PlayStation 2

Destroy All Humans!

While there are some noticeable blemishes in the game such as graphical pop-in and broken cut scenes, Destroy All Humans succeeds where many have failed. This is truly a refreshing way to experience an adventure that you wish would never end.

Run for your lives! The Furons are coming! The Furons are coming! Well actually, it is just one Furon: Cryptosporidium. But what the little grey invader lacks in numbers, he more that makes up in malice and advanced alien weaponry – plus a good shot to the funnybone. And while his game, Destroy All Humans!, falls a bit short in the gameplay department, it definitely makes most of it up in the presentation department.

The controls may be a bit clunky and the missions may grow repetitive after a few hours, but the thrills are constant. By all means, if you are just looking for a quirky, fun little game, you can't go wrong with Destroy All Humans.

"Destroy All Humans!" empresta parte da fórmula de "Grand Theft Auto", mas com uma temática completamente diferente. Carregado nas piadas, o game diverte com as situações absurdas, apesar de ser um pouco repetitivo e o sistema de combate não empolgar tanto. Uma pena que a duração do game seja insatisfatória e isso é agravado pelo fator de replay estar restrito à caça de um único item e missões alternativas descartáveis. Ele é daqueles jogos que divertem enquanto dura, mas não dura tanto quanto se poderia desejar.

We are taught at an early age to be kind to our fellow humans - to bring enough to share and to lend a helping hand whenever possible. The Furon warrior Cryptosporidium, on the other hand, was taught that humans are nothing but feeble genetic sacks meant to store ancient DNA and it is his mission to retrieve it, vaporizing anything in his path. Destroy All Humans may require a particular sense of humor to appreciate, but if you are the kind of person who would rather extend an Ion Distruptor than an olive branch, it is simply too much fun to resist.

Even a cursory look at the popular media, "educational" films, and general psychological climate of 1950s America shows an era deeply uneasy on many levels. J.D.s are out to harrass you, the commies out to pulverize you, The Bomb coming to vaporize you. 1950s film-aliens were a bunch of xenocidal, bloodthirsty bastards, and in Destroy All Humans!, you get to be one -- otherworldly powers, cool flying saucer, and all.

REGARDLESS OF WHAT WE think about outer space, the most immediate images of space and aliens are the flying saucers and little green men most of us have grown up with on television and in movies. Whether we ever meet up with life from another planet remains to be seen, but the occasional dalliance with this notion of aliens can still be quite alluring.

Destroy All Humans! does have its share of bugs and quirks though. If two sound clips try to play over each other they both cancel each other out and neither plays. Some movies also "skip" and any sound after the skip doesn't play. It's also annoying that you have to redo every portion of a mission if you fail at one of the later objectives. It's also annoying to have to replay the same handful of side missions to harvest enough DNA to earn all of the weapon upgrades. Finally, what's up with not being able to land your ship where ever you want?

Since the game was first announced last year, Destroy All Humans! has been eagerly awaited by Ps2 fans everywhere. Pandemic Studios, the developer behind the hit games Mercenaries and Full Spectrum Warrior, has been hard at work putting a new twist on the classic sci-fi formula, giving gamers a chance to vent some frustration by letting them annihilate the human race … one hairless monkey at a time. Now that the final product has hit store shelves, gamers are wondering if it can possibly live up to all the hype, or if it should be covered up like a weather balloon crash at Roswell.

Destroy All Humans is a fun game to play with scores of “laugh out loud” moments from beginning to end, but that trip from beginning to end is one hell of a rocky road that could easily have been smoothed out. An ambitious but ultimately flawed and underdeveloped premise! Must probe deeper!

Stories of alien invasion are nothing new to gaming, though the usual methodology involves humans having to fend off some vile extraterrestrial species from wiping them out. Well, what if you don't want to save humanity? What if you wanted to join up with the evil aliens to kick humanity's self-righteous ass into oblivion? That's the premise of the newest action game from developer Pandemic Studios. Appropriately titled Destroy All Humans!, you take on the role of a comically murderous alien on a mission of domination and destruction against humanity. It isn't all just blasters and explosions, however, as the game takes a decidedly tongue-in-cheek stance on the subject matter, modeling itself after the good-natured cheesiness of 1950s-era B-grade science fiction. Flying saucers, death rays, mysterious G-men, government conspiracies, and lots of anal probing are the order of the day here.

The combination of frustrating mission mechanics and limited replay value leads me to strongly suggest renting Destroy All Humans before buying, if at all, regardless of your love for bad sci-fi. The chance to probe and incinerate the Cleavers isn’t necessarily worth much money.

The sci-fi genre has always been a popular choice for the game industry. Alien invasions are as natural in gaming as Paris Hilton is on video cameras (although Martian attacks may not be appropriate for children). Usually, you take on the role as a humanity fighting the little green men for your ultimate survival. Developer Pandemic Studios (Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction, Full Spectrum Warrior), however, brings us a different point of view as an alien race in Destroy All Humans! where the earth is your oyster ... well, call it oyster flambé. A mixed bag of simplistic gameplay, hilariously cheesy storyline and characters, and unwanted shortness, Destroy All Humans! doesn't soar to new heights like I hoped it would.

What can you say about a quirky little game where probing is the norm? I'll say this: I had been waiting for this game the moment I first saw the screens over a year ago. I was so excited I even passed up a ride on an actual flying saucer. Now a year later I wish I would have packed a bag and set off for Zzzaelak 9. Either way my ass still would have been sore. Spending time trudging through this so-so title, I feel a bit cheated. Rent this one, blaze through it in a few hours and get back up on the roof and wait for the real thing.

Ultimately Destroy All Humans! isn't the Triple-A title we were all hoping for, indeed much like many of the movies that inspired the game it's more B-grade then anything else. With more refining, more cohesion and an improved stealth section this game could have been much more. Not a bad title if you're looking for something to do but for many it may be better as a rental first.

Destroy All Humans fait partie de ces titres originaux et audacieux que l'on a envie d'essayer pour leur dimension décalée et parodique. Le jeu est un véritable hommage aux premiers films de SF mais il vaut davantage pour ses situations improbables que pour le plaisir de jeu qu'il procure. Le tout reste sympathique mais pas aussi marquant qu'on ne l'espérait.

Destroy All Humans certainly has a lot of charisma but imagine if you had to take the title of the game literally? Killing a few billion people would certainly become boring after a while no matter how psychotic you are. Perhaps if the reward system offered better mini-games this game might have been an instant cult classic. As it is, I would certainly recommend a rental but any further commitment is your call.

Those of you looking for a humorous and bizarre action game will find a lot to like with Destroy all Humans! The game is definitely a case of style over substance though and whilst the game looks good and has a charm few games can equal, it does become monotonous. That said though it's difficult to be too hard on the game because it is humorous and it does feel original. The game's relatively short length may be disappointing but by the end of the game you will probably have had enough of doing the same things over and over again.

The biggest problem with Destroy All Humans! is that it doesn't bring anything new to the table. Sure, its story is different from the standard free-roaming game, but the gameplay is run of the mill, and there's little innovation to speak of. It's a good game to pick up for a weekend rental, and it would be a good value at a budget price, but it's not quite good enough to warrant dropping $50.

For a long time Destroy All Humans looked like it had the potential to be one of the games to look forward to this year. Full of smart humour, the hugely original premise turns the alien invasion concept on its head, puts you in the shoes of the bug-eyed extra terrestrial, sets it in the bubble-headed carefree environs of 1950s American suburbia and makes the 'pathetic humans' the villains for once. With flying saucer shoot-'em-up destruction, mind control, telekinesis, jackpacking, and holographic identity theft all in the mix, the game looks like a banker. Little wonder our early impressions of the game suggested nothing less than brilliance.

Destroy All Humans! certainly has a lot going for it. With a hot developer (Pandemic's recent track record includes the well received Mercenaries, Full Spectrum Warrior, and Star Wars Battlefront), a great premise (GTA meets aliens--right on), and even an entertaining, black-and-white TV Land-style ad campaign, it sure seems set to make a noticeable splash. The fact that it does so much well, though, makes its flaws stand out all that much more.

Is that enough to justify dropping $50? Well, no. I'd recommend Destroy All Humans! as a rental first and foremost. It's short, and so is a good way to kill a quiet weekend.

If you've got that kind of time for an alien fix, you might go with a marathon of E.T., Close Encounters and Killer Klowns From Outer Space rather than watch your high hopes slowly disintegrate with Destroy All Humans. While there's some good stuff here, its sense of humor and playful vision doesn't extend to its repetitive gameplay. Must be another Commie conspiracy.