Alien Breed and the Evolution of Gaming

How the 'Evolution of gaming' has come along in 20 years!

Upon stumbling across one of my all time favourite game remakes, Alien Breed, I couldn't help but think of those great arcade years playing on the Amiga with my Dad.
There was nothing like a good two player top down 'shoot em up'.

Ok, so you had to wait for the game to load off the notoriously unreliable floppy disks, but boy was it worth the wait.

The way in which games has moved on over the years is astounding.
Taking Team17's Alien Breed as an example, you can see just how far things have come since the good old arcade days.

The formula for the game remains the same simple, yet highly addictive formula. Run around a space station in cramped conditions, trying to navigate a maze of rooms and corridors while fending off the invading Aliens.
However, what has changed dramatically is the graphics, effects and sheer depth.

Loading from a floppy waiting to read the opening credits still had a depth of excitement that a book or wooden toy couldn't quite match for me.
Physically seeing the story someone had envisaged and being part of the story by playing the character yourself was far more entertaining.
However, the latest games really have gone to a new level.


Looking at how the great 1992 special edition version of Alien Breed had the opening plot line, Team17 have stuck to those roots and built upon this in the latest re-make.
Just take a look at the videos below, one of the original and the other of the new re-make and see how far things have come in the last 20 years.



It's great to see this comparison since Team17 have kept the original so close to heart.
The intro is just another example, from a static image in the 90's to an almost film like cinematic.
Ok so it's not quite like a GTAV cut scene or a Forza Motorsport replay, but we using a direct comparison here.
The in game effects are even kept similar in may ways, the original bullets hitting the aliens showing some early 'special effects'. Now those are still there, just using new particle effects the latest graphics cards allow.
It doesn't stop there either, why use a generic death animation when you can use rag doll effects? GTAIV shows this off really well when driving into dustbins and pedestrians and seeing them tumble.
Then there's all the clever lighting effects making things glare and shine, shadow rendering and some pretty jaw dropping graphical marvels.

It's hard to say where things will go from here, you only have to look at the last few years of Wii, Playstation Move and now the simply mind blowing Xbox Kinect to start your mind wondering off on a tangent.
What about mixing the 2Pac hologram that appeared on stage along side Snoop Dog, with the Xbox Kinect? The mind boggles. Written by HollettGaming on the 4/29/2012

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