DragonCon 2018 is currently taking place in Atlanta and like 2017’s event, with the event comes the announcement of a new Alien novel. And this one is something of a surprise!
I can finally announce one of my upcoming media tie-in projects, which was just announced at @DragonCon.
Coming in January 2019 from @TitanBooks:
ALIEN: ISOLATION.
Amanda Ripley vs. Xenomorphs.
More soon……..
— Keith R.A. DeCandido (@KRADeC) August 31, 2018
There are no further details as of yet so it’s unknown if this is an adaptation of Alien: Isolation or a sequel. While none of the games have been adapted into novels in English, Sierra & Monolith’s Aliens vs. Predator 2 was adapted in Hungarian and titled Aliens vs. Predator: Forced Chase.
Keith R.A. DeCandido has previously written for the Alien universe. He wrote the short Deep Background for the anthology Aliens: Bug Hunt which you can listen to him read on the Dead Kitchen Radio podcast. You can also follow Keith on Facebook or Twitter.
Thanks to Bryan Thomas Schmidt for the news. Keep a close eye on Alien vs. Predator Galaxy for the latest Alien and Predator literature news! You can follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram to get the latest on your social media walls. You can also join in with fellow Alien and Predator fans on our forums!
My lasting first impression will be the pervasive sense throughout that the author never once played the video game. And then this turned out to be the case.
We need podcast Corporal. Bay 12, please .
Spoiler
and the essence of the original (superior) story isn't present.
They get killed and outran in the films a lot.
Not the best plan for to attract casuals.
But on another hand, the actual in - game events weren't translated to a book format very well and felt very cut . Hospital, Project KG -348, hive sections ( the most memorable ones IMO ) were unforgivably short. Alien didn't seem more of a threat than goddamn Joe or just some malfunction which is a total shame especially knowing what Stompy is in Isolation. And I think it didn't really appeared much in the book. Also not a fan of killable xenos and Amanda being able to outrun them.
But again i enjoyed Amanda's backstory very much and honestly would prefer if whole book was just about Amanda dealing with her life after mom's missing. I guess it would be called Alien Isolation Origins 'cause it wouldn't have any Aliens in it
7,5 / 10
Wonder if that is a nod to the Alien: Covenant Origins prequel where an exactly similar event occurred. The timeline doesn't quite match (she would have been 11 years old), but maybe she was a cadet in training?
Well maybe you should start working for Fox. I think they've needed this insight for quite a while with regard to Alien and Predator.
It's only self-defeating if no one makes any money off of it.
I didn't feel any tension when reading it nor did I miss a lack of tension because I was intimately aware of the events already.
Alex White has clearly played Isolation, and the Alien encounters so obviously inspired by it in The Cold Forge are leagues ahead of anything in this novelisation.
An adaptation should make the reader of the book feel the way the player of the game does. The game was tense, but the novel was not.
*Though in fairness, that was simply because the film was still being made while he wrote it.
Pretty sure he would've had access to the script.
So far every adaptation's fallen apart in my opinion, the book is mediocre and the series is abysmal, a pity considering the quality of the original experience.
Watching the animated series doesn't do the game justice.
There are already a game and a animated series. This is a different take.
That just seems wrong, you can't watch the youtube videos of the game cutscenes, its not even close to the same experience.
Super disappointed in this.
*cough* Alex White *cough*
Turns out Keith didn't actually play the game:
Apologies, not intended that way, which is why I didn't go into detail. My point was more that we don't really learn anything more of any importance from the book than we do from other sources which talk about Amanda, such as the 5 year old video game, for example.
Well done.
Spoiler
I loved the flashbacks that flesh out Amanda's life in addition to giving more to Ellen Ripley and past assignments (I'm not posting spoilers) which explained her distrust of engineers (Parker and Brett - not the race Engineers).
The tie-in to Aliens: Defiance was a nice cherry on top.
I thought that was an annoying aspect of the description. Not sure why it couldn't just be a hack tool, it had to be a "Halfin" or whatever. The fact that this went on for nearly every item Amanda picked up was irritating.
Finished it this morning. Overall, it's not an effective look at the franchise in novel form. The whole thing is just one overly long awkward experience. I began to dread the flashback chapters to be honest. Ugh. Pacing was horrendous all the way through. There's nothing about any of the secondary characters that's expanded upon. I thought it would've been cool for us to get some kind of through-line with Ransome. Nope. The Alien doesn't feel very dangerous. There's no tension. Very disappointing to have what is essentially another swing and miss at this story. The plot of the game still feels incomplete to me. The web series is a disaster. And now this, which essentially amounts to 378 pages of a set up for Amanda and Zula's friendship to be carried on in future books and comics. 2/5 overall. Didn't take long to get from The Cold Forge to here, but I'm still looking forward to the upcoming novels.
Maybe he just thought she would look better as a blond. I found it hard to believe he could have mistaken that, he must have seen a picture of her before. So he choose to do that for whatever reason.
Another reviewer who enjoyed it.
And you can't kill an adult Alien with fire, as Covenant established.