First Impressions: Jean-Claude Van Damme ain't in this Predator suit!
"If it bleeds we can kill it."
With these immortal words from the Governator himself in the 1987 film Predator, the Predator race was established as the ultimate hunter. Through a wealth of spin-off comics, novels, games and two film sequels, the creatures were given a mission and a purpose. They lived for the hunt and for the honor that came with killing a worthy opponent.
Up until now the closest thing a Predator has had as a worthy opponent that didn't involve the Aliens was Danny Glover. But that will all change when a lone Predator must take back his honor from the Chicago mob of the 1930s and their descendants in 2030. In the 30s, a young Predator is dropped into Chicago where his prey is a rising mob boss. But the bootleggers manage to get the drop on the young Predator and he has to be rescued by the Predator dropship, much like the end of Predator 2. In this rescue attempt, our young Predator has left behind some of his weaponry and in the next hundred years the mob uses it to gain enormous power in Chicago. So in 2030 the Predator is given the chance to return to Earth to reclaim his weaponry and his honor.
Predator: Concrete Jungle is being developed by the masters of the licensed game, Eurocom. After last year's Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Chaos Bleeds I have all the faith in the world that Eurocom can cook up an equally appropriate fighting engine for the Predator as well. And much like the Chosen One, the Predators have quite the arsenal of weaponry too. Concrete Jungle will give aspiring Predators the option of using hand to hand combat (with or without the Predator’s retractable claw), the spear, and more advanced tricks like the Predator’s Smart Discs or Plasma Caster.
In addition to the weaponry is the advanced technology the Predator is able to use to aid his hunt. Naturally the cloaking device and Infrared vision will be a factor. There will also be a technology scan, to search for those mob bosses carrying Predator swag, a neuroscan that checks people’s brain waves, and a prey scan that searches for a worthy opponent or a marked target. I just worry that Eurocom's habit of requiring players to change weapons with the D-Pad will rear it's ugly head again. And if early reports of the gameplay are any indication, the D-Pad will at least be used to switch the Predator's Invisibility Cloak in-game.
It's almost enough to think that with all of this hardware Concrete Jungle will be one long killfest. And it can be. But the true nature of a Predator demands more precision and stealth than that and the game's mission based structure will ensure that. There will be missions where you'll be able to cut loose with the spear in a mob of people, but many missions will require the use of wall climbing, invisibility and scanning for the perfect target at the perfect time. And you know that with a Predator there won't be any of those frustrating "protection" missions that bogged down sections of Buffy: Chaos Bleeds.
To make sure that the story of a young Predator regaining his honor is told with the dignity it deserves, Eurocom has tapped comic book scribe Grant Morrison to tell it. Morrison has written for the New X-Men and his hugely popular Invisibles series and will no doubt bring the same type of maturity to Predator: Concrete Jungle.
Futuristic Chicago looks fantastic from the screenshots that have been released so far. While word from Vivendi is that the game is at least five or six months away the environments are beginning to take shape and the Predator looks awesome. Throw in a spectacular looking heat vision mode and I have high hopes that the look will match the feel of a Predator movie and the story that Morrison will tell.
