Alien: Isolation is really something.
Avoiding the Alien and wading through the tension between encounters is downright rollicking. I feel now that the least important enemy in all future games should be as dynamic as the Alien portrayed here. It's one of those things that ruins a whole swath of other games for you because the tinker toy enemies will seem so pathetic, comparatively. Even though I know a lot of it is scripted, the stuff that happens emergently is on a whole 'nother level. The Alien is just cool.
It's one of the best games I've ever played.
It's one of the best games ever, containing one vicous adversary, but I'd say most of the bone-chilling moments are effective because of the combined influence of sound, graphics and game design -- and then the Alien just comes in and stomps all over your already-fragile situation. The tension is so thick that those peaks become almost hallucinatory.
By FAR, the best audio in a video game, ever.
I know. You might be about to say something like The Last of Us has better sound design. And I'm going to go ahead and say we'll have to fight over your convictions about what game has better sound.
Game is scary overall. Possibly, the scariest game I've played if you don't count cheaper scares.
Yeah, but what about PT? I can hear you saying. That's what I mean by "cheaper" scares. P.T. was all completely scripted (and awesome). Alien is dynamic, but still scary. That's amazing to me. Last game to do that to me was Doom. Granted, Isolation is less "anything goes" and more scripted than Doom, but still.. The lack of an imminent sequel is almost a level of tragedy equal to the Silent Hills fiasco.
Considering that Creative Assembly went from historical RTS games to Alien: Isolation (what the?), they should probably make a point-and-click adventure game in DOS next. (They're so random.)
Seriously though, if they want to build on their strengths they should make the next Metroid. They'd be a perfect fit for Silent Hill, Metroid, a Quake 1 Remaster or Dead Space (like, totally.) But the real corkscrew pitch that you would never see coming would be if they made a Resident Evil.
I've seen a lot of reviews rag on the pacing and length. I understand that point, but I've had to slog through all of my favourite games, at some point. To me, if you're under A:I's spell, those things are blown into insignificance. Just like Bloodborne's flaws are quickly forgotten in the face of its brilliance.
It's better than I expected. Much better. But, as with Bloodborne, a sequel could easily make this one obsolete.
One of the scariest moments, which can repeat itself throughout the experience would have to be the times when you try to make a run for it. Say, for one of the crawl spaces. Rarely works out. Speaking of which, getting killed in a crawl space is always a trip. The alien looks so damn creepy when it comes through the vents toward you. Kind of clumsy and awkward, but fast and agile at the same time. Really surreal.
Really, though, the game just does an incredible job of making you feel threatened at almost every moment. The tension is so thick, I just had to stand in awe. Eventually, you have to learn to just turn your back on the general direction of the threatening vibes and try to do your business. The hair is just permanently up, but it's so thrilling.
Unbelievable achievement, this. So many different elements of the game are unrivaled in ANY other game.
Graphics are in a class of their own, in more ways than one.
Best single enemy of all time, by miles.
Best use of a licence, by miles.
Must authentic fear I've ever experienced in a game, by miles.
You know how all QTE is bad? That's not true. I LOVE the huge variety of QTE stuff here. This game has the best use of that, ever. Ever, I say.
Best flamethrower, ever, too, as a matter of fact. And fire, generally is very well represented.
Crazy Town...
Also, the Working Joes are scary as hell when you bump into one unexpectedly, in case you thought the Alien is all you need to fret over.
Are there negatives? Of course there are negatives.
Yeah, the simple fact that it's not an interconnected world, but rather a series of areas divided by load screens, is a bummer, because it feels so real otherwise. That's what the load screens serve to remind me of, rather than being an impediment in themselves, because the layout of Sevastapol is well articulated despite being carefully staged behind said load screens.
The NPCs twitch and stutter here and there; their lip-syncing and facial ticks are a little off-putting. Breaks immersion a bit, but it's not serious.
Alien AI seems scripted at times and the "tether" could've been maybe less obvious. Overall, though, the illusion is fairly seamless. The Alien is scary.
The humans have stone dumb AI but they're still fun because they're the only thing you can mow down with guns.
And remember those face-hugger things from the movies? Yeah those things weren't done too well in this game.
I learned to smash them with my wrench thing.
The main problem with those is that they should be able to drop onto you from above and go under furniture like in the movie. They're just on rails here, basically, and they don't look/move quite right. They should be very scary, actually. Sequel to fix!
Too bad the patch culture didn't kick in until a little later -- this game could've easily been patched up to near perfection.
In a sequel, I'd like to see more instances where you see the Alien indirectly, as a reflection or by seeing its shadow. Also, a sequel should get rid of the few exploits you can repeat to get out of trouble and add some wrinkles to the Alien's methodology. Then, make it truly open-world so you can do away with the tether. Then get the story tightened up a bit (the story here is compelling though -- don't get it twisted.) Holy crud, that would be the best game of all time, if they did it right.
I'm somewhat perplexed that gamers didn't rally to fly the banners for this, as an all-time great (although it definitely has its fans); then again, that allowed me to discover it on my own and enjoy a very pleasant surprise. The main reason I think it's underrated is that it's under-appreciated as an exemplar of a very nice trait, specifically, that of being a very unique game in a sea of clones. No other game like it, and that usually generates a lot of good will. Didn't seem to happen with this one.
Without a doubt, one of the greats. Not just good, but great, in spite of some things that could've been better. Considerably less celebrated than it should be.
I'm very down on myself for not having something of Alien: Isolation's caliber to dive into, as a follow-up, but there's nothing like it. And there's nothing like a great big stomping AAA, so I'll wait for a sequel since I already tangoed with Bloodborne.
The Alien franchise has had a long history in video games, but few games have come quite as close to being perfect as Alien: Isolation.
This sounds great as after 10 years; the soundtrack is coming in multiple formats.
IGN : On Alien: Isolation's tenth anniversary, we revisit both Creative Assembly's divisive survival horror and our own review.
The Alien Isolation review was the final review that made me stop visiting IGN regularly. My dislike of the site had already been growing, but this one was the last straw for me. An absolute joke of a review.
IGN holds a lot of power and influence (unfortunately) on the buying habits of gamers. I could understand a 7 maybe if it wasn't his thing, but to give it a 5.9... not a 6, mind you, symbolically marking it as a poorly made game. This game probably could have sold a lot more if a competent reviewer at IGN had gotten their hands on it.
I'm not saying that all reviewers should be hiveminded. IGN is a monolith in the gaming community though, a collective voice. One of their editors should have caught this before release and investigated the validity.
I do think a positive review could have pushed even more sales and maybe we would have had a proper sequel to this by now. Ask most people, hell, just look at the poll on this article.. most people still today call the game brilliant for its time, or at the very least simply "good". I heard most people praising it, even back then! My thoughts are that IGN wanted to push the review anyway without further input from the IGN team because it was edgy, and they were more interested in getting clicks for themselves.
It really seems like Ryan wanted Assassin's Creed stealth patterns and broke down when he had to actually think and react, rather than exploit poorly designed AI. IGN never had a problem giving AC's stupidly simple AI great scores.
I can't say I know what their current methods are, but assuming their reviews are done by individual people, I think they should move to do their reviews in groups. Have 4-5 people play a game, write a short review, come together and discuss and write a more extensive review based on mupltiple perspectives.
I was just going to ask if this supports VR... if not then VR2 would be great to experience it. I see there is a mod for PC though.
The game has really poor AI that cheats and teleports. Once you figure it out it's comical or downright obnoxious depending on your ability to deal with it. That's why the game either lands as a great game for some or a terrible game for others.
For me since the Alien aspect was a core mechanic it's not something I could look over, it was too jarring and finished the game with a bitter taste. Thankfully once you get the flamethrower you can just cheese your way through it as quickly as possible.
Give this a read. It's a scholarly analysis of the AI mechanics of Alien Isolation, investigating its fairness.
https://www.gamestudies.org...
It boils it down to 2 ideas: The Sublime vs the Contained (Animalistic)
What you were expecting was a fully animalistic interpretation of the beast, trackable at all times, and contained within parameters of rationale. However, the creators were going for more of a sense of the original movie, and many horror movies for that matter. Horror movies always "cheat". The monster or killer slips into the shadows, in Aliens it's usually the ceilings, which is almost treated as a void. In movies, the monster is always able to pop out of this void at the opportune times of the experience.
It's not a matter of right or wrong really. It's whether you like pure predictability, or if you're down for an attempt at shaking that up, giving the player a constant sense of being on their toes.
Further, the author of this paper explains the divisiveness of Alien Isolation by dividing the general responses into 2 camps.
"Based on their approach to gameplay, players commenting on the Alien can be roughly divided into two camps, which I will call experientialists and simulationists [9]. The former see the game primarily as an experience, while the latter see it as a simulated system. Experientialists are primarily interested in how the Alien “feels,” their point of reference often being the 1979 film. In their view, a monster should remain sublime; and too much theorizing ruins the game and breaks the suspension of disbelief. An experientialist commenter suggested that humans are not supposed to understand the Alien, because it is a creature with its own “alien logic” and “quirks” [R]. In Kirsi Kallio and her colleagues’ typology of gamer mentalities, experientialists would fall somewhere between the “entertaining” and “immersing” profiles (Kallio, Mäyrä, & Kaipainen, 2011). They consider games just one of their possible entertainment options, connect and compare them to film, and immerse themselves in the game world rather than optimize their play strategies.
Simulationists, on the other hand, observe and scrutinize the game’s mechanics, mostly in order to get better at the game. To do so, they expect the mechanics to be consistent and transparent. In the abovementioned typology, they would correspond to the “having fun” profile of players for whom “speed, progress, flow, skillfulness, and other such characteristics of a game are more important than the story or… characters” (Kallio et al., 2011, p. 344). As such, they are more likely to conceive of the Alien as a simulated zoological entity."
***Ultimately, I think they made the right call bc for many players (including myself) the game resonates with the "feel" of the original movie. Other Alien games before it were never that scary bc they maintained predictability.
Alien Isolation doesn't need defending. It's a terrific survival horror game! I sure wish there was a PSVR 2 patch for it!
I am going to buy this new this fall. Big fan of the 1979 movie in the Alien franchise .
I feel that the first is the ultimate Alien film. Actually, the one-two punch of Alien and Bladerunner is my favourite consecutive two movies from any director, ever. Alien Isolation captures the essence of the immaculate set design of the Ridley Scott masterpiece, perfectly. Why wait until fall, though?
You're right, that WAS another great 1-2. In particular, Close Encounters needs to be seen and appreciated by more people. It seems to go over the heads of it potential new audience with striking regularity.
Yes, I'm referring to old-school DOOM, baby! Nothing will ever truly capture the thrill of brand new DOOM, and I found the distinctive use of sound and the deeply amoral and ruthless enemies to have clear parallels in A:I.
I hope you enjoy this game as much as I did, whenever you get to it.
You're welcome for the review and thanks for commenting.
I always wondered about this game, but always overlooked it. Not anymore. Proper review, thanks!
Got this ages ago but only played couple of hours...really oughta give it a real go.