I’ve always been a fan of Team 17. For those not old enough to remember as far back as the Amiga, these guys were up there with the likes of Psygnosis, the Bitmap Brothers and Sensible Software in terms of what they produced on the Commodore home computer. Body Blows, Project-X, Superfrog and of course, Worms were all hits back in the 16-bit era.
The title that brought them into the limelight was Alien Breed, which was a Gauntlet style sci-fi shooter with smooth graphics, easy to pick up gameplay and a high quality level throughout. Now, after a long and almost unforgivable absence, the franchise is back in the form of Evolution. The story itself has been split into 3 episodic parts, which will be released separately throughout the year, but the initial synopsis involves Conrad, a chief engineer for the Leopold spacecraft and a cyborg Lieutenant named MIA, trying to save the rest of the crew and important guests after they are pulled into a gravitational field and crash into a strange object.
The Unreal Engine seems to be the weapon of choice in most games at the minute and Alien Breed is no exception. It bears a slight resemblance to Shadow Complex in style, with some lovely lighting and rendering done; bearing in mind this is an 800 point arcade title and not a £40 commercial job. Sirens, explosions and everything else in-between are all done with a beauty that belies the price tag, with the ship having a really nice sci-fi feel to it, with really dark, metallic corridors frantically trying to digest any light from your torch as you battle to save everyone from the alien horde. The alien design does have a slight hint on occasion to the H. R. Giger creations, especially the crawling face-hugger style creatures at the start, but that’s not really a bad thing. Some of the other designs are pretty creepy and as you progress become ever more deadly, especially the nasty regeneration ones, who bring back fallen foes to life again, just to shrink your ammo supplies even more.
There is voice acting here, and on occasion it can be decent, but there are moments of cringe worthy anguish, in particularly the final words of some poor sod who’s trying to tell you something mid way through the game before he dies. It ranks up there with some of those really bad Hong Kong dubbed movies from the 70’s and 80’s I can assure you. The rest of the sound department is very solid in comparison, the computer voice is very Star Trek, but does manage to retain the Alien Breed heritage, as Intec systems make a welcome return at each save point. Even some of the gun effects sound like they were lifted affectionately from the Amiga original, especially the assault rifle. Younger folks won’t find this making any difference, but for a seasoned pro like myself, its stuff like this that makes you smile.
As far as the control system goes, it leans heavily towards the dual stick shooters we’ve come to expect from online downloads, like Zombie Apocalypse and Geometry Wars, with the inclusion of the triggers to use primary or secondary weapons and the D-pad allowing for change of guns, grenades and medical supplies. It all feels very intuitive and helps to allow a very free flowing game. It shows its worth when there are a load of aliens coming towards you from all directions, as you can swivel round on a sixpence to take out whatever wants to get in front of your gun first.
The gameplay itself is solid. The difficulty level is of such a state that you do find yourself having to preserve any ammunition and health you can and with a claustrophobic feel brought on by the ship layout, this can sink you into the game and have a tendency of not letting go, notably having you shoot just in panic to survive (yes that did happen, last night in fact, but I still died) and this happens rather often. As well as the rock hard single player campaign, you can also play through as a two player co-op, allowing for someone else, either on the same console or over LIVE to get in on the action.
As long as you don’t put it onto rookie you should get a few hours out of this, probably as much as you get from most Arcade games at the minute, but the quality mixed with the feel of Alien Breed means that there is a good sense of value for money on display, regardless of how many episodes there may be. You may think at first play that it’s not going to be likeable, but trust me when I say that Team 17’s title is a grower. From a nostalgic point of view, I’m just so happy to see the UK development team go back to their roots and give us something us old gamers knew they could, rather than going back to their worm farm and unleashing a few more slithering war machines on us. Will this mean an HD Project-X or a Superfrog remake? I hope so, as God knows the older gaming generation want and deserve it.
Alien Breed Evolution reminds me of a game on the PS One called Loaded, from another great, but long forgotten British company, Gremlin. It was also a top down shooter with 2 player co-op, built with simple and fun gameplay in mind. I enjoyed that as much as I do this. The atmosphere is impressively moody, the controls are easy to pick up and the addition of playability online with a friend further shows that more games need to cater for the very system that allows us to purchase these titles in the first place. I’m looking forward to the next chapter and have to say, admittedly with a proud smile on my face, that Team 17 have finally come home.
Well done, chaps.
VideogameUK verdict: 8/10
