REVIEW: Alien: Isolation

Alien: Isolation, or the agony of defeat

How do I put this best... Have you ever been in a relationship with one person, and wished you were with someone else? This might be the most accurate way to sum up my feelings on Alien: Isolation. 

But before I get to far in the deep end, let's acknowledge a few of the things that encouraged me to finish this game, all 30+ hours of it. That's right this game is loooong, and I can't endorse that as something to scribble into the "pro column."

Atmosphere out the wazoo 

It's got it. The effect wears off after a while (more on that later)... but there are some effects that continue to impress as you go through the game. Whether it is the superb use of directional audio, the lighting, or the slight film grime that glosses over the entire frame, the game takes great strides to put you in the world of a space-horror film from 1979. It is hard not to be drawn into Sevastapol Station (where the game takes place, primarily) and feel your heart rate elevate while trying your best to go un-noticed and accomplish your next objective. The music pitches, the Xenomorph (Alien) growls, and stomps, and clambers, all to a cacophony of nerve inducing racket against the otherwise stoic audience of beeps and hisses of the station's systems. If you can allow your sustainable disbelief to wander the halls of Sevastapol, it will gladly take you in.

Expect failure, hope for success

Oh yeah. This game is hard. Like really F&*#ing hard! I had to put the game on easy just to get on with it (an experience which seems to track across the internet pretty consistently). And here is my argument for playing on easy. You will still die a lot, but not so much that the suspense and terror of your situation will be lost. When I was playing on normal (I shudder to think what Hard is like), I would die so much that the game became comical and any level of suspense or horror, just went out the door. I guess what I am trying to say, is get used to seeing these a lot:

There is no autosave feature. These little things are your new best friends.

Old school survival, almost

There are definitely some themes here that run deep in my own personal gaming history. Namely Resident Evil's sense of inventory management, crafting, and progress saves. Now I don't think you could argue that AI approaches the level of severity or choice that is experienced in the original RE, but the similarities are certainly present. Unfortunately, as the game wears on, as is usually the case, I found myself flushed with items and ammunition, diminishing the need to make any really hard choices with how to overcome obstacles. This could be an effect of playing on Easy for the later two thirds of the game, but I can not be certain. Once, as a player, I was saturated with ammo and items, I just started to Rambo my way through the game, which while satisfying after hiding and running so much, does change the dynamic of the game for the negative.

Expect to wait

The AI of the Xenomorph is good. Like really unbelievably good. Goof up just a little bit and that freaking alien will be right on top of you. The translation, expect to spend a lot of your time in AI waiting in lockers, or cabinets, or under tables, or behind crates, or in dark corners, or... well you get the idea.

Rinse and repeat

I mentioned earlier that this game is long. While in most cases, not a bad thing, here I feel that it works to quite the opposite effect. As the game drags on, you will find yourself in familiar patterns, such as:

1. Check map for waypoint
2. Move towards waypoint
3. Survive
4. Do arbitrary thing that is required to progress
5. Save
6. Repeat

This gameplay loop is easily ignored in the early moments of the game, when things are more focused, and you are still distracted by learning the alien and absorbing the environment, but once you pass the ten hour mark, you just start going through the motions. From a game design perspective this is very lazy, and makes you wonder if there was a core requirement passed down from on high that the game must hit a certain hour mark to ship. This feels to permeate a lot of decisions, from the objectives, backtracking, movement speeds during EVAs, and many other more nuanced decisions, and inevitably is the biggest negative that I can throw on this game... but it is a big negative.

The grass is always greener...

So then who is this other person, or rather game, that I wish I was with while I was playing AI? Well, there is one game that in my opinion defined the first person stealth-action adventure genre. That struck that perfect chord between gameplay, story, atmosphere, and location...

Hail to the king, baby.

There are probably a strong handful of people that would throw the Thief franchise out into the ring at this point, and I am sure that is a fair thing to do. But admittedly I have never played Thief. It is on the "To Do" list.

Wrap it up already

Who is this game for:

• Anyone that likes stealth games
• Anyone that likes the Alien franchise
• Gluttons for punishment (playing on Normal or harder)

Who should avoid this game:

• People looking for a quick fix
• Folks looking for a deeper and more meaningful story
• Thirty year olds who still sleep with the lights on

Final Appraisal: Buy

All negatives aside, there is something about Alien: Isolation that is undeniably entertaining. Maybe it is living inside the 1979 sci-fi aesthetic, or perhaps it is the extremely polished Xenomorph behavior and AI, or those moments of escape and relief punctuated by the awe of being inside a living space opera that just make it hard to write this game off. Whichever way you slice it, I think it is fair to say that at this point in the games lifecycle, it is hard not to recommend. As of writing you can pick up AI for anywhere in the $20-30 range.

Amazon: http://amzn.to/1M2GhbE