E3 Hands-On — Destroy All Humans!

While at E3, I was able to see Destroy All Humans! in a more intimate setting than just a trailer. Here is my take on Destroy All Humans!

One of the titles that was a slight surprise and one of the most requested out at E3 had to be the remake for Destroy All Humans!. Things were rumored out there way back when THQ Nordic picked up the IP and then we had an early announcement from Black Forest Games that they were remaking this game. I saw a whole lot of gamers get excited that Destroy All Humans! was coming back but still a bit hesitant that it would be a remaster and not a solid remake. Thankfully, I had a chance to talk to the developers working on this title and a bit of hands-on with the game while doing so. Let me break down what we are going to need to expect when the game hits the PS4, Xbox One, and PC in 2020.

As you will most likely have seen from the past trailer and screenshots, this version of Destroy All Humans! has had all of the visuals updated and altered to fit with the current standards of the industry. It still keeps the 50s Sci-Fi look and feels with most of the levels keeping the same layout. Obviously, the bigger change coming in with the new technology that allows the game to render things off in the distance to make the world of Destroy All Humans! feel a bit more open even if you will always be kept on track in the game. Most of which was forced by the voice in the ear telling us to get back to doing what the game’s title says we need to do.

The next thing to not for Destroy All Humans! before we dig into the gameplay, is that Black Forest Games is also keeping most of the dialog from the original game in this one. Some of it re-recorded by the voice actors to fill in some of the changes going on, but most of it reworked to fit the current standards. You may scoff at that, but that was part of the charm of the original Destroy All Humans! and the team is trying to preserve it all as best as they can while still making it all feel new for us all. You can hear it in motion quite a bit in the following gameplay video as well as the other trailers out there. It seems like a small touch, but it is something I am glad to hear in the game.

In terms of the demo shown on the floor and behind doors at E3, you can see most of it down below but there are a few things in there that you may not be able to see. Some of the gameplay mechanics taken from Destroy All Humans! 2 but reworked to fit in here. Things like being able to fly, use psychokinesis, and use the main weapon in the game. If you remember, about fifteen years ago this was not possible but it is now. If it sounds like there is too much going on for all of that in Destroy All Humans!, rest assured that it flows really well in its current state. Once you have something/someone in PK they will stay there until you press a different button and the rest flowed like the usual jump and shoot for so many other games out there.

Another interesting note, while not fully implemented in this build of Destroy All Humans!, the team has ramped up the destructible things in the game and what we can use psychokinesis on and how we can string it all together. You can get a taste of it above as one of the missions requires us to destroy a few things on the map, but know you can go to town on everything as long as you can survive the returning fire. All of the destruction will also persist in the cinematic scenes of Destroy All Humans! too as we are also at a place where we can keep things rendered unlike before. It is a little touch, but something I am excited to see here.

One more taste in this build of the game that we will see play out in the fuller version, is the escalation of enemies in the game. This is a basic thing from Destroy All Humans! already, but it happens much faster in this demo. It will play out a bit more organically when we start our destruction and not as rapid as we see here. That is, we will get the citizens coming at us, then the police, then the army, and finally a MiB style government organization. Do not expect to see it go as fast as we see here in Destroy All Humans! as this was just for the demo. Something I wish I did not need to keep saying for games in their early forms anymore.

Lastly, it looks like we will have a few changes to traversal in the game’s world now that there is a bit more freedom with the development and hardware we will play on. Crypto will have his jump and flying of sorts. It is more of a glide but it will last a bit longer than I remember. There are also a few dashing and gliding systems mixed in to make getting around a bit easier and fun. If you are worried about the environmental dangers with this, note that Crypto will have his PK Shield here and it will defend against not only bullets but the world too. In fact, it will let him deal with water a bit more than an instant death as we saw before. It is little touches like this that make this remake a better idea than a remaster.

If you could not tell yet, I am fully excited to get more time with Destroy All Humans! and hope we do not need to wait too long into 2020 to finally get it. It has all of the humor and charm of the original version of the game yet all the updates many have wanted since it first launched. Not to mention that fact that we will get the destroy all humans in a fantasy world. Something I dream of almost every day. Do not judge me at all.