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Given that the Human Genome Project is nearing completion and
that were already cloning sheep and video games, I suppose it was only a matter of
time until someone created a game about the joys of genetic splicing. Welcome to Evolva, a
graphically superb 3rd person shooter in which you control a squad of four genohunters
whose mission is to scour a planet of the alien parasites that are sucking it dry. As the
game progresses, your genohunters improve their own skills and gain new abilities by
assimilating the DNA of alien and indigenous life forms, and its up to you to choose
the mutant path they take. Much like your mutants, the game itself is an intriguing
hybrid; its part FPS, part strategy, part puzzle, part RPGand all these parts
add up to one very good game. The first thing youll notice about
Evolva is the graphicstheyre astonishing, from the reflective skins on your
genohunters to the atmospheric environments. Of course, youll need a hella machine
to revel in all of Evolvas graphic glory. The game was clearly made with high end
machines in mindits even optimized for the GeForce card, and its the
first game Ive seen that actually recommends a PIII 500 and a TNT II Ultra. And
thats no fooling. With my PIII 450, 128 MB of RAM, and an TNT II Ultra, I still had
to tone down some of the graphics to get an acceptable frame rate. You begin the game with four types of
genohunter, each named according to its most distinctive abilityagile, speed, heavy,
and intel. Though you can control only one of these at a time, you can switch between them
at any time and even give limited attack and movement commands to the other genohunters.
Controls are very simple to useyou can switch back and forth between your characters
and weapons easily, and the game uses the familiar old WASD Quake setup for movement.
Its a snap to group and ungroup your genohunters, and the games camera is
usually excellent--the only time camera angles get a little problematic is when you get
caught in a corner, and switching to first person view can alleviate even that. Generally, the games twelve
missions are very good; they take a bit of thought to figure out, and are played out in
spacious and colorful environmentsthis is definitely not a corridor shooter. The
environments can be quite deadly, toomany of the planets indigenous plants
either shoot at or blow up on you, and slippery surfaces can cause harsh damage from
falls, so tread lightly. Most missions will tax your brain just enough to be
enjoyable--youll have to figure out how to use your weapons and genohunters most
effectively, what skills to build, and when to leave units behind to guard critical areas.
Though some of the missions objectives can be vague and confusing, you can generally
figure them out after a while, often with the help of the games extremely useful
mini-map with its lifesaver objective pointer. Though
there are only 12 missions, theyre pretty tough, and itll take you a while to
play through them. In fact, theres a lot of save-and-reload involved in Evolva, so
it helps that you can save anywhere. Youll do that a lot, especially since theres never enough health around.
Evolvas artificial intelligence
really shines. Though you can only control one genohunter at a time, the others embarrass
themselves surprisingly seldom. If you leave one to guard a doorway, it usually will, and
genohunters do a good job of choosing the right weapon for the right threat. You can
usually turn them loose to attack and trust theyll not kill themselves or you, and
they generally watch their health and the odds. The only chronic AI problem I noticed was
with friendly fire. Your fire will affect your teammates, and sometimes overzealous
genohunters will dart into your line of fire before you have time to react. For all of the friendly AIs
virtues, enemy AI is another matter altogether. Parasite guardians are not the most
intelligent of creatures. Though projectile-armed enemies will usually attempt to stand
off, most of them will just run right at you. Thus for all the thought it takes to solve
some of the games missions, much of the actual combat comes down to backing up while
firing and using the good old circle strafe. Evolva is mostly excellent, but it does have some problems. The
biggest letdown is that theres no compelling story here. The genohunters dont
have much personality, and the missions are challenging but tied together by only the
slightest of narratives. Its a deadly combinationpeople you dont really
care about doing stuff for no particular reason. And theres a deep irony in the game
as well. Even though youre supposedly saving a planet from being stripped of life by
alien parasites, thats actually what you do. The most successful player is
the one who kills all the aliens and indigenous life forms and incorporates their genes
into his or her own gene pool. Its kind of like being a Borg, and thats a
little weird. Another weakness is multiplayer. As of this writing, you can only play over
HEAT. Thats just unacceptable. But overall this is a beautiful,
intelligent, and fun game. Though it may be frustrating at times, and even though the
story is woefully underdeveloped, Evolvas strengthsan original premise,
excellent AI, thought-provoking missions, and stunning graphicsmore than carry the
day. If youre looking for a different
kind of action game, this ones for you. |