Alien: Rogue Incursion Meta Quest 3 Impressions & Survios Visit

Alien’s first foray into the realms of virtual reality, Alien: Rogue Incursion, released on Steam VR and PlayStation VR2 back in December 2024. A third version of the game, which runs natively within the headset hardware of the Meta Quest 3, was delayed until yesterday, February 13th 2025. Survios had said they needed some extra time to get this version right.

The Meta Quest 3 headset is the successor to the legacy of the Oculus Rift which Meta acquired back in 2014 before the first generation consumer model of the Oculus Rift even released. I had never used a Meta Quest headset until my visit to developer Survios last November to try a demo of Rogue Incursion. For that demo, the Meta Quest 3 was connected to a PC with a cable, so the game was being run using PC hardware. I was really impressed with what I played of that demo, and when the game did release, we quite enjoyed it!

More recently, Survios invited us back out to their offices for a press & influencer event to try out the fully untethered version of the game. Being quite curious about this version, I ventured back out to Southern California to give it a shot.

Upon entering the Survios building, it was completely different to how I remembered from my previous visit – the whole space was transformed into the dark and spooky facility of Castor’s Cradle on Purdan. This themed space and just how well put together the production was ended up being the real highlight of my visit, so I’ll be talking about that after sharing my thoughts on the demo I played.

So how does the Meta Quest version stack up? Honestly… from what I experienced, not very well. Keep in mind this is not a full review of this version, but this was the same segment of Alien: Rogue Incursion I played through during my first visit to Survios, and a section I had become familiar with from playing the game on release. It was just running on different hardware. Right after putting on the headset and entering the demo, I could tell that graphically this was a significantly scaled back version of the game.

The resolution overall seemed lower, the framerate wasn’t buttery smooth like I was used to from the PSVR2 version, and things even got a bit choppy. I couldn’t really make out the dynamic shadows in the game, it seemed like they had been either reduced or completely cut from this version.

As I made my way through this corridor sequence with Davis 01, the Xenomorphs attacked. When this activity started happening, I noticed a wave of pixelation which appeared, seemingly to maintain the framerate during this high action sequence.

Continuing down the hallways, there was another differing element I noticed. Everything was very… blue, much more so than what I was used to. There was a thick draw distance haze which appeared more as a fog of war than anything else. Seemingly gone was the volumetric fog that so impressed me in the PSVR2 version.

Here are some examples of exactly how the game looked during this demo sequence:

So much of the immersive experience of Alien: Rogue Incursion relies on the incredible atmosphere. It’s a huge part of the game’s appeal for me as an Alien fan, and the Meta Quest 3 version unfortunately just doesn’t measure up to how the game should be experienced.

It’s not all bad, though. I will say, though I consider the PSVR2 version to be the best way to experience the game, given its impressive graphics, and that it’s the only version with haptic vibration in the headset itself, the Meta Quest 3 is the most comfortable VR headset I’ve tried. It’s also an incredibly crisp image when playing with the headset while it’s tethered.

If you have a gaming PC that meets the recommended specs, I’d highly recommend using your Meta Quest 3 headset to play the PCVR version of the game, as you’ll be getting a much more visually impressive experience.

Apparently a significant patch is coming next week to address some of these issues with the Quest version.

If you have a Meta Quest 3 headset and use it natively and without a gaming PC, I imagine you’ll still be able to have a decent experience with Alien: Rogue Incursion. However, after having been completely spoiled from playing the PSVR2 version, I can only really recommend the native Meta Quest 3 version if it’s your only avenue for experiencing VR games, and you really want to play Rogue Incursion.

It just feels like the hardware is barely hanging on with this game. Hopefully, once Meta eventually releases their next headset, we’ll be able to have a completely untethered experience that is visually on par with PSVR2 and PCVR. Either that or fingers crossed Survios can improve the optimization for this version with further patches.

Now as far as my visit itself goes, I gotta hand it to Survios, they put on a fantastic event for this demo. I’ve always loved Alien attractions and themed spaces, be them Halloween Horror Nights AvP mazes, Madame Tussauds Alien: Covenant experience, the ill-fated Malaysia theme park area, or the now defunct Alien: Descent attraction, they’re the one thing that can be more immersive than VR itself for me.

Right when I entered the building, I passed a black curtain into a dark space. After I was checked in, I had a look around this dark and moody entrance area. The classic Alien alarm siren was blaring, red warning lights were going off, and a gigantic monitor was swaying back and forth as it displayed the Gemini Exoplanet Solutions logo and various other imagery. Tubes were chaotically strewn across the ceiling, and one of the larger ones was dripping neon green (Kenner style) slime.

I continued into a scare hallway set like an industrial space with thick mist covering the floor. Ahead was a monitor displaying camera feeds from the facility. I was surprised by a survivor (scare actor) behind some barrels, scratch marks strewn across his face. He got my attention by telling me:

“It got loose! Check the monitor! Check the monitor!”

I obliged and examined the screen, then a Facehugger shot out of a mist filled case and gave me a good scare. After exiting this hallway, I passed through some strip curtains flanked by alarm klaxon lights into the main waiting area. This larger room was awesome, really evoking the feel of a facility in the midst of a Xenomorph outbreak.

While I was waiting for my timeslot to play through the demo, I enjoyed conversations with some of the folks around. There was a representative from the Walt Disney Archives, who told me that the Alien eggs on display were actual props used in the film Alien: Covenant.

There was a bar sporting the Gemini Exoplanet Solutions logo and featuring Alien themed cocktails, as well as some awesome looking Alien-themed hors d’oeuvres. I couldn’t help but think of the “Disney shill” accusations I was putting myself at risk of while I enjoyed these. To be honest, though, I wish there were more themed Alien experiences like this for the public. Predator cosplayer who goes by “ozzyhuntress” suggested an Alien-themed nightclub, how cool would that be?! You’ve done it with Star Wars, Disney!

In the back of this room was a large frosted window which showed the shadows of Xenomorphs, facehuggers, and hapless humans trying (and failing) to survive. These shadows were using the same models from the game. Another facehugger was projected onto the wall, emerging from an egg. It reared up before scurrying away.

In the center of the room was more dripping slime into an acid-burned drum. One of the tubes even shook as I could hear a facehugger scuttering through. Not even the bathroom was safe. It was filled with red warning lights and after the door closed an air canon gave me another jump scare.

This was just a top-tier level atmospheric space, and I really have to hand it to Creative Director Steven Petersen and his team at CLOVE for putting this together. We’re planning to have him on the podcast soon to actually discuss this topic of themed spaces.

Check out some more shots of the event space below:

So while the demo itself was unfortunately not at the quality I was hoping for, the journey out to LA was totally worth it just to vibe out in this space for a bit. I also had the opportunity to talk a bit more with Eugene Elkin, the game’s director and lead software engineer. We’ll be looking to have some folks from Survios on the podcast soon to discuss Alien: Rogue Incursion in more details. A big thanks to them for the invite out to this really great event.

From AvP Galaxy, this is Ridgetop signing off.