When I saw that The Xeno Project
2 had been released, I decided it was about
time I would call this a rainy day and pull
the original Xeno Project out of my yet-to-be-played
levels archive. It was awesome, and definitely
better than anything to date for Half-Life (apart
from the yet-to-be-played USS Darkstar and Redemption).
So I expected TXP2 to be even better - aren't
sequels supposed to be better? Well not this
time...
You start off where the last mission left you
- surrounded by the Gman and his deadly forces
who throw you in prison on board their huge
starship. You then need to escape, but just
as everything starts to get a little repetitive
- along come the Xen! The ship is intercepted
and the Xen starship starts stealing all the
cargo. You must fight through the dark and damaged
human spaceship until you get on the Xen one.
The gameplay here goes a little downhill as
you start to run out of ammunition, and the
puzzles get frustrating, but everything improves
once you board the unique Xen starship. Those
who don't like the Xen style levels might not
like the latters levels in this pack, but I
sure did!
This 14-bsp set reminded me alot of some Quake
2 levels, and although it was not as fun as
Mr White's first release, it had better design,
atmosphere and originality, which makes it an
excellent release and #2 on the ratings page,
just 1% behind the original Xeno Project.
