Have you ever heard of Avatar? No, not that game that Dali played to feel better about his gamerscore. No, its the new James Cameron movie-stravaganza which is also being pitched as a triple A video game… IN 3D!
At PAX last weekend, I got a chance to sit in on a private showing of the game, and just prior to that, I got about 20minutes of hands-on time with the mono-scopic version as well. The game played quite well, with a camera very reminiscent of Lost Planet’s pseudo over the shoulder 3rd person aiming system. The weapons themselves felt a lot like Lost Planet as well. Its not something that I could place my finger on, but the majority of the game (the parts played as a marine) felt very akin to Lost Planet. The grandiose scope of the world, but not being able to physically take part in any of it, the movement, the dodging, the mechanical suits, giant alien beasts which drop RNA (DNA type things which fill up a meter that allows you to do special awesome things… much like the T-eng in Lost Planet). As I say this, it may be seen as a negative thing, that is totally wrong, I personally LOVED Lost Planet, so this is very exciting to me!
The map and environment are toted to be expansive, with many areas which you will return to throughout your stint in a particular zone, to collect RNA samples, complete missions, and meet with people. The zone we were shown was large, but it didn’t seem like the open sandbox that they were explaining it as, it was less of a Oblivion world, and more of a Fable 1 or Mass Effect world, where the paths through the level are all pre-determined, and all seem to lead to the same, or two of the same ends, but give the illusion of ‘open worldness’. There were sections in which vehicles were used, and it was stated that they would play a vital role in getting around the open world, but from what I saw, they were more of a self operated transit system, only operable between a single stretch of ground, and at that point, just eliminate the open nothingness, thus eliminating the need for the obligatory vehicles. If you’re not following what I’m saying, here’s an example, you fly a helicopter gunship into the zone, you then set it down and it has no where to go again from that helipad because its blocked off by dense canopy. You then walk through the jungle, and pass upon a buggie which you then are able to pilot across a open swamp area, then you have to leave it behind because the jungle is again too dense. This may be an odd negative on my part, but I just feel as if it’s an awkward transportation system.
The environments themselves are fantastic, they feel alive, and half of the flora is also trying to kill you just as hard as the fauna is! They lighting system is dynamic and a quick speed through of the real time day/night system was very impressive, showing off individual shadows and reflections.
The demo took a bit of a nose dive when we were given the option to play as an Avatar (the big blue reptile aliens); they felt overpowered, yet resoundingly underpowered at the same time. Once you got the character up close to an enemy, they were devastating, but the actual act of getting your big, blue, club-swinging butt over to the marine was a near impossible task. Maybe I was just plain terrible at it, but a friendly Dev came by and showed me that as an Avatar, a more vertical plane comes into play, in which the Avatar can scale up a giant root, into the canopy, and jump down at the enemy… I just ended up being shot down a lot.
Now, onto the very last topic at hand, stereo-scopic graphics. When we played ourselves, if was on a regular old 21 inch LCD monitor, our live demo on the other hand was done on a ginormous Sony prototype stereo-scopic, 100inch TV. The glasses we were given weren’t the regular red/blue 3D movie glasses, instead they were big, thick, sunglasses looking things with a sensor on either side. The strangest part was that they were talking to the TV set, actively switching out lenses throughout the game, and if the connection was broken, if you by chance looked at your standard issue blogger’s note pad, the entire lenses would darken to the point of no return and writing was made impossible. The graphics themselves looked mediocre in 3D, the size of the TV, coupled with the many layers of game that was presented forth equalled in quite a few jaggies and a general sense of ‘This just doesn’t feel right’ syndrome. I could barely watch it without getting a little itchy in the eyes, playing it would be another story entirely. Mind you, I’ve never had eye pains, or headaches from video games before, so this was pretty extreme.
Overall, the game has a lot of potential, its quite a ways down the line, but there’s still a very obvious ‘under development’ feel to the game. Id give it a little time in the oven to percolate, and release it on the world in tandem with the movie. If anything, it should awe people as a movie game that doesn’t play like a plate of mashed potatoes.
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