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I know it’s been in gaming news all week, but I wanted to chime in on the release of Aliens: Colonial Marines. No, this isn’t going to be a game review; it’s just going to be an editorial rant. And yes, I’m going to vent some anger and frustration at Gearbox.
First of all, I have to say that I didn’t get a review copy, so I only started playing two days after it was out (and I pre-ordered, but more on that later). So, game sites that had reviews out on release day beat me to the punch. That’s not normally a big deal, but in this case, if you’re wondering why I’m only now saying anything, it’s because other reviewers got the jump on me in terms of time. And, in this case, I was just a normal, paying customer like the average gamer who bought it on Steam.
So what’s wrong with Aliens: Colonial Marines? I’m glad you asked, because I have an itemized list (major spoilers ahead).
Someone screwed up the game’s installation, and it wasn’t me
I pre-ordered the game because I’m a big fan of most things related to Aliens. In fact, the scariest FPS I’ve ever played was Rebellion’s Alien vs Predator from 1999 (not the 2010 version, which I bought during a Steam sale and hated with a passion). So, like an optimistic idiot, I pre-ordered so I could play it the day it came out, and even get the pre-order goodies.
Then it came out. I came home, double checked the files, and started the game. Crash to desktop. And so, instead of playing on the first day, I had to wander around two technical support forums until I found a solution to the problem: delete the app-cache folder in Steam’s directory. This is an easy fix (and I probably should’ve just done it without even checking tech support posts, but when something isn’t working, I like to get official solutions first). But the fact that Sega had to give this advice to a substantial number of gamers tells me that someone screwed up the download and installation files. Whether it was Steam or Sega or Gearbox is something I can’t answer, but I know that it was a bad start to the gaming experience for a number of paying customers.
The graphics are nothing like they appeared in early footage
To be clear, I’ve always said that graphics aren’t the most important part of a game. However, if you advertise them in a demo one way, and they look completely different in the release version, then you’ve engaged in unethical business practices.
Quality aside, the graphics lack something else that the demo had. In the demo the visibility was poorer, thanks to particles in the air and interesting lighting effects. In the game, visibility is just plain better because there’s less smoke and lighting reflecting off the shiny, glossy surfaces found in so many environments. So, even though the quality is less important, the real problem is that the actual game footage from Aliens: Colonial Marines is less atmospheric than that from the demo. The demo footage, which influenced me to buy the game, had a very Aliens-like quality to it. It was kind of scary. In the game itself, the entire feel of any level with xenomorph stuff (eggs, mucus, corpses and so on) feels wrong because they’re too well lit, there’s not enough smoke/particles/off-kilter lighting, and the glossy features of the alien stuff overwhelm the darkness.
The game is called a true sequel to Aliens, but Gearbox pointlessly adds stuff from Alien 3
If you were going to make either a movie or a game and call it a true sequel to Aliens, would it make any sense to include anything from Alien 3? I wouldn’t think so. And yet, the game pointlessly references the 1992 film. In the opening of the game, the dropship pilot even points out that the Sulaco was last seen in orbit around Fury 161, then she asks why the Sulaco is back in orbit around LV-426. Not only does it seem stupid that Weyland-Yutani would capture the Sulaco and then tow it back to LV-426, but it also makes the plot needlessly complicated. The simpler way to write that part of the story would be to not bother mentioning anything from Alien 3. You could then write a line somewhere that says, “And the Sulaco failed to leave LV-426 because of damage to the ship from the fight with the xenomorph queen. Acid got into some critical subsystems, and the computer failed to execute its automated commands to take the ship back to its base.” This way you have a reason for the ship to be in orbit around LV-426, it makes sense given what happened at the end of Aliens, and you don’t have to reference other movies and then give a convoluted explanation as to why the ship came back.
Did I also mention that Hicks is still alive? Colonial Marines opens with a transmission from him to Marine headquarters saying that all the Marines are dead, and that the Sulaco needs help. This opening scene makes no sense when the game references Alien 3, which opens with a scene that indicates both Hicks and Newt are dead. The game doesn’t really bother to explain this at all. But it wouldn’t need to be explained if you just ignored Alien 3.
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Finally a good review of this game. Well thought out, valid criticism.
Well done, sir.
I guess i’ll just re-watch the Alien Anthology blurays one more time, instead of playing this game.
You nailed it buddy, we need to hold Gearbox & Randy Pitchford accountable, not just as gamers but as consumers as well.
I agree on all points. This game dropped the ball on so many levels.
The game really failed to create any tension or atmosphere or fear. The player just gets shuffled from one fire fight to the next without any build up or any real lulls in the action.
The motion scanner was a complete waste. Since most enemies don’t spawn until the player reaches a certain point, it doesn’t show anything tactically useful (which defeats the purpose) or build any tension. When it does finally show something meaningful, the player is already being swamped with xenos and is too busy shooting to care about its annoying bleeping. It did do a decent job of locating collectibles.
Most so-called AAA titles these days are mediocre. Most movie/TV tie-in games are bad. So the odds of getting a great Aliens game were pretty slim to begin with, but I think Gearbox really hit a new high watermark for incompetence this time. The echo chamber of grist mill development and clueless publishing has brought us to the point where Big Gaming is self-destructing before our very eyes. We’re rapidly entering an era where anything worth playing will originate on Kickstarter.
I guess what I find so bizarre is that I could brainstorm a more logically coherent plot for the game and its story just sitting around and typing my blog entry than the designers who got paid.
I know how you feel, psycros, but I feel that the one thing big studies should be able to do is get the technical stuff (graphics, installation, bugs) right even if they screw up the design. But in this case, they screwed up that, too. It’s not like this is Gearbox’s first, second, or even third AAA title.
Yeah I agree it’s flawed to say the least but I still kindof like it, maybe it’s the painstakingly recreated setpieces from the movie (at least in terms of geometry, the textures are another story) and the way you actually have to choose to use the motion tracker just like they did in the movie (hold gun out of the way manually lift device into view) unlike the always on hud tracker of other games and how some of those setpieces are wide open outdoor places instead of the tired, dark corridoor with no room to dodge anything staple relied upon to force tension by other games. Oh and your flashlight doesn’t run out of batteries after 30 seconds either.
I also have to say I don’t get the “bad ai” rants either, all the xenos have to do is bum rush you, which they do but they don’t just bum rush you they bum rush your ai team mates too and they do so slow enough that they actually benefit from animation unlike the xenos in the AVP series which are too fast even for 60fps and end up looking like stick men sliding about.
As for the plot, yes it’s illogical, but it’s a first person shooter, all the plot has to do is provide a flimsy excuse to shoot things and then drop you in the thick of it, it does manage to do that at least (although to be honest we all know already that Weyland Yutani are bad and xenos are bad and that USCMC are good and shoot bad things so a plot wasn’t even needed).
I think the “real” problem with this game is that it’s being sold full price and is riding on 5 years of hype and buildup that it never stood a chance of living up to (not unlike a certain Duke game I needn’t explain). If this was the product of some hitherto unknown eastern European developer and was being sold for £10 or even £5 I don’t think anyone would be complaining this much. I’d say pick it up out of the bargain bin in a couple of months when you wont feel it in your wallet so much.
Jason – Fantastic piece. Great analysis, and the kind of honesty and thoroughness that makes me proud of being the Adrenaline Vault’s primary benefactor. Cheers!
Kahless,
Two things. First, you’re kind of proving the point Jason seems to be making — this is not a AAA title in spite of being sold as such. Second, you’re proving what Gearbox seems to hope — IT DOES NOT MATTER that this is not a AAA title in spite of being sold that way, because the IP is strong enough to carry the day.
Ask yourself this: If the game had been about generic aliens and starred generic Star Defenders or whatever, and was called “Star Defenders: Shield of the Galaxy,” would you be as pleased with it? You’d get your standard complement of weapons: machinegun, heavy machinegun, rocket launcher, pistol, shotgun, flamethrower, and “special” weapons like…I dunno…a ricochet launcher, but none of it would look anything like the Aliens franchise, and there’d be no colonial marines, no references to Hicks,Hudson, Bishop, Ripley, etc. No “Company,” no LV-426.
If we strip ALL that stuff out and replace it with generic stuff….are you satisfied with the quality of the title? My bet — and I’ll admit I haven’t played the game yet, but I’ve heard PLENTY about its shortcomings thus far — is that you’d be pissed you paid 30GBP (or $60 USD or whatever).
However, I think Gearbox recognizes that the bar is actually set LOWER for games that come with a strong brand association. People will still buy them — even pre-order them — just based on the strength of the brand itself. And plenty will like it simply BECAUSE it includes the visuals and sounds and in-game references to their favorite franchise, even if the game is at best mediocre and at worst pretty lame.
I don’t think you can overestimate the power of a solid license to sell games and to convince people that, no, they’re really ok with the game. Think about how many craptastic or mediocre Star Wars games there are. Yet LucasArts keeps having them made (some of us remember when LucasArts used to MAKE the games themselves…), and the fans of the Star Wars franchise continue to buy them and say “It’s not that bad…” Yet, I GUARANTEE you, if you stripped out the Star Wars IP and replaced it with generic “Space Paladins” or whatever, people would think these games are pretty crappy.
It’s actually, in my opinion, a fairly savvy business movie, if a frustrating one. For every fan who’ll bitch about how it makes no sense that the colony survived the nuclear blast (which could be seen FROM ORBIT), there’ll be seven fans who are just happy for an excuse to shoot aliens with a pulse rifle, even if they have to empty a whole magazine to kill one of ‘em. Doesn’t matter. They’re shooting a pulse rifle at aliens on LV-426. That’s worth $60 to ‘em.
Don’t get me wrong — I’m not trying to insult you. I mean, if it’s worth $60 to you to play around in this universe, then you’re getting your money’s worth and that’s fine and dandy. You’re also not alone. Hell, you’re the majority. For all the complaints I’ve seen — and I’ve seen plenty about this game — I’ve also seen plenty of folks saying “Oh come on, it’s not THAT bad. And hey, it’s fun to kill stuff with a smartgun!”
All I’m saying is that if it were just a generic tracking chaingun shooting generic aliens, but everything else was basically the same (same graphics quality, same overall game plot, same game mechanics), they’d dismiss it as a $20 title.
Solo brings up some interesting points.
Let me just say the fail present in Aliens: Colonial Marines comes along two different axes. The first axis is technical stuff. The game had technical problems that I mention. No matter who made the game or what the content was, advertising graphics that look nothing like the game’s actual graphics is unacceptable. This is something unrelated to the story, game mechanics, or the material from which it was licensed. To me, this is the part of the game where Gearbox and Sega really should know better. Charging a AAA price for a game like that is just plain unacceptable regardless of the content.
The other side of the coin is the use of the Aliens setting. Their failure here is clearly bothersome to me (as you no doubt can tell
), but I could understand someone enjoying it despite all the things I dislike. If this was the only thing they screwed up, then I could have said, “Well, there’s an interesting game here, it’s just not really Aliens.”
So, basically I’m agreeing with you.
The whole Aliens connection, the demo and preview videos, and the other hype around the game duped me and a bunch of others. I wouldn’t have been duped without the convergence of these multiple factors.
No no, I agree it’s not an AAA title and if you took the Aliens references out of it completely it would almost certainly suck beyond belief (and probably be rightly blasted for ripping off the aforementioned Aliens lol) but that’s all “what ifs”.
Also although I never saw any demo footage, I was under the impression before it’s release that this game was using the same engine as AVP 2010 and I was a little disappointed to discover that instead it uses a 5 year old variant of the now pointless Unreal Engine 3, the only plus point being that the UE3 is so well known now that tweaking it is really easy and lo and behold the community have indeed tweaked it and while nothing at all can be done about what are some of the worst textures seen on PC in the last decade (at the moment anyway, expect someone to fix that soon) other things like shadow resolution and other post processing effects are easily fixed, even the AI behaviour can be fiddled with (although it’s a subjective fix you either see it or you don’t, it’s a matter of perception).
The fact remains however that such tweaking shouldn’t be needed, but we live in an age where it nearly always is. How many PC gamers didn’t fiddle with and modify Skyrim for example.
I am admittedly miffed at the full price tag they elected to sell this at but there’s still some undefinable enjoyableness about them saying “You’re on LV-426, there’s Hadley’s Hope, have a M41A and blast some xenos!” You even find a chestbursted Hudson at one point!
For those with an interest some help in tweaking it can be found here http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=127541833#25938
I’m actually having fun with this game, I haven’t finished it yet but it’s fun. Okay, it’s kind of mediocre video game, but it isn’t too bad. But anyway, great review
No!All of you, just no! It was this game or Obsidian’s RPG Aliens..
We lost another really great IP to Gearbox/Sega/manager/whomever/CODkiddieswantmoney…
Alien brand is to good to be so easily screwed up, at least guys at Obsidian would do a game worth playing and they would respect the bloody franchise, at least that.
Gearbox tricked us with Duke Nukem Forever(well, i really dont blame them, it was either they release it or leave it to oblivion), now Aliens, also, Borderlands is not really that good of a game, generic shooter with dash of Diablo …
IDK is this started with Wii or before but this “casual” movement, everyone wants a pice of COD and WOW pie, X360,Skyrim=streamlined to hell,D3 SP always online,auction houses,DLC on disk, this whole generation is probably worst thing to happen to gaming ever(since 1983 and E.T.), im here only because of the Kickstarter and a little hope(little) that Wasteland2,Torment,Eternity will be good games…
I think that never in history of gaming was industry so blind and so far away from their consumer, its like they punish us with every game it come out.. Core gamers are niche now, well core gamers brought them from garages and basements to huge buildings and gave them money , yet they betrayed us and instead they went to cater “casual” audience but they dont get it, casuals will stay casuals, there is no love, they will play something a little but they dont care about IP,franchise or anything else, casuals will leave them and go do other stuff, they are not loyal. I have a feeling that it will backfire big time to EA, Acti ect…
O.K…….wow….I hope you all realize its just a game…its not issues like the safety of children or world hunger,or war its a game…it doesn’t need detailed analysis or long group discussions about its shortcomings roflmao…..my advice would be turn the game off and do something none of you have done since graduating high school and getting a job…turn off the game and maybe open the curtains on your windows and I don’t know…maybe go outside or join the real world…..I mean really….get a life!
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