A few missed opportunities

[SpreadEagleBeagle]

Ok, ALIEN: Isolation is amazing and by far my favorite Alien related game by far. To me this game is as close to flawless as it comes, but even so I have a few minor things that bug me and that I wished they would've done differently.

I'm not a gun guy by any means, but it kind of annoys me that added new guns to the game when there already are a bunch of equivalent pieces of weaponry they could've picked from the movies (ALIEN).

For example, they could've gone with the original "Laser" Pistol (Kane carries it in the Derelict) instead of the Revolver we see in the game:

The Laser Pistol (or whatever it is) could take just same amount of time to recharge and could have the same rate of fire and amount of ammo before reloading it as the Revolver. Same function but a design and lore more true to canon.

...Or why not Ripley's Speargun instead of the weird Bolt Gun they implemented?

The Speargun is a single-fire weapon that takes time to reload. Just like with the Laser Pistol/Revolver, they could just switch the designs to make it fit, but they could also utilize the fact that the Speargun is a harpoon weapon, as seen in the movie. Wouldn't it be cool to temporarily shackle an Android, or even the Alien, for a few seconds, giving you some precious extra time to escape or whatever.

I also wish that they would've been more frank with the Egg-Morphing concept rather than just hinting at it. It's so gruesome and nightmarish and would've really given the game another dimension of horror to it.

Another thing that I wish they would've had time to implement in the game is to pushing furniture around, toppling over chairs or even throw them to divert attention. Pushing furniture would enable you to make your own makeshift barricades, or just temporarilly blocking doors. Lighting them on fire to create a temporary barrier between you and your enemy would've been amazing too.

Really hope there will be a sequel!

[THE CITY HUNTER]

AI did have its flaws

[windebieste]

It's a great game; and I do love it.  I'm sure the reason the developer went with using pistols and shotguns is for the sake of functional familiarity.  Everyone understands how they work. You squeeze the trigger and a projectile is shot from the muzzle.  It's an easy concept to grasp.  I don't think that anyone knows how the pistol in 'ALIEN' is supposed to work.  What's more, a scoped sight on a pistol?  ...really?

Anyway, I would love to have seen eggmorphing taking place in the game.  But some people think there's a Queen present and CA staff even mentioned that it's presence is indirectly hinted at - but never been verified.  Game designers talk a lot about what goes into a game and never make it happen.  For every idea that makes it into the game, there's 2 that failed to make an appearance.  It's just talk. 

As far as I am concerned, the math doesn't add up, either way when you look at it:  There's an abundance of open eggs throughout the latter part of the game and nowhere near the necessary number of facehugged victims present to account for them.  We just take it on face value that those victims are present somewhere in the game.  Like the Queen, I guess.

There's an abundance of other anomalies, too.  How does that facehugger get aboard the Anesidora, anyway?  It's not like the game is without questions.  Why are there so many Nostromo boxes and containers surrounding the Jockey?  How doess that Alien get aboard the Torrens?  So many questions you could ask...

One thing for sure, there's a good reason why the game doesn't support objects being randomly pushed around.  Once you add physics properties to such items and relocate an object, say a box or table, then the AI has to be capable of convincingly navigating its way around the newly placed obstacle.  Additional code for that would have to be written for the AI would to recognise, act and behave appropriately.  It's at this point that you're coming up against the Law of Diminishing returns for making the game.  It would be nice to have it present in the game, but would it really justify the additional expense of implementing it, testing, ensuring that dynamic lighting works across all surfaces of the object and cast appropriate shadows, making sure it's not just a gimmick and actually work as intended.  I's actually a lot to ask.

-Windebieste.
 

[Olde]

The game has more problems than that. Suffice it to say that the "laser pistol" and "speargun," to my knowledge, didn't have clear uses in Alien (1979). The weapon that Ripley fires at the alien looks like a harpoon weapon, which I assume would have been used for either linking objects together or grappling, the latter of which would have been a good idea to implement into the game. I have no idea what the laser pistol would have been used for, perhaps welding or cutting through debris. The presence of a scope on it isn't unusual, but what is baffling is what the use would be.

The problem I have is the presence of weapons altogether, especially the shotgun but to a lesser extent the flamethrower, which is the same issue I take with Bioshock. You're talking about an enclosed, self-sufficient, supposedly peaceful area in a hostile exterior climate (either space or underwater), which is reliant on the cooperation of multiple people. It is to the detriment of everyone's survival to permit even a single weapon on board, for reasons so obvious that it needs no elaboration. Why on earth do you need a shotgun on a space station? How many weapons are on board the international space station? Of course, if there weren't any weapons in the game at all, the FPS players would cry foul, so CA had to acquiesce. It still doesn't legitimize their presence in my opinion, though.

[SpreadEagleBeagle]

It's a great game; and I do love it.  I'm sure the reason the developer went with using pistols and shotguns is for the sake of functional familiarity.  Everyone understands how they work. You squeeze the trigger and a projectile is shot from the muzzle.  It's an easy concept to grasp.  I don't think that anyone knows how the pistol in 'ALIEN' is supposed to work.  What's more, a scoped sight on a pistol?  ...really?

Yes, but there is a lot of things that functionally and technically aren't logical in the game. For example low-tech computers and such. But it is there because they wanted to stay true to ALIEN. Not implementing the Speargun is a huge miss if you ask me, as it could've added even more strategies for the player.

Anyway, I would love to have seen eggmorphing taking place in the game.  But some people think there's a Queen present and CA staff even mentioned that it's presence is indirectly hinted at - but never been verified.

I've read that too. Even so, leaving her (the queen) out of the game, considering that A:I is somewhat based on ALIEN - which had Egg-Morphing in it, I assumed that that's what they were going for (egg-morphing).
 

As far as I am concerned, the math doesn't add up, either way when you look at it:  There's an abundance of open eggs throughout the latter part of the game and nowhere near the necessary number of facehugged victims present to account for them.  We just take it on face value that those victims are present somewhere in the game.  Like the Queen, I guess.

There's an abundance of other anomalies, too.  How does that facehugger get aboard the Anesidora, anyway?  It's not like the game is without questions.  Why are there so many Nostromo boxes and containers surrounding the Jockey?  How doess that Alien get aboard the Torrens?  So many questions you could ask...

Well, it's a game! Games usually have to sacrifice realism and such for game mechanics, conveniences and narratives. Anomalies are to be expected.

One thing for sure, there's a good reason why the game doesn't support objects being randomly pushed around.  Once you add physics properties to such items and relocate an object, say a box or table, then the AI has to be capable of convincingly navigating its way around the newly placed obstacle.  Additional code for that would have to be written for the AI would to recognise, act and behave appropriately.  It's at this point that you're coming up against the Law of Diminishing returns for making the game.  It would be nice to have it present in the game, but would it really justify the additional expense of implementing it, testing, ensuring that dynamic lighting works across all surfaces of the object and cast appropriate shadows, making sure it's not just a gimmick and actually work as intended.  I's actually a lot to ask.

You're right about that. It would've made the game incredibly hard to program and balance. But at leas t few standardized objects, like certain types of crates, chairs or tables. Crates can be pushed to block doors/entrances, certain smaller chairs can be thrown and certain lighter tables can be toppled over. Nothing major.

[windebieste]

Yeah.  The purpose for those items is never really made clear.  Both the 'pistol' and the 'speargun' could be tools for all we know and not weapons.  Mind you, that of course doesn't prevent tools from being used as weapons.   Replacing them with familiar weapons removes the ambiguity.  We all know the purpose of a pistol or a shotgun.  Their uses are unmistakable. 

It's also very grounding when you see that the weapons use familiar ballistic ammunition as well.  We understand what bullets and shotgun shells are.  If we have to accept 'lasers', 'blasters' and other energy or particle weapons in a game of this nature, it begins to lose that very real and grounded sensibility that the game delivered so strongly.

As for there being weapons aboard the Sevastopol, I think that's easily justified.  It's not just an orbital research facility manned by trained Nasa personnel.  It's a port of call for travelers in the region.  The destination board in the flight terminal suggests the station sees quite some traffic through the station.  There's no telling who is traveling through the place.  Armed guards would be present.  Just like armed guards carrying assault rifles at Los Angeles air port.  The same goes for the marshals and other security forces.  Arming them would be necessary.  So I have no trouble with that. 

You can bet that the pistol Marlow used to threaten Nina was his own.  Kept on the Anesidora.  So there's always the possibility of smuggled weapons as well.

Then there's always this. 
http://www.universetoday.com/118829/did-you-know-soviet-cosmonauts-carried-a-bear-killing-shotgun-into-space/

-Windebieste.

[SpreadEagleBeagle]

The game has more problems than that. Suffice it to say that the "laser pistol" and "speargun," to my knowledge, didn't have clear uses in Alien (1979). The weapon that Ripley fires at the alien looks like a harpoon weapon, which I assume would have been used for either linking objects together or grappling, the latter of which would have been a good idea to implement into the game. I have no idea what the laser pistol would have been used for, perhaps welding or cutting through debris. The presence of a scope on it isn't unusual, but what is baffling is what the use would be.

The problem I have is the presence of weapons altogether, especially the shotgun but to a lesser extent the flamethrower, which is the same issue I take with Bioshock. You're talking about an enclosed, self-sufficient, supposedly peaceful area in a hostile exterior climate (either space or underwater), which is reliant on the cooperation of multiple people. It is to the detriment of everyone's survival to permit even a single weapon on board, for reasons so obvious that it needs no elaboration. Why on earth do you need a shotgun on a space station? How many weapons are on board the international space station? Of course, if there weren't any weapons in the game at all, the FPS players would cry foul, so CA had to acquiesce. It still doesn't legitimize their presence in my opinion, though.

I don't know if there is an exact number, but it seems like Sevastopol is pretty huge and that there are enough people there for criminal activity to occur. If that is the case one would think that there must be some kind of law enforcement / police on-board, or at least security officers and staff, which might be the ones carrying revolvers and shotguns, much like in the movie Outland (with Sean Connery).

Personally I could've done without the revolvers and shotguns and instead gone with the tools-as-weapons kind of route, including manufacturing your own weapons and devices. That said, the "Laser" Pistol in ALIEN has been suggested to be a low-yield laser gun that can be used to cut/weld with up-close, but also stun, possibly blind, targets from afar. It makes sense not to have weapons with penetration power on board a spaceship for obvious hull-breach reasons. The flamethrower in ALIEN seems to be more like a flamer meant to burn and disintegrate debris, dust and whatnot without causing a fire. The fuel inside those flamers burn fast and doesn't seem to stick and burn at high temperatures, like the fuel of a military issued flamethrower or incendiary weapon (i.e. no napalm or thermite), as the purpose of these incinerator devices is the one of a tool rather than a weapon.

Yeah.  The purpose for those items is never really made clear.  Both the 'pistol' and the 'speargun' could be tools for all we know and not weapons.  Mind you, that of course doesn't prevent tools from being used as weapons.   Replacing them with familiar weapons removes the ambiguity.  We all know the purpose of a pistol or a shotgun.  Their uses are unmistakable. 

It's also very grounding when you see that the weapons use familiar ballistic ammunition as well.  We understand what bullets and shotgun shells are.  If we have to accept 'lasers', 'blasters' and other energy or particle weapons in a game of this nature, it begins to lose that very real and grounded sensibility that the game delivered so strongly.

I understand that part as I'm not a big fan of "energy weapons" in supposedly realistic video games. Even so, A:I is supposed to pay more than a tribute to ALIEN, which it is really good at. Introducing new weapons that could've easily been replaced by already existing weaponry/tools from ALIEN is, according to me, a missed opportunity. They could've easily asked Ridley Scott wether Kane's pistol is a traditionally ballistic/kinetic weapon or some sort of directed energy/particle weapon. And if it is indeed a laser, the actual laser beam doesn't have to visible. The only hint that you're firing a laser could be that the ricochet  is more fitting a weaponized laser (a burning dot of light, or a heated molten hole, a smoking flare etc.). The sound it makes doesn't have to be "pew-pew!" either.

To make the laser more interesting the power of the laser becomes weaker the further away the target is. Up close it can cut through a human or android, whereas from afar it only slightly dazzles or stuns humans/androids. Against Aliens it fares just as badly as the Revovler in the game.

[TheBATMAN]

The problem I have is the presence of weapons altogether, especially the shotgun but to a lesser extent the flamethrower, which is the same issue I take with Bioshock. You're talking about an enclosed, self-sufficient, supposedly peaceful area in a hostile exterior climate (either space or underwater), which is reliant on the cooperation of multiple people. It is to the detriment of everyone's survival to permit even a single weapon on board, for reasons so obvious that it needs no elaboration. Why on earth do you need a shotgun on a space station? How many weapons are on board the international space station? Of course, if there weren't any weapons in the game at all, the FPS players would cry foul, so CA had to acquiesce. It still doesn't legitimize their presence in my opinion, though.

They have weapons for exactly the same reason many security forces on Earth carry weapons. The files in the game mention that this region of space and Sevastopol itself has a huge smuggling problem. Comparing it to the International Space Station is just daft as that is a just a tiny station full of dedicated, trained astronauts and scientists and somewhere the general public will never have access. Sevastopol is a freeport full of traders and literally hundreds of other people passing through each day, very much like a modern-day airport, so there's an obvious need for a high security presence, and that presence will obviously  need to be armed. Then there's also the fact that people permanently live on the station, which is also full of multiple shops, businesses and licensed premises, and with all of those things you get crime.

Frankly Sevastopol not having any weapons of any kind would be a massive oddity.

But in terms of missed opportunities, for me what would have made the game perfect would be unlockable story DLC where you are trying to hunt the chestburster down. It would be RPG-ish where you could roam the station and actually speak with people such as Lingard and Ransome before the shit hit the fan.

[𝔗𝔥𝔢 𝔈𝔦𝔤𝔥𝔱𝔥 𝔓𝔞𝔰𝔰𝔢𝔫𝔤𝔢𝔯]

The game has more problems than that. Suffice it to say that the "laser pistol" and "speargun," to my knowledge, didn't have clear uses in Alien (1979). I have no idea what the laser pistol would have been used for, perhaps welding or cutting through debris. The presence of a scope on it isn't unusual, but what is baffling is what the use would be.

Howdy...

[Flexserve]

Isolation suffered from mostly technological flaws. By that I mean some blatant programming errors that were never fixed.

Scripting had issues in parts (Meaning programming, not dialogue)
Absence of working AA (A powerful video card and DSR fixes this though)

As far as the technological feel for it's time it was spot on. Soundtrack was done perfectly as well.

I wished they would have given us the option of an Alien model (original 1979) after beating the game once..or at the VERY least a multiplayer scenario on the Nostromo would have been very cool with player controlled android and alien as well as player controlled crew members. That would at least answer the TRUE question: How would we as humans reacted and survived (or not) in the Nostromo scenario? They had all the maps and doodads to make this mode ULTRA cool!

[windebieste]

Actually, all of the above.  All of it.  ABSOLUTELY ALL OF IT!.

...but the biggest missed opportunity was failing to release any mod tools for the game. 

-Windebieste.

[Olde]

the biggest missed opportunity was failing to release any mod tools for the game. 

Companies just don't do that anymore. I think the biggest missed opportunity was failing to incorporate multiplayer with a player-controlled android and alien. Not totally sure how that would logistically work, though.

Howdy...

https://beezkneezblogblog.files.wordpress.com/2014/12/elgyn.jpg

Howdy!

[windebieste]

the biggest missed opportunity was failing to release any mod tools for the game. 

Companies just don't do that anymore.

(My apologies for complete and unbridled imminent sarcasm) Yeah, sadly you are right. 

Except for maybe some companies like Bethesda.  You can bet that mod tools will be released for 'Fallout 4' in 2016.  ... Oh, and for 'Doom', too.  They're getting all worked up about how easily it is to get into their 'Snap Map' editor. 

...and don't forget, 'Minecraft', which really is one big fat mod tool.

I guess CD Project Red released a set of mod tools for 'The Witcher 3' as well.  Sure, they weren't as extensive as others in the past, but they still got released. 

Oh, and 'Dying Light' developer Techland released theirs as well.

So yeah, you are correct.  I guess no one releases mod tools any more.  There's just no one interested in modding any more.

(End of sarcastic rant.  Hate to admit it.  Sorry, once again.)

-Windebieste.

[Flexserve]

the biggest missed opportunity was failing to release any mod tools for the game. 

Companies just don't do that anymore.

(My apologies for complete and unbridled imminent sarcasm) Yeah, sadly you are right. 

Except for maybe some companies like Bethesda.  You can bet that mod tools will be released for 'Fallout 4' in 2016.  ... Oh, and for 'Doom', too.  They're getting all worked up about how easily it is to get into their 'Snap Map' editor. 

...and don't forget, 'Minecraft', which really is one big fat mod tool.

I guess CD Project Red released a set of mod tools for 'The Witcher 3' as well.  Sure, they weren't as extensive as others in the past, but they still got released. 

Oh, and 'Dying Light' developer Techland released theirs as well.

So yeah, you are correct.  I guess no one releases mod tools any more.  There's just no one interested in modding any more.

(End of sarcastic rant.  Hate to admit it.  Sorry, once again.)

-Windebieste.

YUP, I was hoping that modders could fix issues and make new modes. What ever happened to TC's (Total Conversions) of Alien(s)?

[Olde]

sarcastic rant

Ah, you're right, how stupid of me. Game companies nowadays are releasing their modding tools and SDKs all over the place. That must be why we've gotten so many extensive mods for the recent major releases of Alien-related games.