Four alleged screenshots from the upcoming Alien: Isolation videogame by Creative Assembly and Sega have been revealed online via twitter.
The unreleased material is seemingly being dumped from XBL. These images also come from the same Twitter account as the previously leaked artwork which has been unofficially confirmed to be genuine to us. You can check them out below:
Saying that, I'm still excited about this game and I really hope they'll be able make the story at least somewhat believable.
DUDE!! I love the "play as newt on Hadley's hope" dlc idea! That would have been freaking awesome!
...I just really have my doubts that video game writers are the ones to pull it off.
I hope I'm wrong! When all is said and done, I just want a scary game, that looks as good as those screenshots, and is as macho-bullshit-free as possible.
Amanda Ripley is a new character, she is really a blank slate, except for 3 things.
1. She lost her mum at the age of 10
2. She has a very clear motivation for trying to find out what happened to her mum, and thus go looking for the Nostromo / find out about the special order / LV246 setting up for the game's plot
3. She dies an old lady with no kids
You could argue about point 2, but I expect this is the point the story will hinge on, which isn't a bad start for me. Yeah they could have done some random standalone story with a brand new character to randomly stumble across the Alien, but I think the Amanda Ripley angle could start us off with some emotional investment in the character, which again isn't a bad start.
That said, it will need to be done right. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.
I think part of the problem, at least for me it is, is that they are expecting us to swallow that both mother AND daughter have chance encounters with the same type of creature. It's like they are trying to establish that Ripley and her kin are like mortal enemies with the xenomorphs and destined to be locked in eternal combat with one another.
That movie was certainly painful to watch, but you have to admit it was responsible for two fantastic quotes!:
- "I have never seen it, but by all accounts it is terrible. However, I have seen the house that it built, and it is terrific." -Michael Caine
- "What shark wouldn't want revenge on the family of the man that killed it?" -Roger Ebert
Let's hope Alien: Isolation can do better.Well, shit. You just reminded me of that damned movie. Jaws: the Revenge's plot was so ludicrous; keeping it in the family was literally what drove it. Now every time I think of Isolation I'll be thinking of Jaws 4 and going, "Dammit, it is the same." We can debate about the comics all day long, but at least they used different characters and in some cases, succeeded greatly.
Give me a new character that isn't related to the other movies or its characters at all, give me a clean slate.
See, I don't truly hate it, but it's another case of missed potential. They could move away from the movie characters, similar to how the comics and books did, and say, "hey, the EU states there's plenty of colonies on other planets and interstellar travel, so why not do a story about one of them." I'd like to know who's actually writing this story, be it CA, SEGA or someone at Fox, just to understand more about why it can't be about something other than Ripley or characters she's met at one point or another. Probably. It's always simpler to use something already in existence rather than make up something new. I'm not sure how the canon argument plays into it, since usually only fans care about that and we typically agree on the movies being your "purest" canon and everything else in existence is up to one's discretion.
Pool's closed due to lack of new content
Don't forget "awesome" "nice screen shots" and "sweet! No gearbox!" Lol
As for our constructive debates, theories and speculation being "off topic" I apologize, I didn't realize you were hoping for 13 pages worth of "Cool" and "Hope its not like Colonial marines" posts.
We know nothing about Amanda. And you can't draw those conclusions. End of story. Nice to hear opinions though.
Boo! No more Ripley clones. How about Hicks 2.0 instead.
*ding**ding**ding* Exactly! Of course, they can't half-ass it like Colonial Marines (arguably, they went full-ass).
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Lol @ full ass.
The Amanda thing is as others have said, in my opinion, just rehashing old characters and I feel like the series can't go anywhere. Now, if you want to do an Alien(s) style story where you have an onslaught on a hive by the USCM, that's cool by me. New characters, different story, similar model. That works.
You don't know she's going to be "Ripley-like". Not every strong female character has to be a Ripley clone.
*ding**ding**ding* Exactly! Of course, they can't half-ass it like Colonial Marines (arguably, they went full-ass).
Yes, the thread went on a little bit of a tangent, and I think I'm the one to blame for that... Which I apologize for. But conversations tend to do that. I'm willing to let the debate die because, you're right, it just keeps going in circles.
You should read it. There's a reason it was brought up in this thread.
Well it is kind of relevant ~ earlier in the thread we were discussing theories based on the screenshots of the game, and speculating where the xeno in the game is from, why there are clones and soldiers aboard this station etc... the debate about Ash stems from "who knows what" about the derelict, LV-426, the alien...and more importantly whether special order 937 is some sort of umbrella corp style conspiracy within Weyland Yutani, or whether it was more likely a lone wolf operating in his/her own interests (similar to Carter Burke) which is relevant if it turns out the xeno on this station is from LV-426, considering this game is set between 'Alien' and 'Aliens'
On Amanda Ripley - well I think it could make a good story, I mean she has a clear motivation to try and discover what happened to the Nostromo, however it could have just as easily been a relative of another member of the crew. I'm not too worried about that.
I really like the idea of a more stealth based game - that gives the impression that being detected = death, i.e. you will not be running around gunning everything that moves down, but rather having to spend the vast majority of the time avoiding confrontation. I think this will add some genuine scares and is the right approach for an Alien game.
Also I wonder how my the Alien's acid blood will play a part here - it could be the case that you just can't shoot it for fear of creating a hull breach.
Firstly, in my opinion, there is no doubt whatsoever that Ash knew about the special order BEFORE he left Thedus, he was put on the ship SPECIFICALLY for this task, and the company (or at least whoever issued the order) was aware of the hostile organism BEFORE the Nostromo landed on LV-426. Now, before you write me off, here is the evidence presented in the movie;
1. The most senior officer is the only crew member on the ship with access to Muther. During the opening scenes of the movie Kane is heard saying "Dallas, Muther wants to talk with you" to which the captain responds "Yeah...my eyes only." Later in the movie, after Dallas is (presumed) dead (or killed depending which cut of the movie you roll with) and Ash asks Ripley what she wants him to do, she responds "What you've been doing; Nothing. I have access to Muther now and I'll get my own answers thank you." (Implying she didn't have access prior to Dallas' demise, and, as she stated earlier in the movie "When Dallas is off the ship, I'm senior officer." Now...If this was all a co-incidence, and Ash didn't know anything about this before they left Thedus, then, explain how he received special order 937 once the Nostromo had left for Earth? He had no access to Muther. Thus, he had his orders before they left Thedus.
2. The company (or whoever issued special order 937) knew in advance there was a hostile organism on the planet. Whether that be prior knowledge due to a previously unseen encounter, or (most likely) the Derelict warning beacon had already been deciphered fully. There is no chance that (as someone suggested here) they *didnt* know until Kane was facehugged. How do we know this? Again, because it is in Special Order 937; (see highlighted sentence in screenshot)
So what does this tell us? They knew there was a hostile organism on the planet before the Nostromo got there... Dallas states that he shipped out 5 times with another science officer, who was replaced two days before they left Thedus with Ash. Ash would have HAD to be aware of his orders before he left Thedus (meaning he was put there intentionally) In my opinion, i can't see how or why any of this is being debated...its all in the movie
I wonder how heavy on the shooter part, it's already been said that melee would play a large part in the game.
And not picking a fight, I'm asking out of curiosity: What is it about Amanda Ripley that has turned people off? I've written my thoughts about it probably three times on this forum, so I'll spare you repeating myself. The short form is I can see it going either way, Completely dependent on the writing.
Edit: I think I found the source of that: http://www.gamespot.com/articles/leaked-alien-isolation-screenshots-already-look-better-than-colonial-marines/1100-6416706/
A first person stealth game... I don't know how to feel about that.
That is what is being shown here on these forums. Nobody trusts them. Sega knows they've got to knock one out of the park and they have to do it quick. News of CA doing an alien game came out quickly after A:CM, which was the right move. Rather than everybody knowing ACM was bad, we are speculating about the outcome of this new game, and that's a much better gamble than letting the bad product hang in our minds without something new to look at.
If Sega screws this one up, then they are in real trouble. Consumers can forgive a mistake, but they typically don't forgive repeats of mistakes.
True. I dream of the day that happens. Y'know, as much as I despise EA... I would really like to see Visceral take a swing at an Aliens title. I mean, look at Dead Space (which they admit Alien(s) was one of the inspirations of the series). They are the only ones that I feel have the experience and the resources to start doing the franchise justice. But again... EA.
That soon after A:CM... they would have booed as soon as the trailer started playing. They'll still boo when they show it at the next E3. The sting of Colonial Marines will not go away for a long while.
Agreed. FOX/SEGA just needs to learn to let Riley go. Does EVERYTHING have to absolutely be a direct connection to Ripley?
I agree, the best games ever relating to the franchise were the avp games on PC. I want nothing more than a stand alone alien title with SOME quality though... Lol
I could get on board with this! Sort of a middle ground between the conspiracy angle and coincidence angle. Nonetheless, I still find it scarier to think the nostromo was completely isolated, and not a soul knew about the incident except for the crew onboard.
Hey so not wanting to open a can of worms or derail the thread but thought I should respond to this.
The way I imagined it was the derelict transmission had been picked up before, by some long range scan, a satellite, or hell maybe even another ship that had passed before but didn't wake everyone up. So once the guy knows this, he arranges for the next ship to pass by (Nostromo) to get ASH and also programs the special order into that ship's system as part of the package.
Now this is space right, so the time and distance involved is huge - it might be the case that he had to plan YEARS in advance in order to move everything into place, or even just to wait for a ship to be on course to be close to the right area, my point being that I don't believe the special order was sent during the evens of the film, but set-up at some time before.
The way I see it during the movie Alien there is absolutely no contact with the outside world beyond the Nostromo picking up the Derelict transmission, that they were way, way out in space.
But of course this is all just speculation on my part, this is just the route of least resistance for my logical mind! Always open to new ideas :-)
You know I think they should have made the character for this game YOU, not some known name or new character with tacked on plot or connection to existing characters,make it that you ARE the character. The experiances are yours. seems every game these days puts you as a character with a face and a story of their own,never letting you feel like its actually you in this situation.
I thought that AVP was fine by the way, with the exception of the rock, paper, scissors thing. It had strong atmosphere, and I thought it captured the best of both worlds in those regards. I'm in the publishing business (Meaning I read everything, all the time) so just about all the stories we see in games are lack-luster to me, so I can't really critique that. I don't know enough about graphics to say if that was good or bad, but I will say I would like to see those graphics pasted over AVP 2. The sounds were fine as well.
This could have a good or bad effect. Bad in the sense that she's on some adventure to find her mother, which is a technique used way too often, and almost always lacks substance (there's usually no background development, it's just handed to you and you're expected to accept it as is).
Good in the sense that it could allow for character development (Dynamic Characters). Granted Amanda finds out about the link between her mom and the Xeno later on in the game. You can run through all emotions there. Sadness, Despair, Anger. Not having Amanda know about the Xeno's and not being on some quest for her mother from the get go leaves alot of doors open. Granted this a story about Amanda and not Amanda and her new boyfriend or Amanda and her new crew.
Talking about narrative structure on this forum has made me realize more and more just how shitty quality video game stories are. The stories were the first reason I even started playing the damn things. Took me over a decade to realize that...
AvP 2010 was largely a disappointment, too. So yes. The mistakes do get repeated - and by their appearance - amplified as well.
The fan base is big enough to accommodate lackluster titles - but only for so long; and some of us have reached breaking point already. There hasn't really been a decent ALIEN themed title since AvP2 was released a decade ago, which SEGA had no hand in.
As to the future for what 'ALIEN: Isolation' holds? Well, the inclusion of Amanda Ripley as the major character is more of an ominous sign rather than an encouraging one.
-Windebieste
Think of the politics here. They've had one terrible launch with A:CM, do you really think a Corp responsible for millions is going to make the same mistake twice? They probably bought it with a Concentrated contract.
I'm sorry to all of you who were so harmed by A:CM and just can't get behind another aliens game, but business works better than a single mind. They're not going to repeat their mistakes. Get past it.