond.
Six weeks later, the alien infiltrates the Pods during a brief security failure caused by Corporal Harrison. It takes the opportunity to wreak havoc, killing dozens of guards and scientists, releasing a Predator-alien hybrid, and finally liberating an entire artificial hive within the Pod. Along the way, it kills scientists who are about to infect another Predator with an alien chestburster.
Eisenberg has taken advantage of the marines' arrival to initiate the Large Mass Specimen Extraction, a project to capture the alien empress. As part of the plan, combat synthetics have wired explosive charges throughout the tunnels of the hive. After leaving the Pods and armed with this information, the alien must disable these explosives as it tracks the empress.
The empress is successfully captured, but the alien pursues her captors, including Eisenberg himself. It tracks them through an archaeological site, killing guards, civilians and Iron Bears, to a dropship landing pad. It kills two Predators and sabotages the pad's support machinery, causing the dropship to crash. Furious, Eisenberg attacks the drone directly. When the alien incapacitates him, the game ends. A cutscene reveals that Eisenberg (in his current incarnation) is an android, and he has been cocooned within the empress' chamber. His limbs have been removed and his screams echo through the hive, as the empress and her rescuer gloat.
[edit] Final Cutscene
In a final cut scene (which is accessible after completing all three campaigns in no specific order), the USS Verloc is seen departing LV-1201 with the US Colonial Marines. As it heads into deep space, the Predators can be seen stalking the ship in their own sleek battleship, appearing to chase their next 'hunt'.
[edit] Weaponry
Each species of playable creature has its own unique weapon selection:
[edit] Human
The human's weapon selection is as follows:
- Combat knife
- M4A4 Pistol
- Shotgun
- M41A Pulse Rifle
- M-92 Grenade launcher
- M56 Smartgun
- M-6B Rocket Launcher
- M-90 Minigun
- WY-102 Sniper rifle
- M240 Flamethrower
Humans recover health by picking up medical packs.
[edit] Predator
The predator's weapon selection is as follows:
- Wristblades
- CombiStick
- Plasma Pistol
- Speargun
- Plasmacaster
- Smart Disc
- Netgun
- Remote bombs
Predators also have a Medicomp device that allow them to heal themselves, and an Energy Sift device that allows them to recover energy for their equipment.
[edit] Alien
Aliens can only perform mêlée attacks with their claws, stunning tail whip, and via pounce attacks. However, this limited range of "weaponry" is augmented by impressive physical skills: they are able to climb walls at any inclination, and make better-than-human jumps. To heal, they must eat from the body of a Predator or human. This is done by clawing at the bodies of their opponents, with the most health coming from executing a successful head-bite of an opponent.
[edit] Screenshots
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[edit] Gold Edition
| Aliens versus Predator 2: Gold Edition | |
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| Developer(s) | Monolith Productions, Third Law Interactive |
| Publisher(s) | Sierra Entertainment, Fox Interactive |
| Engine | Lithtech |
| Release date(s) | May 30, 2003 |
| Genre(s) | First-person shooter |
| Mode(s) | Single player, multiplayer |
| Rating(s) | ESRB: M (Mature) USK: 16+ ELSPA: 15+ OFLC: MA15+ |
| Platform(s) | Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X |
| Media | 2 CD-ROMs |
| System requirements | 450 MHz CPU, 128 MB RAM, 16 MB video card RAM, 4X CD-ROM drive, DirectX 8.0, 750 MB available hard disk space, Windows 98 |
| Input | Keyboard, mouse |
The Gold Edition of Aliens versus Predator 2 was released over a year after the original game. It combines the original game with the Primal Hunt expansion pack.
[edit] Trivia
- As with the Nostromo and Sulaco from Alien and Aliens respectively, the naming convention used for the human ship (the Verloc) in this game is a reference to another character from a novel by Joseph Conrad, following the fondness for the works of this author of director Ridley Scott who directed the first film.
- On the ALIEN plot portion of the game during the "Pursuit" chapter, after the cut scene featuring the androids killing the drop ship personnel, the alien character you play starts out in a blue tunnel. If you listen closely to the audio that is going on in the background, you'll hear the audio from Bonus Features menu of the first Alien DVD release, complete with the Nostromo's alarm, chains clinging together, and even Jerry Goldsmith's score.
- After playing the chestburster scene where the player actually eats through the chest of the ill-tempered guard, if you walk towards the closed door that you entered through as a face hugger, you'll hear people on the other side trying franticly to get it open.
[edit] External links
- Dedicated sites
- Miscellaneous
- AvP2 Timeline
- Bosskey.net - Aliens versus Predator 2 tips*
- [1]
- PlanetPhillip - Commentary and Analysis of Sci-Fi Single Player First Person Shooters - Includes an extensive list of single player AvP 2 maps and mods.
