Destroy All Humans
From THQ
Use destructive weapons and innate mental powers to take on the most feared enemy in the galaxy...Mankind! Play as Crypto, an alien warrior sent to Earth to clear the way for the Furon invasion force
- Amazon Sales Rank: #3960 in Video Games
- Brand: THQ
- Model: 752919460504
- Released on: 2008-06-04
- ESRB Rating: Teen
- Platform: PlayStation2
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: .53" h x 5.75" w x 7.75" l, .30 pounds
Brainless Fun (with Brains!)
"Destroy All Humans" is not exactly the deepest, most challenging, most thought-provoking game you'll play all year, unless you're about 5 and you've given up on "Monsters Inc." But if you're a "Teen" or above who's just looking for some brainless and effortless pick-up-and-play fun, Cryptosporidium-137 is your extraterrestrial.
(By the way, that green "blood" is for all you teens out there, as in "T" rating, so that you understand that it's just a game and you don't go to school the next day and try to anally extract your school chum's brains. Cuz if it was red, there goes the neighborhood. But as long as heads explode in a GREEN mass of goo in the game, no problem kids. And that's great, but I kind of wish they'd gone the whole 9, taken the "M" rating, and made this game as gruesome as it should've been, since it's already pretty marginal. When you've got freshly extracted brains bouncing around in the cornfields, they might as well be dripping with RED blood...lol.)
The graphics in DAH are decent as far as they go - especially the lovely ambient sunlight and rolling cloud effects - but they don't quite go all the way. You get the feeling that this title, like so many, was rushed into production. Much has already been said about the pop-in issue, and indeed, it's truly out of control. Bushes will grow out of the ground at distances of less than 10 virtual feet in front of Crypto, as if his alien presence favorably influences Earth vegetation. It won't necessarily interfere with gameplay since your weapons and psychic abilities have a limited range anyway, but it's pretty annoying and distracting.
The environments are fairly good-looking if you don't get too close. Certainly they do a nice job of suggesting the archetypal sunny pop-culture idea of the 50's - it's all very "Pleasantville." Some scenes on the farm almost look like Hidden Valley Ranch labels...lol. The people likewise look great from a distance, but up close they're as blocky and crudely mapped as anything in the GTAs. It's especially obvious in the cutscenes, in which you see how much they've relied on shading to suggest depth - some of the women appear to have 5 o'clock shadows. Part of this is due to the fact that the levels are relatively large (although nowhere near as large as the smallest GTA), since you explore the same areas on foot and in saucer; so some fine detail has to be sacrificed.
Gameplay is likewise relatively rude and crude. You'll never really have a problem staying alive unless you just aren't paying attention, since Crypto's life bar automatically recharges after a few seconds; so if he's about to die you just jet-pack away, find cover, and wait. The saucer doesn't automatically recharge, but you can find sheild boosters everywhere, and you can actually take damage beyond your saucer's life bar for some reason. For weapons Crypto starts off with a "Zap-O-Matic" and an Anal Probe (which, yes, literally goes up the humans' butts, which inexplicably makes their heads explode), and he gradually acquires new weapons and upgrades. The saucer starts off with a "Death Ray," which does indeed bring massive amounts of death, and an "Abducto Ray," which doesn't actually abduct, but just lifts people and things a few feet above the ground - great for picking up military convoys and slamming them into the sides of government buildings.
Crypto also has some standard "PK" (psychokinesis) abilities which are kind of fun, but nothing new (see "Psi-Ops"). He can lift objects with his mind and pitch them far away; he can read people's (and cows') thoughts and parasitically suck up their "concentration;" he can hypnotize people to create distractions or perform mission-specific tasks; he can assume the general shape of anybody he sees; and of course, he can pop heads like green pus-filled zits. There are a few caveats, but for the most part these abilities, his weapons and his jetpack place Crypto at such an advantage over all adversaries, it's never really a contest.
Not only that, but DAH is extremely short, so it would be hard for anybody to get more than 10 hours out of this. Once you finish all the missions, both mandatory and optional, all that's left is the easter egg hunt for the rest of the "probes" (different from the anal), and this could quickly get boring and tedious.
Still, don't get me wrong, I got this the day it came out, played it through and enjoyed it for what it was worth. But it's such a simple game that I can't say I'd necessarily recommend it to buy as opposed to rent. If you're an alien buff or 50's buff or you just like the pretty, almost-there graphics and fun if basic and repetitive gameplay, you might choose to buy. The game's sense of humor is another selling point, with it's "cute" parodies of 1950's pop-culture, which are often thinly veiled commentaries on modern day government-inspired paranoia and civic unrest (there are many obvious slams on the Bush Administration). I'll keep it around, cuz at the end of the day, after an hour in heavy traffic, who doesn't want to destroy some humans?
Wild and entertaining ride from the makers of Mercenaries!
Destroy all humans! is one of the most innovative games of the year, with a unique perspective and destructible environments you will be addicted in no time.
DAH! is set in the 1950s and revolves around the accidental destruction of a Furon scout ship by the US Army, this accident sparks an invasion force...of 2 Furons, Orthopox and Cryptosporidum-137.
You Play as Cryptosporidium-137, sent to earth to investigate the disappearance of your previous clone Cryptosporidium-136. Your leader is Orthopox (voiced by Richard Horvitz, the voice of Invader Zim from the cartoon series Invader Zim), he provides you with missions, weapons and upgrades as well as funny conversations and Intel.
Cryptosporidum has access to a variety of weapons, the most entertaining being the disintegration gun which turns humans into gray ash skeletons that blow away in the wind. Even better then your weapons are your mind powers, Crypto can use telekinesis, telepathy, hypnotism and the strange ability to make a persons head explode in order to harvest their brain. Crypto also has an interesting stealth option, he can use a "HoloBob", a device that generates a holographic image over Crypto enabling him to copy the appearance of targeted humans and move undetected among his foes.
Now what alien invasion game would be complete without the ability to unleash massive devastation from the air a saucer? DAH! has you covered with Crypto's modifiable spaceship! It comes standard with the high concentrated heat "Death Ray" and an abduction beam, but as your progress you will unlock some more entertaining weapons, namely the "Sonic Boom gun", a weapon that shoots a small orb of sound that sends everything around it flying off into the air from the shock wave.
The game play in DAH! is solid and the graphics are flawless, this game is basically a more entertaining version of Pandemic's other popular title "Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction", both games feature destructible environments, except Mercenaries is a standard war game while DAH! is a unique, one-of-a-kind alien invasion game. Levels have a variety of styles and objectives, one of the most fun is when you are required to copy the appearance of a small town mayor with your HoloBob and address the town in a meeting, you are given a selection of topics and responses, each one is extremely funny and well written.
The game is divided into multiple invasion sites, each one with different attributes and design, but all allow you to free roam the terrain after the mission objectives are completed, there are hidden items to be uncovered,
mini games and plenty of other interesting things going on giving the game a high replay value.
All in all DAH! is an extremely funny game that should not be missed! Go out and buy a copy today!
Great Spoof for Older Gamers
Destroy All Humans is a great adventure game with you as the grey-skinned, big-eyed alien out to destroy / conquer human-kind. The humor is great!
The basic concept is a campy spoof on all 50s alien movies. You are wandering around a traditional 50s landscape with drive-ins, town centers, and town fairs. You have a variety of cool alien powers that assist you in your take-over attempts, flying your saucer around from spot to spot.
This game is marked for teens, and that's true both from a "violence" standpoint and a simple enjoyment standpoint. Many of the in-jokes are going to go right over the heads of younger players, who will only understand the game as a simple shooter. For example, reading the minds of the various townsfolk will have adults laughing for hours, while younger kids will be going "Huh?"
On the violence side, the "blood" is green, but it's still pretty nasty. You are ripping brains and spinal cords out of creatures, blowing things up, and being generally destructive. There are a number of references to sexual acts, since many in the 50s felt that aliens were only out to rape females and to perform "unnatural" acts on males. This definitely is a game geared towards older teens and adults.
It's really funny to see all of the old stereotypes - about aliens and cows, aliens and politicians, etc. - played out in real time. The graphics are rather good in supporting these scenarios, and the sounds fit in as well. But the real fun is in the plot and dialogue.
Yes, the basic game is rather short - it's not going to last you months like the FF or GTA series. On the other hand, this game isn't meant to be epic. It's meant to be a really funny spoof for older gamers, and it fits this niche extremely well!
