Intentional or not, a lot of video game protagonists are probably based on the Predator. This is an angry, 80s space alien designed with the sole purpose of looking extremely cool to a thirteen-year-old. It’s such a shame, then, that when the Pred does make the leap to what should be its home world of video games, what we get is yet another naff, underbaked and dated effort like Predator: Hunting Grounds.
Predator: Hunting Grounds reviewDeveloper: IllfonicPublisher: Sony Interactive EntertainmentPlatform: Reviewed on PS4Availability: Out now on PS4 and PC
It doesn’t have to be this way! Developer Illfonic has some history in adapting iconic bad guys into asymmetrical multiplayer games, because the studio did the exact same with Jason Voorhees in Friday the 13th: The Game. You’d hope that, even if Friday the 13th was more than a little B-movie, it could at least be built on and learned from when it comes to something as ripe for adaptation as the Predator.
And, buried in the jungle mud, Predator: Hunting Grounds does have some nice ideas. Its sole game mode – asymmetrical multiplayer, pitching one player as the Predator against several others as semi-defenseless grunts – has a premise that’s decent enough, but is just lacking in execution. Playing as the Predator is always a cool idea. And playing as a grunt, especially with a friend, can be a good laugh for a little while, too, one of you shrieking as the Pred decloaks right on top of the other, another frantically emptying a clip into a bush when it pops off a few shoulder cannon from some vague direction in the trees.
Moments like these, teasing out recognisable nods to the films, suggest Predator: Hunting Grounds needn’t be that bad at all. The Predator’s movement through the trees while cloaked – when you do manage to get a shimmery glimpse – is nicely done for instance. Hard to track, hard to hit, weirdly euphoric when you clip it and manage to spill some of that iconic green blood, and terrifying when it roars after healing.