Alien Rage (PC) Review

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Alien Rage is a game that draws on the style of the classic corridor shooters of old, with gameplay largely resembling that of Unreal Tournament and an art style to match. The old school feel is aided with an announcer commending every headshot and double kill, scoring you for your efforts. Unlike the games of yore however, Alien Rage adopts the more modern regenerating health system, making the game much easier for those used to the likes of Call of Duty to simply pick up and play, although this will undoubtedly annoy the fans of old school shooters that this game is trying to appeal to.

So how well does this return to the old school stack up against what other modern games have to offer? Let’s move on to what’s Hot and what’s Not about Alien Rage.

Hot

Guns
The weapons at your disposal in Alien Rage all feel punchy and solid, with satisfying sounds rewarding your expenditure of ammunition. This is obviously a good thing, but doubly so as you’re going to be firing those weapons near-constantly throughout the game. Every weapon has two fire modes, with the secondary fire typically leading to suitably impressive explosions, allowing even the most mundane of weapons to be impressive. That said, most of the weapons are mundane, with a bland selection of shotguns, SMGs, assault rifles, pistols, a minigun and a rocket launcher, which is a little disappointing.

Graphics
Alien Rage is a great looking game, with satisfying weapon effects and generally excellent textures. The graphics are all the more impressive given that the game is running on Unreal Engine 3 without many of the most modern graphical bells and whistles we’re used to seeing in modern games. The game’s performance is therefore generally excellent, although I did experience some slowdown upon loading new areas. The game claims to be built using start of the art graphics and while that isn’t really true it certainly isn’t a bad looking game.