''Destroy All Humans!'' is an open world

action-adventure The action-adventure genre is a video game hybrid genre that combines core elements from both the action game and adventure game genres. Typically, pure adventure games have situational problems for the player to solve to complete a storyli ...

video game Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This fee ...

developed by

Black Forest Games Black Forest Games GmbH is a German video game developer based in Offenburg. The company was founded in July 2012 by a team of 40 staff members, including chief executive officer Andreas Speer, previously employed by Spellbound Entertainment, ...

and published by

THQ Nordic THQ Nordic GmbH (formerly Nordic Games GmbH) is an Austrian video game publisher based in Vienna. Formed in 2011, it is a publishing subsidiary of Embracer Group. Originally named Nordic Games, as was the parent company, both companies were re ...

. It is the fifth installment in the ''

Destroy All Humans! ''Destroy All Humans!'' is an open world action-adventure video game franchise that is designed as a parody of Cold War-era alien invasion films. '' Destroy All Humans!'' and '' Destroy All Humans! 2'' are available for the PlayStation 2 and Xbo ...

'' franchise, and a remake of the 2005 original game. This remake is the first entry in the franchise since '' Path of the Furon'' (2008). The game was released on PlayStation 4,

Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for ser ...

, and

Xbox One The Xbox One is a home video game console developed by Microsoft. Announced in May 2013, it is the successor to Xbox 360 and the third base console in the Xbox series of video game consoles. It was first released in North America, parts of ...

on July 28, 2020 and later on

Stadia Stadia may refer to: * One of the plurals of stadium, along with "stadiums" * The plural of stadion, an ancient Greek unit of distance, which equals to 600 Greek feet (''podes''). * Stadia (Caria), a town of ancient Caria, now in Turkey * Stadi ...

December 8, 2020. The game received mixed reviews upon release. A Nintendo Switch port was announced on April 8, 2021 and was released on June 29, 2021.

Gameplay

The game is played from a

third-person perspective Narration is the use of a written or spoken commentary to convey a story to an audience. Narration is conveyed by a narrator: a specific person, or unspecified literary voice, developed by the creator of the story to deliver information to the ...

. The player controls Cryptosporidium 137 ("Crypto" for short), an alien who arrives on Earth in 1950s America to harvest human DNA. Crypto is equipped with a vast arsenal of alien weapons such as the Zap-O-Matic and Anal Probe, to defeat enemies. He also has superhuman skills such as

psychokinetic Psychokinesis (from grc, ψυχή, , soul and grc, κίνησις, , movement, label=ㅤ), or telekinesis (from grc, τηλε, , far off and grc, κίνησις, , movement, label=ㅤ), is a hypothetical psychic ability allowing a person ...

powers and the ability to disguise himself as humans. Crypto can use a

jetpack A jet pack, rocket belt, or rocket pack is a device worn on the back which uses jets of gas or liquid to propel the wearer through the air. The concept has been present in science fiction for almost a century and became widespread in the 1960s. ...

to quickly navigate the environment. He can also command the

flying saucer A flying saucer (also referred to as "a flying disc") is a descriptive term for a type of flying craft having a disc or saucer-shaped body, commonly used generically to refer to an anomalous flying object. The term was coined in 1947 but has g ...

, which is equipped with a death ray to kill opponents. Players can perform movements such as gliding and dashing, and they can chain actions together such as shooting enemies while levitating them. The game introduces the Focus Mode, which allows players to lock onto other enemies. Crypto is protected by a shield, which informs players the direction of hostile attacks. The game features six sandbox locations which can be explored freely. Each location offers unique challenges for players to complete.

Development

A team of 60 people in

served as the game's developer. The original game's dialogue and humor remained intact, though the team enhanced them by updating the character models and

cutscene A cutscene or event scene (sometimes in-game cinematic or in-game movie) is a sequence in a video game that is not interactive, interrupting the gameplay. Such scenes are used to show conversations between characters, set the mood, reward th ...

s and introducing motion capture. Instead of re-recording the lines, the team used the audio from the original game and improved its quality for the remake. The game also includes a mission named "Lost Mission of Area 42" that was scrapped during the development of the original game. Black Forest considered developing the remake as a "natural continuation" of their work after finishing the development of ''Fade to Silence'' as they learned more about utilizing the technology and designing large, open areas.

acquired the

intellectual property Intellectual property (IP) is a category of property that includes intangible creations of the human intellect. There are many types of intellectual property, and some countries recognize more than others. The best-known types are patents, cop ...

rights from

THQ THQ Inc. was an American video game company based in Agoura Hills, California. It was founded in April 1990 by Jack Friedman, originally in Calabasas, and became a public company the following year through a reverse merger takeover. Initi ...

in 2013. In 2017, the firm reaffirmed that the company realized the demand for a new game in the series and added that they were exploring options to revitalize the franchise. The game was officially announced in June 2019. An extended gameplay demo was launched at

E3 2019 The Electronic Entertainment Expo 2019 (E3 2019) was the 25th E3, during which hardware manufacturers, software developers, and publishers from the video game industry presented new and upcoming products to the attendees, primarily retailers a ...

. It was released for PlayStation 4,

and

. A standalone multiplayer spin-off, titled ''Destroy All Humans! Clone Carnage'' was released for PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Windows via Steam, on May 31, 2022.

Reception

''Destroy All Humans!'' received "mixed or average" reviews, according to

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...

. Sales on the game have exceeded THQ Nordic's expectations. As of May 19, 2021, the game sold more than 1 million copies.

References

;Notes ;References

External links