Mingan on 21/2/2008 at 04:35
Are you going to have that conversation all over? Again? For the nth time?
Scots Taffer on 21/2/2008 at 04:42
I will kill every motherfucker in the room.
Rogue Keeper on 21/2/2008 at 08:15
Quote Posted by Mingan
Are you going to have that conversation all over? Again? For the nth time?
Whatever, whenever.
Anyway, colonial marines are fine and well, and the new Aliens game may look good but the concept GETTING SO OLD. Besides, they have been copied so many times... tatatata, etc...
What I'd like to see for a long time, is a game based on the first film, at least in gross idea - essentially it would not be a wild shooter, but a first-person SURVIVAL HORROR combined with ADVENTURE, where you would be in role of a civilian with limited or no access to weapons, in closed environment like Nostromo spaceship is. And you would have only ONE Alien on board. Maybe you could control one of more crew members and when that one dies, you would assume role of the next crew member with highest rank and try to figure out with your crew, HOW THE HELL YOU CAN GET RID OF THAT THING. Part of the goodness of Alien film comes from desperation and dense psychological clashes between the crew members, a beautiful thing which nearly vanished in Aliens stuff, focused on action and BOO scares.
The game would be written and designed so that one Alien drone would scare you more than their hordes in AvP games.
Who's up for that?
EvaUnit02 on 21/2/2008 at 09:15
Quote Posted by BR796164
but a first-person SURVIVAL HORROR combined with ADVENTURE, where you would be in role of a civilian with limited or no access to weapons, in closed environment like Nostromo spaceship is.
As long as it's not like Penumbra's combat. I'm so sick of the survival horror genre's tendency for creating tension through frustration over poorly implemented game mechanics. They finally scrapped the shitty awkward camera angles and crap digital movement from 3rd person Survival horror games, but then came Penumbra whom chucks the basic combat mechanics of FPS out the window.
Muzman on 21/2/2008 at 10:29
Quote Posted by BR796164
What I'd like to see for a long time, is a game based on the first film, at least in gross idea - essentially it would not be a wild shooter, but a first-person SURVIVAL HORROR combined with ADVENTURE, where you would be in role of a civilian with limited or no access to weapons, in closed environment like Nostromo spaceship is. And you would have only ONE Alien on board. Maybe you could control one of more crew members and when that one dies, you would assume role of the next crew member with highest rank and try to figure out with your crew, HOW THE HELL YOU CAN GET RID OF THAT THING.
...
The game would be written and designed so that one Alien drone would scare you more than their hordes in AvP games.
This idea I like very much. I can hardly concieve of a development studio with the balls to do it these days (perhaps one run by women is needed. It would fit the material after all)
Rogue Keeper on 21/2/2008 at 10:48
I don't see it as a problem of dev studio, they can have good ideas... it's the problem to convince the bizsuits that it's a solid material that would do fine on the market. There is no question who would publish it - Fox Interactive. But it seems Fox had always in interest only selling us stuff based on Aliens. Those two or three old games based on Alien 3 and Resurrection were bad enough and I'm afraid they see Alien 1 as an arty stuff not appealing mainstream players. But survival horror is an established subgenre and if games like Alone In The Dark, Silent Hill or Penumbra received good critics for artistic approach and at the same time they were commercially succesful, I don't know why Alien Survival Horror wouldn't have a chance.
What I would take as an argument to convince them ? In the first place game based on The Thing, but also Scarface and Ghostbusters (which will earn enough I believe). They prove well that games based on old movies can still have appeal, IF they're done right.
*More ideas for the game : Every crew member would have his special technical, scientific abilities or leadership skills. For example
Enginereers would be good in constructing gadgets and repairs of the ship, doing technical tricks, while scientific members would be able to research Alien's strengths and weaknesses and officers would be superior leaders with higher morale and problem-solving ability. And when a crew member dies, it will be a huge loss, as it will severely limit your options how you can destroy the Alien.
Another main strength of the game would be detailed model of the spaceship and it's working sub-systems, which you can use in various ways to your advantage. There would be many opportunities for you, but it would depend on skills of your crew and your wit, how you use and combine these opportunities.
catbarf on 21/2/2008 at 11:46
Eh... I don't know. I think AI still aren't good enough to recreate that sort of emotional, psychological conflict without feeling scripted or robotic. And in order to make the loss of each crewman felt, they'd each have to be important. That leads to easily killing the alien if you can keep the crew alive, but getting mauled because one or two people die early on.
Angel Dust on 21/2/2008 at 12:12
I agree that a game of that scope would most likely not be possible to pull off today but the characters would not have to be important from a gameplay perspective to make you feel the loss. The best way would be to make them likeable human characters (as opposed to likeable caricatures).
Rogue Keeper on 21/2/2008 at 12:27
We shall figure that out... basically the cooperation would be based on character's morale level and intelligence, charisma... We can have stats for that, there is a possibility for RPG-like levelling up for certain accomplishments, like researched knowledge of Alien lifeform, construction of a gadget or weapon, repair and regular maintenace of the ship, or for being just able to convince your fellow crew members to try some new strategy. Well the crew members will be important, each for what he's skilled in. But you would be possibly able to gain new and improve your current weak skills to the crew members, a pilot would be able to learn medical skill through providing first aid to other crew member, or you buy him grade in technical skill, so he'll be able to repair damage caused by Alien's acidic blood, for example.
There would be a strong emphasis on making the Alien more cunning and intelligent than we are used to expect from this race as it has been portrayed in Aliens. His intelligence could be subject of game difficulty you select. In the first movie I thought that Alien is actually quite smart, watching and sensing what the humans are planning, he's travelling unseen through the ship, stalking prey that has been splitted from the crowd. The player would be often forced to split the crew into groups of 2, even send someone somewhere alone, if he wants to do more tasks simultaneously (leave the scientist in a lab, send engineers to repair the ship, etc.). And the Alien would normally keep himself away from large group of people, unless you invent an efficient trap strategy.
But because there would be different ways how to get rid of xenomorph, you wouldn't rely only on one's crewmember's help. F.e. if your scientist dies, you won't research sample of Alien's tissue and realize that he's vulnerable to fire, instead you could freeze him with this great freezing gun your engineer has just constructed from spare parts. Just the more people die, the more challenging the game will be and this would be the game's main trait - how to solve this problem with limited people and their skills left?
Of course all this would put a heavy burden on shoulders of a talented game designer, to create such complex game system - it must be balanced - and eventually some interesting ideas would be lost in the process, but it's not impossible - we have seen some interesting game worlds in RPGs which have been shaped during the campaign by your unique style of gameplay.