Rating: 
Summary: A treat for fans of the old movie
Review: "The Thing" is a good game, but it could have been better. I wish that it had been released on the PC first. It was originally released on consoles, and this becomes obvious while you are playing through. They did a lousy job of porting this title. It still has the stupid console saving (or lack thereof) system, and an annoying auto-aiming feature that is totally unnecessary when you have a mouse and keyboard. The original PC game had no mouselook feature, but you can download a patch which fixes that. Still, they should have done a better job with this. Other than, that, "The Thing" combines a lot of different elements into a pretty good game. The best part about this game is how faithful it is to the movie. You can tell that the developers were huge fans of the1982 horror classic. Granted, this game is an action game, so instead of a half-dozen things like the movie, there are hundreds to kill and shoot. But they look incredible (part of the outstanding overall graphics for the game). The Things are horribly gruesome. They drip blood and spit goo. They morph into weird forms and form tentacles. Early in the game, you visit some locations that you will recognize in the movie, like the US and Norwegian outposts. One scene recreates the recreation room in The Thing, with the pool table and pinball machine. You actually stumble upon the tape recording that MacReady makes in "The Thing". There are some lines in the game that are taken directly from the movie, like "Now I am going to show you what I already know". You have the main character, Blake, and then up to 3 squad mates with you at various points of the game. You choose what to arm your squad mates with, and you give them simple orders like "follow" and "heal". The AI for squad mates is very good, and that is another area where this game excels. Firefights with Things are fun, and your squad mates can help kill them off without blowing you away by accident. The guns in this game aren't very well done, but the flamethrower is awesome. The game tries very hard to re-create the "trust and fear" aspects of the movie, where you are wondering whether your squad mate is your friend, or whether he is about to morph into a Thing and kill you. There are a very limited number of blood test kits that you can use on your squad mates to see if they are things. They have limited usefulness, since a lot of thing changes are scripted, and a squad mate can test negative when he is actually an alien waiting to change. This game is supposed to be "Survival horror", but it just isn't scary. "Thief" and "System Shock 2" give me the creeps, but this game doesn't. It's more of an action game. It does that part very well, but it fails to capture the suspense and overall sense of dread that the movie was so good at. The trust and fear aspects of the game only have mixed success. Your squad members come and go quickly in the game, so you don't get to know them very well. The game's scripting also quickly becomes predictable and repetitive. That is what spoils the horror aspect of the game. Overall, I enjoyed this game one time through. "The Thing" is worth your money in the bargain bin, especially if you are a fan of the old movie.
Rating: 
Summary: Seira went past its limits (It was awsome)
Review: All I can say is its a difficult game with a few surprises. Ya sure they dont let you jump, but you never realy need to. Just buy the game and try it out... trust me you will certanly like it!
Rating: 
Summary: Good... but VERY buggy.
Review: Does set a nice mood and does have some scary parts, but the game is VERY buggy, even after the patches. Examples:
Player can unavoidably take damage during cutscenes, even if trying to skip them (screen black and AI's are active during this time on boss battles).
Ambience sound effects can play over the dialogue so it's hard to figure out the plot.
Team members can get stuck in their "...out" animations after they calm down.
Bad texture seams in characters faces.
Dead bodies which include wall textues (blood streaks) are not lined up on the wall; so the "blood streaks" are haninging out in mid air. All of this really breaks the mood that they are trying to set. All of this could have EASILY been caught with a good test department, and wasn't... that's disappointing.
Rating:
Summary: The "Frustration" of the Thing...
Review: Gee, I haven't cussed this much since I played Indiana Jones and the Emperor's Tomb or Angel Of Darkness... I bought the game cheap, so I shouldn't complain. The game IS interesting and exciting at times and the graphics are pretty cool, but there are some flawes in the controls. There are two patches out, supposedly, to correct some of the minor bugs. But, when I downloaded them, it screwed everything up. The main flawe in the game, like Indy's latest, is in the fact that you can only save in certain spots, which means if you die, you'll have to go back to the last place you saved and start over and over and over and over again. That can be a far stretch and often, downright annoying. I rated this game 3 stars because it really does have some exciting spots. But, you can't switch weapons fast and you end up getting killed too easily because of it. There were times when I ran out of ammo with one weapon and tried to scroll to the weapon I wanted with the mouse wheel and all of a sudden, I the scrolling function didn't work! I'd be running from a monster and had to run and look down at the keyboard to hit a number for the weapon! Usually I got killed because of it! It's not an easy game either. But, it's fun at times. Some of the scenes are pretty cool and you can be frightened sometimes too. If you buy it cheap like I did, ok. But, I sure wouldn't have been happy if I paid the retail price for it.
Rating:
Summary: Other Than Not Regular Saves
Review: I thought the game was one of true suspense. The gore & graphics set it apart for one of my very first suspense/horror purchases. Minor problems of not looking up or down does not in anyway lessen the satisfaction of a good mystery game. It's unfortunate that you can't save at will instead of getting to save points. I view this as keeping you glued to the computer until you can get there. Addictive, indeed to say the least i've spent a lot of overnight computer play with this game.
Rating: 
Summary: eh. it's only the thing
Review: I thought this game was going to be cool with your teamates turning against you if your a bad leader. I was wrong. Your teammates turn on you and turn into monters no matter what you do. It's damn annoying and fighting the same monsters over and over again...boring! Get something else. anyTHING.
Rating: 
Summary: Pretty cool
Review: I want to clear one thing up, the movie is not about some virus that causes it's victims to slowly mutate. There is no virus or disease what-so-ever. "THE THING" is an alien that eats or digests (or something) it's victims first, however, each part of the thing, down to the cellular level is an individual animal, so this alien, will then assume the form of it's victim, whether it be a human or animal, and act just like it's victim. It can then get more victims, however, this doesn't mean that the alien no longer imitates it's original victim and only imitates it's newest victim, but rather, both victims are now perfect imitations of their former selves. So it sorta multiplies with each victim. Alright, with that out of the way, I will get into the gameplay. I think the reason a lot of people are unhappy with "THE THING" is because they expected a first person shooter. This game was _never_ intended to be part of that overdone genre. It comes from the mainly console genre of "survival horror". Think more in terms of "Resident Evil" and you begin to get the idea. Unlike the original Resident Evil, the whole game is real time 3D instead of 3D characters on pre-rendered backgrounds. You can look around with the aim feature, and I personally feels it works well enough, and generally you really don't need to really look around that often. It is a bit annoying that you can't jump. It feels odd and out of place, knee high obstructions can stop you, but this is due to it's Survival Horror roots. That's an explanation, not an excuse, I think the game should have included jumping but this does not ruin the game. How correct is it in terms to relating to the movie? I haven't gotten all the way through but I'd say it's pretty correct. It's not 100%, they put more stuff to shoot at in the game than was in the movie, but this is a game, not a movie, less things to shoot at makes a boring game and I feel it does _not_ detract from the game in terms of a movie translation. I play this game with my friends around and we take turns because it's also fun to watch. It made all 3 of us jump more than once (including those just watching), and is a pretty good game overall. Ever got that creeped out feeling while playing Resident Evil? THE THING will give you that same feeling, just far more of it, this is the best and most creepy Survival Horror game I've had the pleasure of playing. I will say thet the flame thrower could be better, it appears to aim down too much, and doesn't have enough range, how about something like RTCW? Though RTCW's range and power may not suit THE THING's enviroments. If I had not seen the movie, I wouldn't like this game as much, though I still would like it, and I would still recommend it. The game has it's flaws, it's not perfect, but I'd say it's pretty darn fun, ESPECIALLY if you love the movie, I am very happy to see such a great movie that died in the box office immaturely due to unfair (and just plain foolish) reviews reborn in such a great game.
Rating:
Summary: A shocking, chilling game!
Review: I was lucky enough to come across an early beta of this game, and I'm glad I did. The Thing game, by Computer Artworks (makers of the acclaimed organic-action game 'Evolva') was made for consoles, and you can tell (no mouselook, you 'lock on' to targets, etc.) but that doesn't mean it doesn't control well on the PC. Be forewarned before you play. This game contains all manners of highly explicit gore, entrails; disemboweled, decapitate, AMPUTED corpses lie everywhere around the Antarctic stronghold which you explore. This game is also, I think, the second game in history of gaming to have the characters saying F-words, scatalogical terms, religious exlamations, etc. A bold step. The graphics are very well done, and the game runs fluidly on my Celeron 800 MHZ processor, 256 megs of RAM, and a GeForce 3 Ti200 video card. The game, obviously, is an action game, you command a small squad of people. Anyone can be a Thing, and you must blood-test your "friends" to see if they are who they say they are. If they do turn into fully grown Things, and you don't have a flamethrower on hand (the only weapon that can fully kill a full-grown Thing), you're screwed. If you protect your teammates, it will minimize their chances of turning into a Thing, but in some circumstances it is inevitable. As I said before, this game is dripping in blood, gore and swears so this isn't for the young'ns :). But, if you're older than 17 and have nerves of steel, have fun! ...wetting yourself.
Rating:
Summary: The Thing PC Game
Review: I would get to the last boss and fill him full of holes,But then I would get a runtime error message and my screen would go black forever. The game would lockup so I couldn't see the final results with the ending movie so I didn't know if I beat the game or not. I thought my computer was messed up and told my Dad. We went to the website and found some patches listed. With the 1.1 patch installed I was able to end the game and see the result. With the 1.2 patch the mouse look option let me look around alot better and control the flamethrower and not get myself cooked by shooting the ground all the time. It's a really cool game without patches though. This made it better. I just didnt like not knowing if I finished or not. The patches were the answer. Now it's perfect. Get the patches from the Website thethinggames.com like I did and no excuses.
Rating:
Summary: Love it
Review: I'd loosely describe it as HalfLife seen through Max Payne's eyes, with elements of Syndicate Wars (remember that?!), though its quite different to all of those. Confused? Sorry... You wonder around an Antartic ice station picking up clues, survivors, trying to keep them alive, killing Things and trying to get to the bottom of what turns out to be a conspiracy. It has a few bugs and 'features', but the graphics, suspence, plot and whole 'keeping a close eye on your team' aspect more than make up for it. Anyway its easier to bullet point stuff than write essays, so here goes: Things I like:
- Interacting with team members, watching their fear/trust levels; great touch.
- The extra team members being 'individual' as opposed to the generic "Barney" style character (HalfLife).
- Being able to trust your AI team members to *really* help you in a firefight (as opposed to running in to walls and frying you).
- Graphics, sounds, weapons, AI, gameplay, interest - all good. Things I don't like:
- There are times when a team member will change into a Thing. Fine, BUT you can test them with a blood test right up until the point they change, the test will be clear, then from out of nowhere, they change! This is not consistent to the plot of the movie or the game.
- Sometimes only a few of your team members will follow you into a lift or to the next level, which is really annoying considering the time spent getting them through firefights and Things. Ok so the game probably needs to lose a few people on the way otherwise you'd end up with an army, (processing power issue?) but so what! The fact that you can 'lose' a team member with no plot explanation is just a bit daft.
- Not being able to step over/jump over the smallest of obstacles, I mean I'm not expecting Lara Croft, but having to walk around a broken pipe or box? Come on!! However these things (ha ha) didn't really ruin the game for me, just niggled a bit, enough to stop me giving it 5 stars. Overall its ace.
|
