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New AVP has suicide feature

Published on 20th August 2009 by Joe Martin

The Alien campaign has a new feature where fleeing civilians may top themselves to escape your slimy grasp.

GamesCom 2009: One of the first previews we saw today at GamesCom 2009 here in Cologne was with Sega and Rebellion to check out how the new Alien versus Predator is coming along and to get a look at the Alien campaign, which Rebellion is only just unveiling. It was during this sneak peak that we got a chance to see a game feature that some people might object to – some rather gory suicides.

The event happened during a hands-off presentation of the game, where we saw a developer play as an Alien and try to harvest some civilians for the Alien Queen, which is done by dragging their living bodies to nearby facehuggers. One slippery civvie spotted the approaching Alien however and ran off to a nearby weapons store, which the player entered just in time to see the civilian shout some swearwords at the Alien before blowing his brains out very graphically.

“Civilians will commit suicide with whatever comes to hand,” said a Sony producer who was on hand during the private presentation. “That includes guns and even grenades. The idea is they are scared and they know that fighting you is useless.”

Suicide is just one of the more brutal and gory elements of the new Alien versus Predator it seems and we got a chance to see some incredibly gross and bloody fatalities too, with fountains of blood gushing out of Marine as they got their throats torn out. We’re not normally the squeamish sort of course, but even to us the level of blood seemed excessive.

We caught up with Rebellion’s Head of Art and Design, Tim Jones, a bit afterwards and quickly put the question of tastefulness to him when it comes to such gory suicides and he explained that it was something that just came with the territory of the franchise.

“People would do anything to avoid going through the Alien birth ritual,” said Jones – and you can catch the rest of our interview with him in the near future.

The level of violence did bring an element of irony to the presentation though, with a Sega spokesperson saying that there were no current plans to tone down the gore and that, though Sega would present AVP to the famously strict German USK rating body, they weren’t confident that the game would be given the all-clear for a German release. Just as well all the German journalists got a chance to see it today, we suppose.

What’s your opinion on suicide and gore in games? Let us know your thoughts in the forums.

22 Comments

Discuss in the forums Reply

Krikkit 20th August 2009, 20:11

Sounds pretty clever to me. I'm looking forward to this game more and more tbh.

VaLkyR-Assassin 20th August 2009, 20:21

"New AVP has suicide feature" - surely the game isn't going to be that bad? :P

Krikkit 20th August 2009, 20:25

It might be quite nice for the human campaign too, when you're critically wounded.

freedom810 20th August 2009, 21:02

Man that's a cool feature! You can imagine having no way out as a human being swarmed with aliens so you just pop one in your head :D hehe

azrael- 20th August 2009, 21:24

Reading this article reminded me of that Monty Python "Sam Peckinpah" sketch. :)

capnPedro 20th August 2009, 21:47

Sounds damn cool, if you ask me. (The game in general, not the suicide bit specifically).

Slightly off topic, did anyone play a HL1 mod, Natural Selection?

human_error 20th August 2009, 23:15

Although the topic is a little gory it is true to the Alien films where suicide/volenatry death was used by several characters when there was no chance of escape. To me that just makes it more realistic and challenging (plus this game is going to be an 18 cert anyway - there are far worse things than suicide in 18 cert films for example).

I must admit that the more i hear about the avp game the more i think that rebellion is doing a very good job making sure the aliens and predators are as terrifying to civilians as they were in their respective films.

Veles 21st August 2009, 01:33

You can't have an Alien or Predator move without lots of gore so you can't for a game either IMO.

xprodancer 21st August 2009, 02:49

i must say after reading this im so gona get this game just for the pleasure of bein in the film! as there is now suicide in the mix it should be quite a great play! nice one! :)

HourBeforeDawn 21st August 2009, 03:08

I wouldnt call it suicide, I would call it honorable sacrifice =p but ya this looks like it might be pretty cool.

Bauul 21st August 2009, 09:07

Yet again it's Sega who hapilly push the boundries of gore and violence. They definitely seem to be repositioning themselves as a very adult publisher, somewhat ironic given their iconic game character's status.

liratheal 21st August 2009, 09:50

Civilians will commit suicide with whatever comes to hand,

Sold.

A million times sold.

LeMaltor 21st August 2009, 10:14

Sound's great.

Grimloon 21st August 2009, 10:39

Well I was going to be buying it anyway but this just added another reason to my purchase justification list :) The fact that they've put this level of detail in makes it a win in my book.

The only question that remains is will we see a repeat of the Gorman/Vasquez grenade scene?

Xir 21st August 2009, 13:14

Quote:

though Sega would present AVP to the famously strict German USK rating body, they weren’t confident that the game would be given the all-clear for a German release.

Which is why germans either buy the austrian version (which is usually in german but uncut) or buy the english version directly from amazon.uk.co, which is a lot cheaper anyway...

SNIPERMikeUK 21st August 2009, 15:13

Making news like this it only ruins the final product, when the press get hold of it...

Krikkit 21st August 2009, 15:21

I know what you mean - it's one of those features in a game that'd just be a "Whoah, did that civvy just smother himself in his own cheesecake?" moment. :D

D3s3rt_F0x 21st August 2009, 15:34

One thing, there is never too much gore, well so long as it isn't there just to distract from how bad the rest of the game is, as has occured in the past.

SMIFFYDUDE 21st August 2009, 16:19

I agree, you can never have too much gore. I think there has been a distinct lack of the stuff in games in recent years.

Mind you, im the sort of person who, using the HL2 Hammer Editor, would make a room full of harmless Combine police and then staple them to the ceiling with the crossbow when I run it.

boiled_elephant 21st August 2009, 16:38

I agree that random tidbits and previews like this make games less enjoyable upon release. In fact, I distinctly remember enjoying games more when I didn't read review sites on the net. My own fault though :(

NethLyn 22nd August 2009, 01:16

Big deal, drop a nade or fire a SADAR into the wall and you already could commit suicide in the first game, it just wasn't part of the story.

D3s3rt_F0x is right, as long as it's not just there to cover up either bad gameplay or deliberately short SP campaigns (five long, difficult and randomised levels to each campaign struck the right balance with the first AVP) then great, roll on 2010.

The_Beast 22nd August 2009, 06:33

Very cool feature, I might just have the try this game after all