Video: How an 11th-hour decision made Aliens versus Predator a classic
We get to the chopper—and the details—with AvP lead artist and producer Tim Jones.
Welcome to the latest edition of "War Stories," where we sit down with video game developers and cajole them into talking about the gameplay design elements that almost broke their brains. In this episode, we're chatting up Tim Jones, the lead artist and producer of 1999's
Aliens versus Predator.
Jumping on the brand wagon
The
Aliens versus Predator brand is a childhood fever dream brought to life—who hasn't had playground arguments over who'd win in a fight between some of the biggest and baddest bad guys of them all? The idea of watching supernal figures battle it out is both fun and endlessly attractive, because everyone likes a spectacle, and the biggest spectacle of all comes from watching one irresistible alien force slam into another unmovable alien object. Sparks fly, things explode, and we're happy.
The "Aliens versus Predator" concept first appeared in graphic novel form, but it was catapulted into mainstream consciousness by a series of films in the 2000s. Though definitely spectacular in the most literal sense of the word, the movies all ultimately fall short in just about every other area; only the first, released in 2004, is (arguably) watchable without the aid of alcohol or other drugs.
In contrast to disappointing, stupid movies that prioritize cacophony over coherence, the small-screen adaptations of the
AvP brand have generally been good (emphasis on the "generally," because there are always
exceptions). The most successful tend to be the games that allow the player to take on the role of both the titular aliens and predators (along with a human Colonial Marine for balance) and either run through a
Rashomon-style single player campaign from each of the three different characters' points of view or battle it out in a (sometimes hilariously unbalanced) multiplayer frag-fest.
If it bleeds...
And that brings us around to the subject of this video: Rebellion's 1999
Aliens versus Predator, the first
AvP game to take the gameplay in that direction. As it turns out—perhaps unsurprisingly—crafting a coherent single-player campaign in such a way that it can be played with three vastly different characters with vastly different abilities is
really hard. How do you properly balance a level's design and difficulty when it might be played first with an Alien who can walk on walls but dies with a single bullet, and then by a predator who can turn invisible and soak up tremendous amounts of damage? (Answer: lots and lots and lots of manual tweaking and testing.)
Fortunately, Jones and team rose to the challenge, and we're all lucky they did: 1999's
AvP set up thematic and gameplay patterns followed by a number of successful sequels (including Monolith's
Aliens versus Predator 2, which I played absolutely to death at LAN parties in college). The folks at Rebellion delivered a timeless classic, and we'll be forever grateful.
