Predator: Concrete Jungle

Written by Troy Matsumiya  on March 29, 2005

Final Glimpse: That one ugly mother is back.

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Who knew way back in 1987 that a summer action flick starring two future US governors, a seven-foot tall dreadlocked alien, and almost as much testosterone as Barry Bonds' flaxseed oil would be such an enduring cultural phenomenon? Yet here we are, 18 years later, and we still get excited at all things Predator Ц and this is despite the Danny Glover sequel (which sucked), the much ballyhooed Aliens vs. Predator (which also sucked) and a whole host of video games, many of which Ц you guessed it Ц sucked.

While they can't do much about the movie sequels, Eurocom is instead trying to reverse the video game trend with the upcoming third-person shooter, Predator: Concrete Jungle.

The story starts in 1930s Chicago, where our beloved Predator decides to mix it up with the mafia (apparently, they made him an offer he could refuse). Unfortunately, he somehow manages to break the Yautja's rules for the hunt and is banished to barren prison world for 100 years. To add insult to injury, the mafia steals his weapons and technology before he's carted off to jail. Talk about a bad day.

After completing his sentence, our Predator is allowed to return to Earth to hunt, as long as he obeys the rules. But since our hero isn't the obedient type and is a wee bit peeved at having his stuff stolen, he plots revenge against the descendents of the original mafiosos. The only difference is that now his enemies are armed with the same weapons and technology he has, making things a little more challenging this time around; after all, it's not 1930 anymore, when all you had to deal with were Tommy guns and zoot suits. And let's not mention the fact the Predator is also 100 years older and probably suffering from alien arthritis, liver spots and an enlarged prostate.

Despite his old age, the Predator still has some spring in his step Ц so much so that he can nimbly jump over buildings and leap from rooftop to rooftop much like Spider-Man. And like ol' webhead, he can perform acrobatic flips, hang from ledges, jump-push off walls to scale skyscrapers, and even power up a crouch jump, all in a large free-roaming version of 2030 Chicago. All of this hopping around like a giant alien frog is necessary to track down your enemies and even run away to safety when things get frantic.

But the Predator fears no man and with a kick-butt collection of weapons at your disposal, it's easy to see why. You will have all of the weapons from the movies, including the wrist blades, the shoulder-mounted Plasmacaster, the deadly SmartDisc, which has homing abilities in addition to its razor-sharp blades, and several other weapons no bloodthirsty Predator should be without. Most of your weapons are for up-close and personal melee attacks, each with their own unique abilities.

But sometimes the odds can be a bit overwhelming even for a Predator, and so you will need to use your defensive technology like the invisible cloaking device (which will short-circuit if you get wet, so avoid stepping in puddles and stay out of the rain) and the voice synthesizer, which you can use to lure unsuspecting victims into a very nasty surprise. You can also scan your environment with thermal vision, night vision and neuro vision, which lets you see people's emotional state and loyalty, allowing you to easily pick out enemies in a crowd (which is helpful considering Yautja rules state that you can only hunt hostiles and not innocents). Tech vision allows you to spot cloaked enemies and technology you can interact with, such as power kiosks to recharge your own cloaking device and certain weapons. You can also use your first aid kit to heal yourself, though there's no word on whether you'll need to keep some drywall handy.

Once you find an enemy, you can get down to business. If you're facing a big crowd of bad guys, you can lock on to a specific victim to better focus your attacks. Of course, you can always run around hacking and slashing at random too. The combat system is fairly simple, since you only need to use two buttons to pull off some brutal and bloody combos. The violence level is promising to be pretty extreme, so this is definitely not a game for the kids; in fact, the Predator probably wouldn't feel out of place in Mortal Kombat. If you sneak up behind someone, you can either grab and use him as a shield, or pull off a stealth kill which can range from ripping off his head to cutting him in half. You will also be able to skin victims and hang them up for display. Now that's gotta hurt.

The game will span 27 УchaptersФ as you battle various street gangs, the police and of course, the mafia family you are seeking revenge against. The developers are providing multiple paths to your objectives, so you will have a choice to either sneak around back all stealthy like, or run in with guns a-blazing in a full frontal assault. To add a little variety to the mix, the missions will range from hunting, stalking, collecting trophies and even escort objectives; as well, several missions will be timed. There are also bonus missions that will let you unlock new costumes and the Ritual Challenge game mode, which is a checkpoint race against the clock. A detailed record book will track all of your stats, which you can use to impress the Predator ladies when you get home.

Graphically, the Predator looks awesome; he is very detailed and his weapon and cloaking effects look quite impressive. However, enemies and environments don't share the same level of detail and look rather poor in comparison; but to be fair, we will reserve final judgment when all of the touch-ups and tuning are complete.