Alien Breed, Team 17's series - A difficult game?

[hamster]

Alien Breed, Team 17's series - A difficult game?

I used to play Alien Breed (the first version) and liked the atmosphere, sounds and graphics. I found the game difficult though with the ammo constraints and limited keys. And of the course the unlimited Aliens...

Do you find this game difficult? Or what did you do to make life easier in the game. I tend to like to explore and revisit areas and in Alien Breed - The same aliens are regenerated time and time again in the same spot. No sense of cleaning or completing an area. How did you conserve ammo? Did you just learn the areas to visit and make a priority list of areas to visit and exit the level?

Hmmm.. so many versions. What was your favourite and why?

Alien Breed (1991)
Alien Breed - Special Edition 92 - Is there a difference?
Alien Breed - Tower Assault (1994) - I had move to PC by then and played a quick demo
Alien Breed II - The Horror Continues (1993) - I have tried this before.. more like the original?
Alien Breed 3D (1995) - The 3D Amiga version - What did you think of this?
Alien Breed 3D 2 - The Killing Grounds (1996) - Hmm version 1 must have been good then.

I'm going to look them up but I am curious what fans think about the best and worst of the series.

[EmuChicken]

I think Breed SE 92 had different levels, .. actually the most I can remember is that it had no pong game in the intex entertainment system

My fav is prolly the first two, they kept the dark atmosphere better I thought than the later topview games... prefer 92 because I played that as a kid more

[gimbal]

I played all of them accept for the 3D games (didn't have the Amiga that could run them ). Alien Breed SE was my favourite, but I still found it a below average game. It gets boring very quickly, due to the lack of variation. The respawning aliens may have kept the action going, but the respawn time was way to fast. If the aliens would have respawned only when the warning timer went off, it would have been a much better game IMO.

[andyr]

AB3D was my first introduction to FPS games - and as such I think it's a superb game.

Graphically it's not much to look at while sonically its not bad but level layout, playability and atmosphere are second to none - especially the level with the massive robot!

I've finally got around to playing AB3D2 under emulation. Even my A1200 030 @28MHz with 18 meg of memory had trouble running this game at an acceptable speed when it was first released but use WinUAE on a 3GHz machine and it flies! It has some AI flaws but while playable, doesn't even come close to matching the playability of the first 3D version.

Then again, I'm totally bored with the FPS genre now though. I think it's almost reached saturation point and it seems almost every other game released these days is an FPS of some kind. There was a time where I would have been salivating at the thought of something like Quake 4 - but not now. Even Half Life 2 was boring to me - the same old thing with slightly better graphics - it's currently gathering dust on some shelf somewhere around here.

It doesn't help that I'm not into online gaming I suppose. Why do developers seem to think that online gaming is the be all and end all of gaming now? Multiplayer to me means having a couple of mates round and having a laugh playing games and not the totally disconnected idea of playing against someone you don't know who's halfway across the globe. Where's the atmosphere in that?

[Galaxy]

Alien Breed was always discussed in the mags as being a difficult game

[hamster]

I think I start with Alien Breed SE 2 first and aim to finish it. At least each level has a code.

As for FPS... I haven't really touched one in ages. I liked Half Life... but that was nearly 7 years now... wow is really that long? Wow, it is. Emulation takes my free time now.

[wanderer]

I don't think Alien Breed was anywhere near as difficult as it's close relative Project-X was. Wasn't there an option to set the difficulty level? If I remember correctly, the only 'unplayable' setting was the highest one. Main thing about this series is that it's a total, shameless rip-off of the Alien film series, of that wonderful Sega game, Alien Syndrome (just love that game ) and probably lot's of other stuff too. Team 17 wasn't about originality I guess.
My fav is AB2, extremely polished and claustrophobic. At a time when the italian version of 'The Games Machine' mag had come to reviewing 1-2 Amiga games max and 20+ Pc ones, leaving no mention to Amiga games whatsoever in the cover for months, even years perhaps, AB2 made it possible, ("the Amiga amazes still", they shouted in the cover), complete with full review, work in progress and Team 17 interview.
Tower Assault was good, with milestone CD32 intro, but the first level was horrible. (ducking bombs and canon shots? )
Don't know about 3D versions, hated the idea 'cause 3D was Pc territory. Played AB3D only for 1-2 minutes or so, many years ago and still remember the great atmosphere and playability.