The Thing Review (no fat)

Game Description

The Thing follows the adventures of Captain Blake who is sent to Antarctica to investigate the events of John Carpenter's 1982 film of the same name. The storyline is excellent, with terrific and unique twists, moody and atmospheric, and at some points downright creepy. There is a lot of blood and, as you have probably guessed, a fair bit of gunplay in this game.

The Thing Gameplay

The game does do a good job of staying accurate with the film, but if you followed the movie you'd know that The Thing is an alien and that the adventure begins where the movie's action ends so, sure enough, this makes the story more interesting.

The 19 levels are well designed and reasonably varied; the gameplay mixes bloody combat and coordinated team strategy to overcome obstacles and continuing discovery of the secrets of the Antarctic base. As you progress, the action becomes more frenzied, the confrontation at the end is memorable, challenging and fulfilling. The things themselves come in a variety of shapes and sizes. You'll encounter many small and very fast two-legged things.

In the beginning of the game, the gameplay focuses on controlling one character and you spend most of your time gunning down hordes of ‘Thing’ creatures. Your job is to make sure your crew members remain well-equipped and uncontaminated by the alien species.

As the leader of a team you get to order around other minions, so your fellow soldiers are motivated by fear and trust, and your actions affect this. Another factor is also present and it denotes that each crew member can have paranoia and anxiety attacks, but most of the time you can actually rely your team.

The thing requires some puzzle solving in order to complete a level's objectives and find items such as keys or junction boxes in order to open doors to new areas, or to find the right area to trigger a scripted event.

The Thing Graphics

The game is beautifully rendered and quite impressive, the animation and particle effects are very good. There is a bit of clipping, from the blinding snow conditions outside to the shadowy building interiors. Human models are not clones, and they show a good deal of individualization and also the monster, in their various forms, is hideously realistic.

The game works on a fairly wide range of systems; environments are convincingly portrayed and are full of paraphernalia, electronic equipment. The sense of desolation is very real, the creatures are gruesome enough and when you are outdoors you can feel the freezing cold.

The Thing Audio

The minimalist approach works very well here, the music, the sound effects, brings it all together, and the cinematic scenes interspersed with the action move the plot along. The voiceovers are amusing, some of the cinematics appear to have characters talking (you can see their lips moving), but all you hear is a thunderous heartbeat.

You will hear the wind and moans and noises are also authentic. The impact of the atmosphere is huge, a little bizarre, and you'll probably have the sensation of isolation and foreboding.

The Thing 2cent

The Thing is a polished and fun game. Add this one to the list of games that are fun to play in the dark when you're alone at night. The action is interesting, full of dangerous and repulsive creatures. The squad-based gameplay is intelligent and the thrilling time waster will definitely not disappoint.

The Thing Pricing

The game can be purchased for a price of $2.05