Alien: River of Pain (Book 3) - Reviews

Started by Perfect-Organism, Nov 18, 2014, 10:36:08 PM

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Alien: River of Pain (Book 3) - Reviews (Read 41,991 times)

predxeno

What exactly are these mistakes people are referring to?

Karpin

Overall i really enjoyed this.The Aliens were really well portrayed, especially the stealth aspect, how well they adapted to their shadowy industrial surroundings and the danger of the acid blood in the close confines where most of the action took place.

Just a few random observations...

I do think there was enough potential story there for a longer book, especially with the use of chapters from the films as a contextual framing, but the page count probably wasn't the author's choice anyway.We could have had a few more in-depth colonist characters, more scenes at the derelict and more fleshing out of some of the scenes we did get.I'd like to have seen more of the marines and administration guys efforts to track down the Aliens early on, before the PDT'S were remembered and used.There was about a day and a half/two days there that could have been more elaborated on.Some stuff about the Marines trying to secure and scour the duct system would have had great potential.

I didn't notice the Marines using any smart guns or motion trackers.It probably wouldn't have made much difference to many of the encounters, but i would have expected to have at least the motion trackers mentioned and used for the scenes later on between the team that went over to attack the hive and the ones left guarding the sealed D-block perimeter.Maybe they did get used during the hunt for the hive, once the colonists were all secured in various locations, but we didn't get to see that.

The conclusion to the Draper arc left me a bit let down.As soon as i knew some of the newt's tale scenes were being used\reworked, i had a good idea of how he was going to die(and that was a great scene when did happen in slightly reworked fashion), but when he finds out about the escape ship and abandons Brackett with the survivors of the team(not sure they would have just gone along with him closing the lift on the cap and abandoning him tbh) i expected to see more of that group of marines\things go a different way.but no, we just get the newts tale-esque death as his only other appearance.Not sure how i felt about that.I would have liked him as a point-of-view character had the book been longer, or even a chapter or two from his perspective after he abandons Brackett, following his failed attempt to get to the escape craft.

Lastly, between the revelations of the amount of Aliens killed in this, and the escape of the colonists in the Onager with the fire and stone arc, what do you think the numbers were in the hive by the time Ripley, Burke and co. get there?.I've not read fire and stone yet, so i don't know how many colonists got away on the onager, but i'm guessing there were about 15-20 or so killed for sure without being facehugged in ROP, and about 20-25 Aliens killed by the Marines.

I'm thinking there would be roughly 90-100 in the hive when Gorman's team gets there?.It all seems to work out quite well.No glaring errors like the marines mowing down scores and scores of Aliens.They were a deadly and well portrayed threat in this.






Machiko Naguchi

Machiko Naguchi

#122
I thought the book was pretty good overall. I didn't seem to notice or be bothered by as many of the mistakes as some people were. Usually those things don't bother me too much compared to other people unless it is something really massive and not just a word of dialogue or small detail. I take it as a separate piece of entertainment and don't expect everything to be exactly the same.

One thing I didn't like was how the marines apparently handled the derelict when they were sent out to secure it following the Jorden's accident. Knowing the danger of what had happened to Russ, they apparently still went right in and got a dozen or so people facehugged? WTF? It just seemed way to forced in order to boost the alien number for the colony takeover. And then like someone else said they just let all of the chestbursters come out with only minimal attempt to stop them.

And like some others have said, the parts with Ripley at beginning and end I found to be not necessary and rather redundant. We all know the content here and it seemed to be only for filler. If they wanted to use some for connection reasons then just have a page or two, but not the amount that they had at the beginning and end.

Everlasting Undead

I have to admit, I read the book and found it... kinda flat.

I am a massive fan of the aliens series, and have been for decades. Ever since I first started reading the Bantam/ Dark Horse novels in the early 90s based on the comics of the time, I think it's safe to say that every book I bought, I read within a couple of days.

River of Pain took a lot longer.

It's not that it was a bad book, it's just that it wasn't great, considering the potential.

It offered very little to the series, and in my eyes tells a tale that we already knew in one respect or another. Pieces lifted straight from the script of the film itself felt they were in for little or no reason, other than to remind us it ties in to another movie.

The main story itself took something like 150 pages to kick in, and in all honesty, there's nothing great there, content wise. A lot of characters felt 'meh', as if they're were in there because they have to be, because they're there in the film. It's a different take on the comic "adaption" of the film, Newt's Tale, which is I felt was better in many aspects of the tale. After reading the previous two books of the new series and their original tales, and then reading the synopsis of this book before it was released, I couldn't help but feel disappointed that they'd balked from the new original stories and retold what we knew already: Surveyors went somewhere they were told, guy got tagged by a facehugger, colony falls.

Questions were left unanswered: the most important one -
Spoiler
What happened to Casey's body?
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Something that did strike me as odd, as that Newt doesn't talk or act like any 6-7 year old I know. I guess you mature quicker in space...

predxeno

Quote from: Machiko Naguchi on May 02, 2015, 04:08:39 PM
I thought the book was pretty good overall. I didn't seem to notice or be bothered by as many of the mistakes as some people were. Usually those things don't bother me too much compared to other people unless it is something really massive and not just a word of dialogue or small detail. I take it as a separate piece of entertainment and don't expect everything to be exactly the same.

One thing I didn't like was how the marines apparently handled the derelict when they were sent out to secure it following the Jorden's accident. Knowing the danger of what had happened to Russ, they apparently still went right in and got a dozen or so people facehugged? WTF? It just seemed way to forced in order to boost the alien number for the colony takeover. And then like someone else said they just let all of the chestbursters come out with only minimal attempt to stop them.

And like some others have said, the parts with Ripley at beginning and end I found to be not necessary and rather redundant. We all know the content here and it seemed to be only for filler. If they wanted to use some for connection reasons then just have a page or two, but not the amount that they had at the beginning and end.

I still don't get what any of these "mistakes" are? ???

The Alien Predator

From the top of my head, I remember one glaring mistake within the Derelict.

There was no hole for the characters to go down and find the huge chamber with the eggs, instead the eggs were surrounding the Space Jockey's seat.

I think someone else mentioned this earlier in the thread. If you are familiar with the films, it can be a tad bit distracting. So when I got to that part, I just pretended they found the hole and rappelled down to find the eggs...

There could be some other bloopers, but that was one that is memorable to me.


Edit: And I remember the author repeatedly calling the Pulse Rifles "plasma rifles" when they aren't plasma rifles. Sea of Sorrows has actual Plasma Rifles that shoot plasma. Pulse Rifles do not shoot plasma.

HuDaFuK

Quote from: predxeno on May 02, 2015, 10:36:03 PMI still don't get what any of these "mistakes" are? ???

If you know Aliens well, the book was full of things that don't correlate to what we see in the film.

Everlasting Undead

I can't remember much of the book and the way it unfolds, but I'm pretty sure in the film they talk about seismic charges and small arms fire... Small arms wouldn't include plasma or pulse rifles. But like I say, my in-depth memory of the book isn't great for the details, just the overall feel of it.

Corporal Hicks

Quote from: predxeno on May 02, 2015, 10:36:03 PM
I still don't get what any of these "mistakes" are? ???

The major mistake is in the Derelict, as mentioned above. Golden merges the egg chamber and pilot chamber together into one room. It was a genuine mistake on his part but it was just so glaring.

The rest of the mistakes are smaller but still quite noticeable. Small dialogue errors, the weaponry as mentioned above.

My biggest issue was the inclusion of the marines. He wrote them into the story really well and I loved Brackett but I just couldn't get over them being there.

However, I loved everything about the colonists. About the frontier life and Golden's view on the whole W-Y knew all along thing. Despite the mistakes, I still enjoyed the book and rate it above any of the DH Press ones.

HuDaFuK

Quote from: Corporal Hicks on May 03, 2015, 01:35:24 PMMy biggest issue was the inclusion of the marines. He wrote them into the story really well and I loved Brackett but I just couldn't get over them being there.

I know it was written as a build-up to Aliens, so I guess the Aliens influence was basically inevitable, but part of me really wishes he'd dropped the Marines completely and gone for more of a horror-based, blue collar guys vs. Xenomorphs scenario, more like Alien but simply with more players on each side. I think seeing the colonists trying to cope without the perceived safety net of trained soldiers to fall back on would've been far more engrossing. If you wanted guys with guns hanging around he could always have taken some pointers from Alien: Isolation and thrown in a couple of Colonial Marshals, whose presence would be a lot easier to justify.

Corporal Hicks

I completely agree. I would have quite liked to have seen Colonial Marshalls myself but I guess there was no overlap between Titan or Creative Assembly. And there is the fact that it was another one of those Fox mandated inclusions handed down.

Mr. Clemens

I feel the same. As soon as Colonial Marines get involved, I know it's gonna be another by-the-numbers, wise-crackin' cigar-chompin' Aliens clone. Opening up the universe a bit and giving us Colonial Marshalls, like Outland meets Aliens, would have been a lot more interesting.

Still the most enjoyable book of the three, though.

Machiko Naguchi

Like I said earlier, my biggest problem was when the marines went to the derelict. They were supposed to guard it to keep more bad shit from happening and somehow a dozen or so come back with facehuggers. That seemed highly implausible to me and was done just to boost the alien numbers for the takeover. Anybody else find that annoying?

True marines aren't usually very smart and maybe a curious one would have wondered inside the egg chamber, but they are also pretty good about following orders so I don't think the entire group would have just walked right in after they knew what had happened to Russ.

HuDaFuK

Yeah, that was one of the things that struck me as particularly dumb.

Maybe if they'd added some kind of explanation whereby the W-Y scientists set it up to further their "research", then that would've made it a little more plausible, but leaving it unexplained just made the Marines seem like retards.

Prez

I've been binge reading all of the books in this trilogy.

Enjoyed Shadows (and the audio book version too) and Sorrows too.

River of Pain has taken a while to get going but the chapter with Russ & Anne Jorden exploring the Derelict is interesting.

Spoiler
So given these books are now considered canon we now have the Derelict having a crew who fought and lost(?) a battle with their cargo ... in that the original space jockey wasn't alone. There was a queen on board who was killed in battle by an engineer which she slayed in the process.

Thoughts on this especially given we know Covenant is bringing the Engineers back and according to Ridley will be the bridge to Alien.
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