Alien: Isolation Angry Review

tells all this [ __ ] in the name of science over my face take a seat someone will be with you shortly Apollo has the situation well at hand let the review begin they did it this was the game that I was waiting for this was the exact game that I was talking about in my aliens colonial Marines review I hope someone in the future sees the potential for survival horror in aliens franchise with some action elements imagine like amnesia mixed with aliens holy [ __ ] that would be a game everybody would be talking about well at least the first half of the game but it's finally here oddly enough it took a strategy game developer creative assembly to get it done and for their first whack at survival horror like this it's pretty impressive yes there are some issues some pretty big ones in the second half of the game but there is no doubt in my mind that if you were an alien fan like I am you owe it to yourself to pick this one up and support it even in this busy month of broke tober you will not regret it I can't lie to you about your chances but you know why so pathetic you play as Amanda Ripley Ellen Ripley's daughters who has made it her personal mission to find out just what happened to her mother the opening level has all of us walking around barefoot and in our panties no this takes you to a deep space trading station who has recently received a flight recorder from your mother ship on the Nostromo but in true alien fashion [ __ ] is just not right when you arrive Marshall Marshall this is the Tauron say again the sounds and the music are just as good and it's so important to get those right and they are beautifully done here eerie music plays at all the right moments intense music during chases and it feels directly from the film's its structural perfection is matched only by its hostility admire its purity a survivor unclouded by conscience remorse or delusions of morality and yeah I role play like nobody's business exploring every inch of that ship opening level and the art design is [ __ ] perfect it creates this flawless claustrophobic atmosphere of the original movies that no game to date has been able to reproduce the way it has here there's just so much authenticity and attention to detail in this retro futuristic looking technology it's just a marvel and a joy to look at all the different pieces in the environment even in the loading screens you can tell that the developers understood the atmosphere this retro you know 1980s VHS static type of stuff it's so good just like the films the games could win an award for it I like it see it starts off in the old school Jackie look at this dragon Joe it's retro you know futuristic I love the style - Dan and the game has this extremely strong opening you're exploring a substation that's had that catastrophic thing happened and it's just so creepy - step aboard the station alone to try to discover what's happened it's a game that is not so much scary as we all pretty much know what a xenomorph looks like but it's one that's dripping with atmosphere and filled with extreme tension impressive to do that with something that we've all seen and quantified many times before in the xeno and you'll quickly realize that it's not just the obvious xenomorph that you will have to contend with but also the station itself as it's literally falling apart in its orbit is decaying and there are many people left on that station some helpful others not so helpful they would rather kill and stay alive just just to survive and finally there's these creepy malfunctioning working Joe's that you will have to contend with on the station there this cheese competitor knockoff versions of the universal synthetics they're strong they're unfeeling and currently they're in a murderous rampage it's a unique enemy that's creative but unfortunately you spend a bit too much time fighting and just dealing with joes for my tastes do you require assistance yeah damnit what have I told you Joe a thousand times please do not sneak up on me working Joe's are not supposed to be creeping around the place bothering the workers we've told you this a thousand times no I don't need help thank you very much okay I appreciate it you always know working Joe really that's great that is a great piece of information but how does it help me do my work I really would appreciate it if you'd leave if you weren't always bothering me all day every day I could get my work done a lot faster thank wait according to stir Oh God are you hurting me initiate dance protocol 75 confirmed initiating dance beautiful times of bogey step back please cheap knockoffs [ __ ] gotta get in a [ __ ] Whalen model [ __ ] hate working with Joe's it's a nightmare though it is all trust satisfying and gross to just beat the [ __ ] out of a synthetic I must admit now the main enemy is of course the alien you start by briefly encountering it twice and that first encounter I wish was done a little bit better or combine that with the other two encounters just it would have been a little bit more effective when you first see the alien but alas when you finally do get that big reveal and you get up close and personal with the alien it's a great moment Joe Hyde get under this goddamn desk right here what is it look up go shoot it do whatever you need to do Joe wait I only have seven bullets your hand is shaking do it Joe no do it you think you're such a man with that big badass gun if I had more bullets all right well next time that alien comes after you why don't you whip out your gun quit [ __ ] messing around it was so important for this game to get its alien AI down correctly and for the most part they did it most horror games end up having this predictable AI path right what they're still fun but you eventually notice and learn the exact path that the enemies take every single time and like they drive around on a track and while this does happen a little bit for the humans and synthetics when you're going up against the alien all bets are off there are no scripted paths here the alien will often turn and reverse direction or even get a little bit more aggressive just at a moment's notice really the passcode is right behind you under the bass go do you close it close it close any place door doesn't automatically close subtle me I'm a little time then it closed all o [ __ ] down you got a job I'm Giovanni you started running you got up right you were walking around like it was nothing disrespecting the alien all this crowd no you were disrespecting him disrespected and what that does is it it forces you to make snap decisions and use your wits and and gadgets to deal with this incredibly unpredictable threat it's just the way it needed to be and that's what fuels most of the relentless tension that this game has and in suspense I freaking love it I mean you aren't even safe in vents or holes as I've seen the alien come crawling into those two to come get you that is scary as [ __ ] in those rare cases Dallas Dallas the game is hard and if you don't play by its rules you're gonna die a lot so much so that I had to reduce my difficulty back down to normal from hard so at least it's not a freaking breeze it's going to be frustrating stressful and annoying at times but once you find out how to work within its world it makes sense if you aren't patient if you don't like heavy stealth focus gameplay you won't enjoy this experience okay this is furthest from running and gunning and Call of Duty that you could get okay even the few sections that do have some some gunning will quickly attract the aliens attention so you'll always need an escape plan right away now granted some deaths can feel a bit cheap the alien can play tricks with you walk away and then just run at you until you you see Luigi Luigi man oh [ __ ] oh [ __ ] did he see me did he see me oh my god is he going in no way there's no [ __ ] way saw me Oh stealth is key here you should never ever run and when you're being chased try hiding under beds or outside or inside lockers like an outlast and I just love that added mechanic where if you use your all-important motion tracker wall close to the e and it will hear you okay they've even added a cool mechanic where you have to hold your breath and like lean back from the alien if it's aspects that you're in one of these lockers didn't you just walked into room he saw you I read some books I know all I saw was an l-akhirin it gets really intense when you're having to avoid both the alien and the working Joe's at the same time my palms were sweating like hell if the alien finds you though it's all over it's a one hit kill that's why it's nerve-wracking can't outrun it so don't even bother you can't kill it is you don't have like the heavy weapons of the colonial Marines but you do have inventive gadgets that can open up doors and Vance and alternate paths to help you avoid or even distract the alien and other enemies noisemakers smoke bombs emps Molotov cocktails can all be crafted using the game's crafting system making scavenging important throughout the game but the UI is clunky and you can't really cancel an item creation so you have to be careful when you're crafting and you can eventually find upgrades to your tools which will allow you to access deeper parts in previous station sections and find the various collectables most of whit's are kind of pointless like the ID cards sweet another ID card what do these actually do that's that's it are these are these the developers actually look like aliens Gary do like this is this is kind of stupid Oh what the hell but some are really interesting like the audio logs and then the straw most stuff voiced by the actual actors from the first movie like an undiscovered treasure trove that's how you do collectibles in fact there are entire levels devoted to just pure atmosphere where you and in effect do very little like the alien derelict mission it's about immersion it's a love letter to fans and I thank you so much Creative Assembly and Sega for having the balls to put in levels like this in this day and age it was a dream come true for fans and I think you'll agree if you play that level this is freakin cool oh [ __ ] space jockeys I am so going over there I'm going to explore the [ __ ] out of it that's good however the biggest source of challenge but also frustration is the game saving mechanic there's no autosave instead you must be on the lookout for phone booths to save your game there were a bunch of moments in the game that I had to replay over and over because I had forgot to save at a phone booth or there wasn't one nearby auto-saves I realize now have spoiled modern gamers on one hand I just hated that it didn't have it it could take out the phone when you have to replay a lengthy section multiple times but other moments I appreciated it knowing that I barely had any health and I needed to get past this section or die that heightened the nerve-wracking feelings and it made finding one of those phone booths just that much more rewarding just know it's gonna be frustrating as hell but it's ultimately a design decision that I I agree with now later in the game you acquire a flamethrower and you feel emboldened in you you can directly confront and push off the alien from killing you rather easily the tone at that point in the gameplay changes mimicking the film's much like how her mother Ellen Ripley transforms herself into a badass you get to go into a badass but you know the alien can still kill you and it becomes about finding your way off the station no surprisingly even after dealing with the alien there's tons more gain but actually that could be considered a bad thing it's like an editor in a movie you don't want to cut anything out of your baby because you think that it's all important it's more content for everyone but you have to ask yourself would it be a more effective story with it cut would it encourage players to play through it more without unnecessary filler now for ultra fans like myself I didn't mind the extra content and I really appreciated that I got my money's worth the game took me 19 hours to complete up to 20 with the additional DLC content I got my money's worth easy but for others who aren't mega fans I feel they probably would have preferred their story shorter without all the repetition through the same hallways and that's a legit point the backtracking now I get that they're trying to establish the station and make you feel like you are in it and you recognize things but you could do that with less back-and-forth gameplay easily so when you do die not only are you doing the same thing over but you're backtracking through the same areas over and over often with unpredictable alien AI who could kill you in a moment's notice it's a mix that has the potential to throw controllers across the [ __ ] room trust me it's happened now graphics and voice acting or quality though for some reason Amanda just sounds weird to me I don't I don't know what it is and and it doesn't help that the lip-syncing in the game is terrible there's also some difficulty hearing people if your head is oddly cocked to the side it's weird headphones fixes that though and I highly recommend that you play with a quality pair of headphones it is so much better with the surround sound and all those sounds closer by your ears the game I also must praise the lighting if that's important anywhere it's important in an alien game and I hope that you could play on the highest settings because it's a real treat see hold up hold up kids and this is this is the kind of lighting that go back to that this is the kind of lighting the colonial Marines wishes they had because there was this scene where colonial Marines completely changed from the concept to the are not the concept from the early version to the actual gameplay and it was just like that that that's a kick in the face the colonial Marines right there in fact it is all looking at me now the game does have its fair share of odd bugs I had the game fatally crash on me twice oh when I was playing with Joe we were ejected into space you see that that is [ __ ] [ __ ] go on and knock your accent and also Amanda's really scared of this particular door there are a few other nitpicky things like how the alien moves he never slithers or moves around on the walls or on all fours it's honestly it is small fries but their compromises that would have been awesome if they were included in the game as far as the DLC the crew expendable and last survivor are pretty good and together they'll add another hour of gameplay it's not substantial at all but the draw is the actual main cast voice acting from the main cast but you really won't be missing much if you didn't preorder it and you want to skip it honestly there's also a survivor mode with various time challenges to try to you know get on the leaderboard for but it's time now for the final verdict I really really want to give the game a high a score for all it does right but I just cannot deny how the backtracking and the filler sections do end up hurting the game instead of adding value that combined with its abrupt sequel / DLC bait ending which I cannot stand when games do I have to dock it down some to a strong eight if you aren't a fan of this license it is still worth a buy but you could probably drop it to like a seven out of ten as it loses steam and focus during those final chapters but if you haven't picked it up I hope you will now at least at some point it's worth it it's the aliens games that I've always wanted to see and the game that we deserve now if only there were some way to blend the two types of games like the colonial Marines in this one just the the stealth with the Marines shooter just in a unique and intelligent way may be multiple killable aliens that have the unpredictability intelligence and stealth elements that this game has once you run out of ammo if that's possible I would be totally down for some kind of franchise out of this or a sequel but I only have one question where the hell is the Queen or did this game just establish that alternate egg transformation theory from the deleted scene in the original alien interesting stuff I'll see you guys discuss it in the comments until then I'll see you on the next angry Joe show always no a working Joe do you require assistance you son of a [ __ ] you taking focus off the alien just like a previous game sick of you [ __ ] touch stop that the focus should be on the alien not working Joe I need you guys to stop stop that [ __ ] [ __ ] go away and don't come back you're becoming mr. cool you son of a [ __ ] what are you doing that's not assisting me this is your assistance hello I'm fine I feel fine don't worry guys everything is okay not Oh why

Channel: AngryJoeShow

Views: 4,861,118

Rating: 4.9041185 out of 5

Keywords: Alien: Isolation (Video Game), Review (Media Genre), sega, angryjoe, angryjoeshow, Video Game (Industry), aliens, aliens colonial marines, gearbox, game review, lets play, commentary, preview, impressions, gameplay, bugs, glitches, funny, parody

Id: TyWW6Qf4ZHI

Length: 27min 3sec (1623 seconds)

Published: Thu Oct 16 2014

Reddit Comments

[u/thcollegestudent]

I can't wait to crap my pants like in Silent hill 2 days of yore.

[u/[deleted]]

Also female protag on the box cover <3

[u/LolaRuns]

I heart Joe and I'm glad that he's happy with the game even if it wasn't 100% what he was dreaming of.

=> curious, has anybody played this yet and is anybody maybe playing this for Halloween (for a stream or something maybe?)