The Thing

The Good
Picking up where the 1982 film ended, The Thing puts the player in control of Captain Blake, a member of a Special Forces group sent to find out what happened to US Outpost 31. Braving Antarctic winds, Blake leads a small contingent through the ruins of the American research station. Here Blake learns that it's no longer a recovery mission; in fact, it's something else completely. Something has torn the outpost apart, slaughtering the inhabitants, and perhaps the Alpha team sent in earlier. Every clue points to this being a medical emergency of extraterrestrial origin.

The Thing is basically a squad-based shooter, equal parts action and adventure. Blake spends stretches exploring derelict buildings, restoring power and repairing switches and then entering into intense firefights as Things either reveal themselves by tearing through infected teammates or bursting through windows or doorways. There are no real puzzles, but there are plenty of environmental obstacles to overcome—including the freezing temperatures which can kill Blake if he remains unprotected for too long. Blake finds notes and computers which expand on the game's story, but most of the inventory is dedicated to killing or healing.

Unlike the movie (or the title), the game is more about killing Things than a Thing. Early on, Blake finds small Things which look like bodily organs with legs ('cause they are) which are easily dispatched with a shotgun blast or a few machine gun rounds. Larger Things, like manThings need gunfire to weaken them before facing incineration via the flamethrower. Actually, the amount of "Thingage" running around Antarctica makes one wonder about the Law of Conservation of Matter; physics aside, it makes for a thrilling adventure.

What made the movie so effectual was that alien life form acted as an agent of infection, hiding inside people. The game retains that aspect with much of the squad mechanics relying on a trust meter. If Blake's troops trust him, then they'll follow him and carry out orders. If they don't trust him, then they may become openly hostile. Blake may have up to three party members: soldiers, medics, or engineers, and he'll need them to gun down Things, heal fallen comrades, and repair broken machinery.

For the most part, trust is easy to gain and hard to lose. Equipping teammates with guns and ammo, healing them, or defending them raises trust while taking their weapons away, engaging in friendly fire, or sitting by when they come under attack lowers it. Conversely, isn't it weird the way Carter keeps wandering off, how Pierce never seems to have a clear shot, and why doesn't Cruz react when the Things leap out of the air ducts? Well, if anyone acts draws too much suspicion, you can always run a blood test on them and see what happens.

Regardless of their size, the Things are pretty smart. They avoid fire and figure out the fastest way to get to you. Human opponents (and fellow soldiers) are not quite as bright, but I loved the squad mechanics described above as well as the panic stages the troops hit. Seeing a blood-stained bathroom with a gutted corpse in the corner and a head in a urinal separates the men from the boys. Blake's a cool customer, but his troops vomit and wet themselves at the drop of a hat. Freaked out party members open fire at shadows or just cower in the corner and refuse to go on. Blake can lead by example, chill out until they others regain their composure, or shoot them full of adrenaline and march on.

The Bad
The Thing looks great, sounds great, and plays great, but the story is mediocre. Teammates come and go either bursting into Things (as scripted) or simply disappearing between levels. There's no real interaction with characters, either between them and Blake or between each other except for a few scripted responses. I can only imagine how much stronger this game would have been, if you tried to keep the same team throughout the whole game.

There's also an unwelcome military subplot—lifted from the Aliens franchise—involving a twisted colonel (voiced by the Cigarette Smoking Man) and his desire to cultivate human/Thing hybrids. The final acts take the player along a nonsensical story where Antarctica is crawling with hundreds of black ops troops and Things who chase each other through large, sprawling military complexes. The real problem here is The Thing can't reconcile the twenty year gap between movie and the game.


The Bottom Line
The high point of the game, for me, came during one of those ubiquitous "been captured, start level unarmed" missions found in gaming. I've seen these so many times, I've come to hate them, but The Thing actually does something different—it treated the level as one giant environmental obstacle where I had to find a medic to heal a soldier who could defend an engineer long enough to repair broken doors. I had to use surveillance cameras to keep an eye on Things and enemy troops and eventually I was rearmed but using remote controlled machine gun turrets against the enemy to defend my team. Brilliant level design, but don't ask me how we got there.

Ebert says in his review of the movie, "…it seems clear that Carpenter made his choice early on to concentrate on the special effects and the technology and to allow the story and people to become secondary." It's amazing how well this description works for the game. I highly recommend this game for the game play and the great squad dynamics, but don't expect an engaging story.