Finally, et voila *the* 3D game that is a true first person, single player, horror experience!
Just like the original AVP, this follow-up manages to thrill you more than most multiplayer events ever will...

The problem with most multiplayer first person games, is that they reduce the action to a point-click loop: you point, then you click to fire... and such a "no neo-cortex required" attitude, tends to bore, after a few hours. There is no effort to contextualize why you are at where your are, doing what you're doing... and you hardly get any surprises, even when a sniper puts you to sleep, because you know that is just the nature of the game: kill-and-get-killed. Nothing more than that.

The AVP series is much more focused on the single player experience, and tries very hard to build a solid context: solid story, solid characters, believable physics (including you not being able to jump safely from 3 meters high, and not surviving a couple of alien scratches), well scaled surroundings, and rich audio content. In one sentence: the AVP world feels exactly as you would expect it to, after watching the corresponding inspiring movies.

You can play as human, alien or predator... I remember playing the original AVP to completion, on "director's cut" (extreme) difficulty, and that is why I am not trying the same, this time. It happens that I can't afford the required +100 playing hours :). The "director's cut" is just too hard, if you want to still have a regular life... so I am playing the "normal" (human) challenge - and may be I'll try the other species later.
The human challenge casts you as the unlucky soldier who'll get trapped on buildings, and who'll be sent alone to check whatever the commander decides.

The ambiance is great! The lighting and the audio set a frightening clima, and you'll fell yourself getting nervous on many occasions, no matter how experienced you are. Believe me: I've seen hundreds of horror movies and played dozens of 3D FPS games, so I've become kind of very resistant to the usual scary formulas; yet AVP2 is such a quality interactive experience, applying the most effective tricks from other art forms, that it indeed ends up managing to pump some adrenaline on your dormant veins.

Your first gaming minutes are quite an example of how to build pressure: you'll be thinking "there is an alien at the corner" for many, *many* minutes... until you finally get to meet your fiends, and - no matter how much you "prepared" yourself to it - they'll scare you! Enough said...

Technically, AVP2 is quite a superb demonstration of how far the Litech engine can go... but the best that can be said about the game, is its "balance": you have such a rare misc of playability, graphical beauty, wise scripted events, and atmospheric audio... that one has to applaud the team responsible for this Christmas wonder.

If you want the best in PC action, you *have to* buy AVP2.

Buy AVP2 (best possible price), via:

amazon.co.uk (best choice for European buyers);

amazon.com (best choice for American buyers).