Aliens Isn't About Shooting Aliens

[Shamus Young]

Aliens Isn't About Shooting Aliens

Capturing a good Aliens game seems like a task in and of itself, now we get some insight as to why that is the case.

Read Full Article

 

[Irridium]

There's also the fact that some developers seem to think that you can only get emotion through better graphics. Which is so wrong it hurts.

Looking right at you, David Cage. Yes I can tell that old man face has feelings, but why should I care? I don't know him, his family, his story, or anything about him. He's just a head with good facial animations.

 

[BrotherRool]

That's smart. It's one of those things which seems instantly obvious when it's pointed out but I've never thought of it before, you even solved the problem of why the Metal Gear games manage to have stories with much more powerful climaxes despite being full of hours and hours of silly exposition.

We need more ways to get all the before-shooting stuff into actual gameplay in an enjoyable way because there must be a lot of different desires to fulfil in a lot of different types of story and game.

 

[SouthpawFencer]

Makers of both video games and movies need to face facts: these are vastly different forms of entertainment, enjoyed in vastly different ways. I'm starting to think that a large-scale failure to comprehend this fundamental point is the reason why it's so rare to see a decent movie based on a video game, and vice versa.

Of course, attempts at making a decent video game based on a movie isn't helped by the fact that most of those being quickly-made, cynical cash-ins forced to be ready to ship when the movie is released, regardless of quality. In the case of the Harry Potter games, this was inexcusable: they KNEW that a Deathly Hollows movie was coming out YEARS ahead of time, and they had PLENTY of time to make, test and perfect a kick-ass game before the movie premier, had they felt like making the effort.

 

[rednightmare]

I think you hit the nail right on the head. To The Moon had me more emotionally invested in its characters then any game of 2012 ever did. The graphics didn't do this for me (facial expressions were barely visible and there was no voice-acting), but the fact that I spent time with these characters and got to know them. Thats what made me cry at the end.

 

[ccesarano]

Playing a Newt-like role in a video game seems perfect, too. It's survival-horror in the most true sense if you're playing a defenseless character that has to sneak into harder-to-fit spots than even the Xenomorphs can access.

I don't see a problem with trying to make a shooty-Aliens game, though. I can understand wanting to play the role of the space marine. But every time people do, they imitate it in the way a 10 year old that doesn't understand why story-telling works would imitate a film. For example, Aliens: Colonial Marines has interpersonal drama between the Marines! Okay...so...what caused that sort of tension in the film? A group of "bad asses" facing a threat that just wiped the floor with them, doing a 180 on all that machismo. What do you get in A:CM? Debate over whether they leave no man behind or not.

My first assessment of A:CM was that it was an Aliens game made for the Call of Duty player. I still stand by that in some respects, but it could have easily been so much more.

But before that, I really, REALLY want people to stop being so tied to Weyland-Yutani, Colonial Marines (did they ever say United States Colonial Marines in the film? I never got the impression they were tied to a specific nationality and were more like the National Guard. I mean, COLONIAL Marines. Marines for/from the Colonies.)

There's also the fact that in the briefing they mention "Another bug hunt", indicating that there are other alien creatures encountered on other worlds, just none so vicious.

I dunno. It just feels like there is room to expand the franchise. If there are Colonial Marines, what about mercenaries? How about space pirates? Alien 3 making a prison planet was an interesting setting (I'm all on board with Jim Sterling's defense for Alien 3), so why not look for other locations?

The Aliens make for a perfect monster wherever they are. But this silly idea that Aliens was the best film just causes people to be tied to the most superficial aspects of it, and to me only points out how wrong people are when they claim it is the best one (but that's an argument for another day).

As for story-telling, everyone loves the tram car in Half-Life 1. Y'know why the opening of Half-Life works? Because you get a chance to see Black Mesa in a state of normalcy. You get a sense of what life is like there. You get to walk around and see the facility. Then you see it destroyed and watch as scientists who greeted you on your way in are getting killed. Doom 3 almost had this as well, only once all Hell literally broke loose you pretty much didn't see a single living human for a while.

Xenoblade: Chronicles managed to teach the player basic combat mechanics before the game's story even really started as well, but I'm still of the opinion that Japan is so far beyond the West in terms of story-telling in games that it's almost unfair to make the comparison (not saying their stories are better, just that they have a better understanding of how to make use of the medium in terms of narrative. With the exception of some games (Metal Gear), you eventually stop caring about the number or length of cut-scenes because you're actually invested in the characters. Xenoblade's opening is pretty damn fantastic, and I wish more devs would learn that you CAN take your time telling a story, and players don't need to be shoved into high octane combat within the first few minutes).

 

[Epic Fail 1977]

Excellent stuff as usual Shamus.

"I know that with the new console generation peeking at us over the horizon everyone is excited about the new graphics, but making the world more photorealistic is a great way to make games more expensive to produce while doing nothing to make the thing more thrilling. Developers need to be working on new ways to involve the player in the non-shooty parts of the story, not making the shooty bits fancier."

I watched that PS4 thing the other day. At one point they were showing new games, and one game had a goodie and a baddie and the baddie was watching the goodie on a big TV screen via security cameras. The baddie said "I want him alive". It seemed to me a perfect example of the sort of thing that just isn't going to get fixed by more teraflops.

 

[ThriKreen]

I always found the first level in the AVP (not the 2010 one) to be the most scary compared to rest of the game, at least on the first play-through.

My memory is a bit hazy, but from what I can remember...

Spoiler

Nothing actually happens, but it was all atmosphere as you escaped from the base. But you knew of the movies and the motion tracker. But remember, it tracks motion, not just the aliens, so anything moving would trigger it's cliche "bee-beep". Which would freak you out as you're expecting the worse ... only to find out it was a falling lamp or ceiling piece.

But it's dark, you don't know what's around, you're alone, it gets so jumpy from the sounds. You could cut the tension with a butter knife.

But no alien appeared AT ALL on the first level.

Edit: found a video on youtube and it appears I was wrong, aliens do appear in the latter half. Still, the first part freaked me out way more.

I think that's what's needed for a good Aliens game: recreate the feeling of tension. You can't beat the aliens, so run and hope the other marine can weld the door shut fast enough before they bust through and swarm you...

 

[grigjd3]

Makers of both video games and movies need to face facts: these are vastly different forms of entertainment, enjoyed in vastly different ways.

Win. I think a lot of people compare video games to movies as art-forms because they both involve an audio-video experience, however, I think that movies are closer to books than they are to video games because both movies and books engage the audience in a one-way experience (barring those terrible choose your own adventure books) and video games design an interface for players to interact with. The most poignant video games create the narrative through the gameplay, not through a cut scene at all (for example: Journey, Shadow of the Colossus).

This whole going for "cinematic" experiences is the wrong direction. The real question game developers should be asking is what is the game's core engagement and how can that core engagement be used to create a story (that the developers may not even develop). I've found far better stories out of games of Civilization than I ever saw in a Metal Gear Solid game.

 

[rembrandtqeinstein]

I'll blaspheme here and say that Resurrection was my favorite Aliens movie.

And if you want to see an Aliens game done right check out Aliens vs Predator Gold https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aliens_versus_Predator_%28video_game%29

The game engine was built from the ground up to capture the feel of the movies. And it succeeded brilliantly. The Marine campaign was pure heart pounding terror. The Predator campaign was as methodical and gadget heavy as any Batman or James Bond experience. The Alien campaign was split between careful hiding and and an exhilarating speed-fueled bloodthirsty rampage.

There is no real story in that game, just an atmosphere so thick you find yourself holding your breath. Play the game alone, in the dark, with headphones. One of your most memorable video game moments will be the first time you "meet" a facehugger.

 

[Woodsey]

More and more I find myself railing against any attempts at non-interactive storytelling. I suspect that, in part, it's because this generation of games has grown so relentlessly obnoxious in seizing control from the player at every opportunity. But I also get the creeping feeling that the entire idea of it is completely missing the point of the medium. Unfortunately, we have invested so much time in mixing interactivity and non-interactivity that suggesting we give up on including the latter almost entirely only seems to garner an instant dismissal and the usual 'compromise' response.


Hell, we already have Half-Life as an example of how to maintain interactivity whilst getting its talkies and expositions in, so why the hell do we still have cutscenes of any real substance? If you can't do something without wrestling control from the player for 5 minutes, perhaps it's time to you admit you shouldn't be doing it.

Everyone accepts that film as a medium has weaknesses in relation to literature, but it also has strenghts. The very vast majority of people in film play up to those strengths and don't bother with the stuff that's suited to literature. But if you dare to suggest that about games, that non-interactivity of any noteworthy length is an inherent no-no, you're pretty much ignored.

 

[Formica Archonis]

Scariest Aliens game I ever played? Aliens TC [http://doom.wikia.com/wiki/Aliens_TC] for Doom was good, but that was unlicensed and a Total Conversion (what would now be called a mod), not a full licensed retail game.

Full retail? Aliens for the C64 [http://archive.org/details/C64GVA270-Aliens]. Few games made me break out in a cold sweat like that one did.

 

[FoolKiller]

Hmm...

And this is why I get bothered by people who liked Heavy Rain but wished it got to the "good part" faster without the hour or two at the beginning that acts almost like a prologue to the game. That hour or two may have felt bland but it gave us a sense of normalcy and lets us get attached as the parent in game. Once we get attached in the game from a birthday party and going to the mall and all hell breaks loose is when you panic because you now care for the kids.

I felt that that was good interactive story telling. Of course, Heavy Rain has been criticized for being an interactive movie and not a game but that is a debate for a different thread.

 

[porous_shield]

Batman Arkyam Aslyum did the normalcy thing as well by having Batman escort the Joker into a still functioning Arkham. You get a little bit of a sense of what the place was like before it went to chaos.

I'm wondering why they didn't make the Aliens game more Amnesia and have a player rooting around in a space craft and avoiding the aliens. A game like the original Dead Space would work too. Aliens are smart creatures and they did't seem smart at all in the game; they actually seemed extremely stupid.

 

[Phuctifyno]

Spoiler: You forgot

the chestburster! It's a dick!

 

[TheSapphireKnight]

They ought to be able to make both a subtle scary Alien game as well as a more action heavy Aliens game. I feel what they have not worked on nearly well enough in the past is the AI of the xenos. Create some advanced AI along with a complex level design that allows them to utilize more advanced behaviors.

The playspace ought to look like maze of tubes where the usable space the player has is actually more constraining than the AI's. I would rather have only a few smart xenomorhps crawling around me at any one time then the hordes most developers seem to send the players way after awhile.

 

[Rad Party God]

Half-Life 2 takes it's time to set the mood and make you care about the characters long before the shooting starts, Dead Space kinda tried to do this to some degree of success, but out of 3 to 4 characters, 1 or 2 are almost immediately killed off, while the other two, while generic, kinda fill in their role. Dead Space 3 kinda tried to do this again and I'd be extremely happy if they immediatly killed off Carver, but the other characters were kinda likable in their own right.

 

[TAdamson]

Here's the problem, where is the sense of dread and forboding that you are supposed to get from facing Xenomorphs? Why is the focus always on "colonial marines". Being a Marine in a computer game isn't scary. Being a clueless science expedition biologist or a waylaid mining-ship technical officer is scary.

It would be nice if, for once, the people who made an aliens game didn't immediately make you Corporal Dwayne Hicks or Private Hudson. Why can't we be Ripley (Possibly too iconic)? Or Lambert? Or Kane?

Or why can't we be on a secret space station or planetary mesa that happens to be researching Xenomorphs until a careless scientist causes a 'Resonance Casca'*... I mean, allows a chest-burster to escape leading to 'All-Too Easily Foreseen Consequences'*.

Why can't we live out the terror of facing a Xenomorph without stacks of military hardware?

That's not to say that the Marines shouldn't show up eventually, get decimated, show you how to use a pulse rifle and smart gun, get decimated again, (Perhaps a second team of Marines should show up to "Clean up" the problem until they 'Forget about Freeman'?*) and then after throwing the Alien Queen into the fusion reactor with a radiation-shielded power-loader you get piloted out of the rapidly collapsing superstructure of where-ever by the good-android. (Bad-android sabotaged the communications and the shuttle to stop you nuking the alien hive and you had to kill him in act 2.)

*Half life 1 is a better Aliens game than any Aliens game.