Fox Announces Alien: Isolation Digital Series!

[skhellter]

Just watched the first episode and this animation is pretty ugly at least on Amanda in this picture, and it's distracting to how it looks completely different than the actual cutscenes.

An Alien Isolation animated series isn't a bad concept..

But, jesus christ...  This is embarrassing.

[Xenomorphine]

Adding new story beats doesn't change the fact that this digital series look is based (literally) upon the game itself. It looks like the game itself! As I said before, it's just pure laziness. And IGN doing it? How can you give this game 5.9 out of 10?

IGN verdict: Mediocre

Alien: Isolation erases the memory of Colonial Marines, but it's still not the great Alien game we were hoping for.

Not the great game?

Can't say I disagree with that view, to be honest. It has a great nostalgic presentation style and sense of atmosphere, but is also very repetitive and unnecessarily frustrating (and that's before all the glitching and teleporting Alien/Amanda nonsense which made it unplayable for me, though I appreciate only some of us have that kind of experience and others never encounter it, for whatever reason).

That's part of why I'm looking forward to this alternative attempt at presenting its core story. Although, some of it has most definitely been changed.

It's resourceful and cost effective; I doubt effort was a consideration. They spent all that time and money on design, characters, locations, rigging -- why not reuse the material? It's better than a lot of DTV 3D animations get.

Agreed. Only seen two episodes, so far and, while there are some obvious problems with lip synching, it's a cost-effective and likely impressive presentation for those still unfamiliar with the game. If you've got great pre-existing assets, might as well use them.

[Samhain13]

Good lord those face animations triggered my Mass Effect Andromeda ptsd.

[Huggs]

Cheap and stinky so far.

Amanda looks awful.

I'll finish them, but the gameplay movies on YouTube are way better than this.

[TheSailingRabbit]

Cheap and stinky so far.

Amanda looks awful.

I'll finish them, but the gameplay movies on YouTube are way better than this.

I'm starting Ep. 5 after finishing the dishes.

Spoiler

They skipped San Cristobal. Why? I peed my pants when I watched the doctor get yanked into the void.

[close]

[XenoHunter99]

It's fine. I never played the game, but I bought the artbook. So I watch this and it's fine. I like the production design. I give the character animation a lot of slack. I could care less about Amanda Ripley, but... It's all fine. 

[Huggs]

It's fine. I never played the game, but I bought the artbook. So I watch this and it's fine. I like the production design. I give the character animation a lot of slack. I could care less about Amanda Ripley, but... It's all fine. 

No offense, but that's like saying " I've never seen gold but this bronze looks real nice".

As someone who owns and plays the game, this is indeed inferior.

[XenoHunter99]

Oh well. No time or patience to play the game, but I can spin through this at 1.5x speed and get caught up. Cheers to Fox for posting it.

[Ironb4lls]

I'm about five episodes in, and while I'm enjoying it, I'm also frustrated that they rushed it out so quickly.

First, the good: I loved the opening scene, once I realized it was picking up right where the game left off. I like seeing what happened to Amanda after we were left hanging at the end of the story. And the fact that her suit has propulsion explains how she was able to get back to the station from the jettisoned lab. I also like the new dialog from the original cast members. It adds to the story and gives more insight into things like Amanda's relationship with her mother, and Marlow's character.

The bad: Some of the edits are abrupt, like when it cuts straight from the Axle scene to the reveal in the comms room. Or when she talks to Apollo, then goes straight to overloading the reactor, but without showing us why.

The ugly: That model they added for the in-game engine scenes! Her skin looks all waxy, and the lip sync is on par with one of those old badly dubbed kung fu movies from the 1960s.

Yeah, I know it's free, and I like that they're giving A:I some more love these days, but this could've been really awesome if they'd just spent a little more time on it.

[The Kurgan]

It was alright for what it was.

The facial animations were horrible and just watching the story did not quite provide the same atmospheric experience as playing it yourself.
But all in all i enjoyed it.

[Voodoo Magic]

Will be watching it tonight!  Woot!

[Hudson]

I thought this was pretty cool, especially the extended ending which looks to be showcasing a deleted 3rd person segment. Some awkward transitions like from the end of level 8 to the beginning of level 11. But overall it was neat.

[TheSailingRabbit]

Spoiler

Jesus, Samuels dying still gets me.

Dude . . . they skipped the hive sequence?!

[close]

[Oasis Nadrama]

I just watched all of it and I'm FURIOUS.

The technical problems are something, yes (the "new" dialogue parts make the character's facial animations completely zombie-like, and there's some terrible sequences like Marlowe's end with shots where the camera is placed on his side of the glass panel and we still have his radio voice), but frankly that's not the worst thing.

I'm depressed at the amount of FPS shots in the finale product. This was an extremely bad idea, it doesn't work and remove any kind of immersion and consistency instead of adding to it. It constantly puts us in and out of Amanda's shoes, quite literally.

But the worst thing is

Spoiler

THE ABSENCE OF THE HIVE. WHAT THE f**k? WHAT THE EVERLASTING f**k?

[close]

The Hospital is understandable because in the end, it's just a "subquest". Even if it is magnificently tense, it is uninteresting plot-wise.

The Hive omission cannot be forgiven.

[Local Trouble]

Can we officially #whinge now?