Good noble aliens versus evil monstrous humans, can it work?

[Cowabungaa]

No.

To make an alien race noble and good, they must conform to our standards of 'good' and 'noble', which means humanizing them to display very human aspects of honor and justice. By the same token, to make humans evil you need to de-humanize them.

Hence, any attempt to pit bad humans against good aliens just equates to 'Odd looking humans fight very human looking aliens'. We've had it, it sucked balls. Convention is convention for a reason.

Good idea though, but one that is by it's nature self-contradictory.

Not really, you should read The Swarm, that fiddles around with that theme (ok not réally aliens) pretty nice.

Anyway, Warhammer 40k is a pretty good example of evil humans (although they portray themselfs as good, obviously).

 

[WhiteFangofWhoa]

While not directly, Starcraft and its Expansion actually imply that the invading United Earth Directorate forces are under a tyrannical government that controls all media outlets on Earth. They then invade a sector containing human colonists and two alien races looking to enslave them all. Like with Warhammer's 'Space Church vs. Evil Aliens' no one in the Koprulu Sector is really 100% good or even 70% good... possibly the Protoss. Also, while technically the Zerg are 'more' evil than the UED they're controlled half the time by an infested human who acts far more human than Zerg.

 

[The Rogue Wolf]

Actually, I did forget to mention the rather excellent "Point of View" Mod for Half-Life 1. The Mod has you play the role of a Vortigaunt fighting off a major Human invasion of Xen, following the troops back to Earth and eventually breaking free of Nihilanth's mental control.

I really do need to sit down and read the original Starship Troopers book, too. Only got to skim part of it.

 

[FinalGamer]

This has ALREADY been done in movie form.

Watch: The Day the Earth Stood Still, but not the 2008 remake (I think?).

The alien is good, benevolent and came with a warning. The human response? KILL IT!

I am so glad somebody mentioned that. Of course it was about the Cold War but the message of paranoia is still there.

Also, E.T.

 

[oliveira8]

Actually, I did forget to mention the rather excellent "Point of View" Mod for Half-Life 1. The Mod has you play the role of a Vortigaunt fighting off a major Human invasion of Xen, following the troops back to Earth and eventually breaking free of Nihilanth's mental control.

I really do need to sit down and read the original Starship Troopers book, too. Only got to skim part of it.

In Half Life 1 the Vortigaunts when you first encounter them you find out they want to brutally murder you. But as the game evolves you find out that they are mind controlled slaves and when you get to Xen you find out that the Vorts dont even noticed you when they working in the factory. In the end they just doing what everyone would do when dropped into a diferent world with the message coded in their brains "Kill the aliens.".

While not directly, Starcraft and its Expansion actually imply that the invading United Earth Directorate forces are under a tyrannical government that controls all media outlets on Earth. They then invade a sector containing human colonists and two alien races looking to enslave them all. Like with Warhammer's 'Space Church vs. Evil Aliens' no one in the Koprulu Sector is really 100% good or even 70% good... possibly the Protoss. Also, while technically the Zerg are 'more' evil than the UED they're controlled half the time by an infested human who acts far more human than Zerg.

In Starcraft and in Warhammer theres no good and evil. Just a competition in who can destroy the universe first.

 

[Draygen]

What Beowulf have you been reading? because its not the Anglo-saxon epic.

Yes and no. Though I hate to use wikipedia as a reference, it will suffice for now: Grendel. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grendel_(novel)] It is a retelling of the story, with Grendel representing the native Britons during the Danish invasion occuring around the same time as the telling of Beowulf.


On another note, Orson Scott Card's "Ender's Game" and the stories that follow it serve a good example. An alien race with an even more alien viewpoint, who mearly kill off a few humans as a way of saying "Hello". They realize their mistake, but too late, as the humans begin their counterstrike and eradication of the "hostile alien threat". It can be done, but requires a strong writing skill to make the story make sense, and even more so to jam it into a video game.

 

[Matronadena]

mass effect did touch on the concept in subtle forms depending on how you look at it...though one would have to follow up with both books to get the full scope....like the classic debate of " who's fault really was the first contact war" etc though it really more or less hit on the good and ugly sides of all species, it did play the idea of human xenophobia quite well with things like terra firma and Cerberus

 

[Pumpkin_Eater]

It would take some masterful writing to make people empathize with aliens or a monster race over humans. The closest I've seen to it is WC3's Blood Elf campaign, but that was more of a battle than a war. Villainizing humanity as a whole would probably only be possible in a sequel, where the player already feels a connection to their heroic alien character and his proud and noble people.

 

[Nigh Invulnerable]

What Beowulf have you been reading? because its not the Anglo-saxon epic.

Yes and no. Though I hate to use wikipedia as a reference, it will suffice for now: Grendel. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grendel_(novel)] It is a retelling of the story, with Grendel representing the native Britons during the Danish invasion occuring around the same time as the telling of Beowulf.


On another note, Orson Scott Card's "Ender's Game" and the stories that follow it serve a good example. An alien race with an even more alien viewpoint, who mearly kill off a few humans as a way of saying "Hello". They realize their mistake, but too late, as the humans begin their counterstrike and eradication of the "hostile alien threat". It can be done, but requires a strong writing skill to make the story make sense, and even more so to jam it into a video game.

I keep hearing rumblings that they're making "Ender's Game" into a movie, a video game, etc. and I keep hoping they do it justice. There's a lot more to that book than kids fighting in zero gravity and Ender beating two kids to death.

 

[kommando367]

I like Yautja becuase, those who defeat them in battle, or fight along side them, get awesome rewards.

 

[Slift]

I'd buy it, play it and if it were done at least 3/4 assed i'd probably keep it around.

The way i see it though, would be more of a 'Humanity invades X, Y hops up to save X, Y saves X (Possibly dies in the end) Humanity figures out they're wrong and makes a deal with the Xites to not wage war with them again.'

Or the Futurama of 'Get the hell of my planet'.

Hmmm, I like the second one actually. Even though every post is a repost of a repost.

 

[ReverendJ]

I really DO hate to mention it, but... the OG Star Wars trilogy. Ok, most of the heroes were humans, but they did work with aliens against an oppressive all-human Empire.

I keep trying to forget about those movies, but there's not enough hooch in the world.

 

[Fangface74]

Independence Day, the advanced, space faring race had been observing us and saw us for the petty, hateful, irrational, territorial, planet wrecking species that we are...and just wanted to do the universe a favour and stop the Humanity Virus before it spread!

My glass is half empty

 

[Vibgyor]

I would love to see this just as something different
I think destroy all humans aliens are supposed to be evil

 

[IxionIndustries]

You know, there's a book called Ender's Game that kindof covers that topic. I'm not going to go into detail about it, but it's a good read, look it up.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

First of all, stop linking to TV Tropes! Whenever I see something there I get stuck reading through the articles for an hour! It's very distracting

Only an hour?

The problem is that Hollywood need an 'audience' character, and while Predator gives you one, they need the human element to draw in the figures, which is why Transformers got those bloody annoying meatbags.

 

[Chaos Marine]

Warhammer 40K. But then again, no race in that game even comes close to being good. Humanity is... fourth in the list of evil bastards and it's struggling with the Orks for that place too.

 

[Benj17]

I'd love that so much! Playing as an alien soldier fighting back against the human menace. That would be so awesome... Hopefully Killzone 3 will let you play as a Helghast.

hopefully there wont be a killzone 3

and i don't know if the idea would work, any games where they try and turn the evil character good and the side you were once fighting for bad has never really worked

but then again what someone else said earlier if it was done by the right developer then it could work but meh, in some games the agonist turns into some sort of super being and gets hunted by his own side so yeah

lol

 

[Sion_Barzahd]

Halo 2 sorta touched on this with the arbeiter's levels. Although they more showed the tyranny of their own system than anything else.
But that is the sort of game i'd envision for this.

I think it sounds like a great idea for a game.