Alien Massacre 2 Review

Before the likes of Call of Duty and Halo came along shooters were, by and large, pretty damn awful on consoles.

The reason given wasn't an over-reliance on firing upon big green splodgy things intent on invading planet Earth, of course, but rather the fallibility of the humble control pad.

When compared to the mouse and keyboard setup enjoyed by PC players, it just didn't offer the same level of dexterity. Those playing on their Sony PlayBox or Nintendo StationCube would be ripped apart, cut to ribbons within seconds, just as they were getting used to the novelty of the full 360 movement at their fingertips.

To the eye of their slayer, it was much like a reenactment of Bambi's first steps, albeit with scores more bullets and buckets of bloodshed.

Not so alien attack

Mobile shooters, on the whole, suffer from no such problems. Not because they necessarily have a better control set up or more power under the hood, but rather because full 360 degree movement for most is simply the stuff of dreams.

Like plenty before it, Alien Massacre 2 is restricted to firing in just four directions – up, down, left or right.

While that's no real handicap in a 2D world where the aliens before you move in much the same manner, what does limit your impact is your range. Only aliens handily waiting for you at a safe distance – not too close, and not too far away – are susceptible to your firepower, making you even more of a scaredy cat than you need to be.

Those who sampled Alien Massacre 2's predecessor will more than likely feel a touch safer, purely because play is largely identical.

Yet again, your role is to roam a series of stages filled with different rooms, most of which house a collection of odd alien beasties – some with several teeth, some with firepower, and some with some especially poisonous looking tails.

As you might expect, your survival relies on your ability to floor every single one of them, the more points and cash you obtain for doing so (multipliers are on offer if you pick several off in quick succession), the easier it is to upgrade your weapons and pick up new ones.

Massacre by name, massacre by nature

Almost word for word, that was the situation in the original Alien Massacre, however, and while most of its strong points remain as a result (most notably, the satisfying splat that sounds every time an alien explodes under your fire), so do its faults.

What screams out during play is a general lack of design nous. Everything – from where you encounter the aliens to the haphazard fashion in which they follow you – feels utterly random.

There's very little craft to Alien Massacre 2, highlighted by the fact that the bonus on offer - flashing nodes that, when picked up, have the potential to multiply your score if you kill within a set time frame – are often located far away from danger, rendering them utterly useless.

Add to that the aforementioned targeting problem – one that results in you constantly moving back and forth while firing in awkward fashion to keep your foe in range – and you have a game tarnished around the edges by what is either poor design, or general laziness.

Its tonic would be some severe sculpting, in truth, honing what can be a satisfying game into an experience that delivers more consistently. As things stand, however, Alien Massacre 2 plays out as a button basher, crudely delivering a shooter that feels like the product of a generation long since put to bed.