Aliens: Dark Descent - real-time squad-based tactical action

[ciox]

Pretty sure the praetorian is supposed to do that, the issue is when you see 'category 2 xenomorph incoming' and then never even see it as a blip on the minimap for the rest of the mission.

 

[Zewp]

Am I the only one who gets disoriented by the map sometimes? There was a situation where I thought I was running away from a xeno but I was actually moving towards it.

Yeah, I discussed it earlier in the thread, but the fact that the map doesn't orient itself to the in-game camera is quite shit.

 

[Beowulf]

Staying in character is fun but the size of these patch notes so soon after the release reminds me of our Owlcat friends and their tendancy to release beta versions in guise of full games..

That's a recurring thing with Focus releases - they usually stick to the release date and don't push the game back, but at the same time their titles are buggy to a various degree on the release.
Hopefully if it sales well the support for the game will be maintained and we might even see some additional content.

 

[Stavrophore]

Dozens of unskippable cutscenes, annoying railroaded sections, that entire disaster of a final mission. All of it feels like someone grabbed you by the collar and shoved their script in your face, saying "isn't this cool?!" I should know, that's something I do.

The game story definitely does u-turn after half of the game, basically when you discover who you have to rescue. The beginning is actually quite promising, and it was quite interesting/surprising to see ship crashing in the planet and then acting as your base. Our primary goal gets sidetracked after half of the game, which is imho most important to warn other planets about this instead of going to rescue that one person. It feels like the writers wanted badly shoehorn the "save one life at hand, than try to possibly save billions".The story arc didn't fit the character of maeko, because at the beginning she sacrifice a lot of people just for the purpose of preventing many more deaths.And also - why we couldn't gather resources for new satellite? Why we couldn't contact Weyland-Yutani about nukes? It is indeed very railroaded experience, i wouldn't mind it if the plot was consistently good from start to end.

Gameplay is pretty tense, but the amount of bugs that force you to load a save, like characters stuck or not getting welder from a crate and other minor annoyances definitely caused some minor dissatisfaction for me. I've lost a person to a bug and didn't feel like reloading, but considering how scarce are troops this can be a big hit. I've played on normal and didn't shy away from combat, the game has well balanced difficulty setting, while i feel playing on highest difficulty makes the game much more stealth oriented, because onslaughts most likely will wipe your squad. Some mission are definitely harder than others even further in the game, docks cultist base with a lot of aliens tightly packed making you to have little maneuver and then pryce tower with constant rush toward the final room.

The game has "diversity hiring" issue, but at least there's no hidden agenda presented by these characters so it's serviceable.

Definitely one of the best games of 2023 so far[beside system shock remake], easily 8/10, especially after this major patch which fix most of the glaring bugs.

 

[Parsimonious cook]

The game has "diversity hiring" issue, but at least there's no hidden agenda presented by these characters so it's serviceable.

Indeed, it seems that the devs were just going through a check list that was handed to them rather then actually trying to push an agenda (which was obviously the case with Battletech by HBS for example). Its kinda like "a stronk female afro-futuristic engineer - check, LGBTQ+-/_? character - check" more than anything else. Its still anoying, but not ass offensive as the body positive obese muslim woman space engineer from Iran in Battletech.

A weird thing that has me wondering a bit is the initial part of the tutorial mission, where Maeko gets catcalled in the cafeteria by some random worker dude and just goes on as if it was nothing. I wonder if the scene was supposed to say that the evil patriarchy is even more powerful than the evil corporation like WY and even managers like Maeko arent safe from sexual harassment by random wageslaves or w/e lol. Certainly not something I would expect to see in what is basicaly a cyberpunk dystopia. Maybe it was just sloppy writting, I dunno...

 

[Monk]

Where did the eggs come from, and don't facehuggers go out of them only when there are hosts nearby (although I'm aware that this not followed in earlier video games)?

Also, I think they released another update with a list of fixes, but are there other bugs like the one in the cover mission, where you have to click somewhere near the first place you're taught to hide in order to unpause the game?

 

[Parsimonious cook]

Eggs were originaly in some cavern deep under the surface, which was broken into by miners at some point and the cult then started to send them around the planet in random cargo containers.

As far as I know, the facehuggers should indeed come out only on contact, but I guess that those who dont find a host after hatching simply start roaming around.

 

[Echo Mirage]

How restrictive is the games doom clock? I generally dislike anything with an inflexible and arbitrary time limit being forcefully imposed.

 

[Wirdschowerdn]

How restrictive is the games doom clock? I generally dislike anything with an inflexible and arbitrary time limit being forcefully imposed.

You can disable it with the next official patch.

 

[Harthwain]

A few impressions from me:

1) I love how the game handles controls. It transfers an action (such as using a flashlight) to a squad member who is the closest to the cursor. In order to highlight objects you have to look around and looking around meaning lighting up the place with flashlight, and dark places ARE dark, so you are actively encouraged to scan the area for useful items and to uncover the fog of war.

2) The game is a squad-based RTS, but it feels like someone used a boardgame as the base for its gameplay. My cousin had something like that back in the 90's and it reminds me a lot of that game (not that I ever got the rules or the name of the game, mind you).

3) The scripted parts are bullshit. When you rescue someone in the first story base you are still in the tutorial part, so you are forced to use the sentry gun in order to deal with the wave of enemies. I ended up one marine short (had to be dragged to the APC sans the leg) and the person you're rescuing got dragged into the vent, because it was a scripted event. Fuck that. I hope the rest of the game is more free-form or I am giving it a thumb down on Steam.

 

[ArchAngel]

A few impressions from me:

1) I love how the game handles controls. It transfers an action (such as using a flashlight) to a squad member who is the closest to the cursor. In order to highlight objects you have to look around and looking around meaning lighting up the place with flashlight, and dark places ARE dark, so you are actively encouraged to scan the area for useful items and to uncover the fog of war.

2) The game is a squad-based RTS, but it feels like someone used a boardgame as the base for its gameplay. My cousin had something like that back in the 90's and it reminds me a lot of that game (not that I ever got the rules or the name of the game, mind you).

3) The scripted parts are bullshit. When you rescue someone in the first story base you are still in the tutorial part, so you are forced to use the sentry gun in order to deal with the wave of enemies. I ended up one marine short (had to be dragged to the APC sans the leg) and the person you're rescuing got dragged into the vent, because it was a scripted event. Fuck that. I hope the rest of the game is more free-form or I am giving it a thumb down on Steam.

1) it is cool. also it knows to queue up commands and soldiers either return to where they were after they complete the command you gave them or know to move to new position where you told the squad to move. Only thing missing is way to cycle which soldier stands in front to tank aliens. If you get your medic to stand in front it is hard to move him to the back and if he goes down first you are screwed.
2) It feels very X-com like, especially if you use Pause instead of slow.
3) Game is full of scripted parts, maybe not as much as that one you mentioned but there is a lot of missions that happen as game wants them to happen. Sometimes it takes control of your squad and moves them to other locations you didn't order them to. Some of these are pretty nasty like when it closes doors behind your squad after doing that. I watched a streamer set up turrets outside that door only to have them on the wrong side when he needed them :D

 

[Tyranicon]

This game is really dated in the way it handles cutscenes and scripted events. There's too much of "taking control from the player" when you're just watching someone hack a terminal (they don't even speed it up lol) or just watching dialogue.

There's also stupid shit that pissed me off. Like in one instance there's a scripted event where you have to defend yourself and the ARC while waiting for evac. So naturally, you plop down your turrets, which are high-value and rare resources.

The fight ends, and a cutscene plays. You leave but you're not in a rush.

Err... can I retrieve those turrets? Maybe the game will just automatically say I did.

Nope. No turrets for you.

And shit like this happens all the time. This game made me hate cutscenes more than any other game in the last five years.

 

[ArchAngel]

This game is really dated in the way it handles cutscenes and scripted events. There's too much of "taking control from the player" when you're just watching someone hack a terminal (they don't even speed it up lol) or just watching dialogue.

There's also stupid shit that pissed me off. Like in one instance there's a scripted event where you have to defend yourself and the ARC while waiting for evac. So naturally, you plop down your turrets, which are high-value and rare resources.

The fight ends, and a cutscene plays. You leave but you're not in a rush.

Err... can I retrieve those turrets? Maybe the game will just automatically say I did.

Nope. No turrets for you.

And shit like this happens all the time. This game made me hate cutscenes more than any other game in the last five years.

I know what scene you are talking about and you are in a rush. It is heavy implied that a lot more aliens are coming and you need to evac right away.

 

[Tyranicon]

This game is really dated in the way it handles cutscenes and scripted events. There's too much of "taking control from the player" when you're just watching someone hack a terminal (they don't even speed it up lol) or just watching dialogue.

There's also stupid shit that pissed me off. Like in one instance there's a scripted event where you have to defend yourself and the ARC while waiting for evac. So naturally, you plop down your turrets, which are high-value and rare resources.

The fight ends, and a cutscene plays. You leave but you're not in a rush.

Err... can I retrieve those turrets? Maybe the game will just automatically say I did.

Nope. No turrets for you.

And shit like this happens all the time. This game made me hate cutscenes more than any other game in the last five years.

I know what scene you are talking about and you are in a rush. It is heavy implied that a lot more aliens are coming and you need to evac right away.

I meant you weren't actively being chased by xenos and jumping onto your exfil craft off a building hollywood style. You can spare the 4 seconds to retrieve your turrets.

I dunno. It gave me turret paranoia for the rest of the game.

 

[ciox]

I heard about that nastiness well in advance, so when playing when I had a hunch it was coming I made sure to only leave 2 out of my 4 turrets down, striking a balance between firepower and risk of turret loss.

Metagaming yo.

Next time I'll know to not leave any turrets there. Honestly back in the day this would just be knowledge you instantly memorize on the first run and apply religiously on the next 15 runs. Nowadays we tend to bristle at things like that, but it is part of the reason why games are getting so dumbed down, players' need for that first run through the game to be perfectly smooth and fun since they don't plan to replay the game and make it smoother themselves by using their experience.

 

[Tyranicon]

I heard about that nastiness well in advance, so when playing when I had a hunch it was coming I made sure to only leave 2 out of my 4 turrets down, striking a balance between firepower and risk of turret loss.

Metagaming yo.

Next time I'll know to not leave any turrets there. Honestly back in the day this would just be knowledge you instantly memorize on the first run and apply religiously on the next 15 runs. Nowadays we tend to bristle at things like that, but it is part of the reason why games are getting so dumbed down, players' need for that first run through the game to be perfectly smooth and fun since they don't plan to replay the game and make it smoother themselves by using their experience.

I think the difference is between good gameplay design and bad.

For example, there's an event later on in where you discover something and it instantly ends the day.

Spoiler

Finding the larger troop carrier that bumps your squad size to 5.

You aren't given a choice whether you want to fly back to the ship and make use of it, or continue with your current squad. The game makes that decision for you, despite it being perfectly reasonable for it to be a choice (despite how much the game tells you about difficult binary decisions there, there really aren't that many).

No, it just costs you a day automatically (along with making your current squad tired, etc).

And there's dozens of examples of this kind of weird implementation. I only rant about it because they are rare instances of bad design in an otherwise very interesting and well-made game.

 

[Mortmal]

How restrictive is the games doom clock? I generally dislike anything with an inflexible and arbitrary time limit being forcefully imposed.

Not ,much, i finished the game with one week left , taking it easy using 2-3 day by missions to clear. Then the last cinematic make it so they are fleeing the planet at the last moment with nukes falling, no matter how good you did.

 

[Harthwain]

This game is really dated in the way it handles cutscenes and scripted events. There's too much of "taking control from the player" when you're just watching someone hack a terminal (they don't even speed it up lol) or just watching dialogue.

No skipping dialogues outside of cutscenes is horrible. Makes me not want to replay the game. Another thing I hate is that the game reorients the camera after a cutscene. It made running away from the Praetorian much harder than it ought to be.

By the way, it looks like ammo is not a resource you can stack up in-between missions?

 

[Tyranicon]

This game is really dated in the way it handles cutscenes and scripted events. There's too much of "taking control from the player" when you're just watching someone hack a terminal (they don't even speed it up lol) or just watching dialogue.

No skipping dialogues outside of cutscenes is horrible. Makes me not want to replay the game. Another thing I hate is that the game reorients the camera after a cutscene. It made running away from the Praetorian much harder than it ought to be.

By the way, it looks like ammo is not a resource you can stack up in-between missions?

To my knowledge your starting ammo is decided by how many marines have the extra ammo perk, and maybe some other upgrades. Ammo doesn't carry over from mission to mission.

I only ran out of ammo once when I foolishly thought the cult patrols were not endlessly respawning, so I just hunkered down and wasted all my ammo killing them thinking I was clearing the map. The game actively incentivizes you to avoid encounters so I mainly just stealthed my way through.

Sidearms don't consume ammo IIRC. Activating turrets for the first time consumes 1 ammo per. That stupid battle drone consumes a lot and it's not really worth it.

 

[ArchAngel]

How restrictive is the games doom clock? I generally dislike anything with an inflexible and arbitrary time limit being forcefully imposed.

Not ,much, i finished the game with one week left , taking it easy using 2-3 day by missions to clear. Then the last cinematic make it so they are fleeing the planet at the last moment with nukes falling, no matter how good you did.

They forgot to tell you they had an engine failure that took them almost 7 days to repair :D

 

[ArchAngel]

This game is really dated in the way it handles cutscenes and scripted events. There's too much of "taking control from the player" when you're just watching someone hack a terminal (they don't even speed it up lol) or just watching dialogue.

No skipping dialogues outside of cutscenes is horrible. Makes me not want to replay the game. Another thing I hate is that the game reorients the camera after a cutscene. It made running away from the Praetorian much harder than it ought to be.

By the way, it looks like ammo is not a resource you can stack up in-between missions?

To my knowledge your starting ammo is decided by how many marines have the extra ammo perk, and maybe some other upgrades. Ammo doesn't carry over from mission to mission.

I only ran out of ammo once when I foolishly thought the cult patrols were not endlessly respawning, so I just hunkered down and wasted all my ammo killing them thinking I was clearing the map. The game actively incentivizes you to avoid encounters so I mainly just stealthed my way through.

Sidearms don't consume ammo IIRC. Activating turrets for the first time consumes 1 ammo per. That stupid battle drone consumes a lot and it's not really worth it.

Turrets have 250 ammo each, that is why they are so effective. If they want to nerf turrets in future they should reduce ammo to 150 but maybe make reloading them faster.

 

[ciox]

I heard about that nastiness well in advance, so when playing when I had a hunch it was coming I made sure to only leave 2 out of my 4 turrets down, striking a balance between firepower and risk of turret loss.

Metagaming yo.

Next time I'll know to not leave any turrets there. Honestly back in the day this would just be knowledge you instantly memorize on the first run and apply religiously on the next 15 runs. Nowadays we tend to bristle at things like that, but it is part of the reason why games are getting so dumbed down, players' need for that first run through the game to be perfectly smooth and fun since they don't plan to replay the game and make it smoother themselves by using their experience.

I think the difference is between good gameplay design and bad.

For example, there's an event later on in where you discover something and it instantly ends the day.

Spoiler

Finding the larger troop carrier that bumps your squad size to 5.

You aren't given a choice whether you want to fly back to the ship and make use of it, or continue with your current squad. The game makes that decision for you, despite it being perfectly reasonable for it to be a choice (despite how much the game tells you about difficult binary decisions there, there really aren't that many).

No, it just costs you a day automatically (along with making your current squad tired, etc).

And there's dozens of examples of this kind of weird implementation. I only rant about it because they are rare instances of bad design in an otherwise very interesting and well-made game.

Yeah, that was a big surprise for me as well, very goofy, but you can still keep it in mind for next time. The reason I'm giving this game a pass for things like this, is they went out of their way to try and make it replayable, mostly through the level design (for instance this run I will most likely not 100% the early areas because the doom clock is already on and I need to hurry) though there is a big issue with character building variety and item variety which hopefully will be addressed later.

 

[Removal]

Definitely didn't expect to like the real time aspect as much as I do
Amps up the stress levels significantly for combat which is key for this game

 

[randir14]

How do you make your guys hold their fire? When I try to use the suppressed sniper rifle every other Marine starts shooting at the same time.

 

[Cyberarmy]

Definitely didn't expect to like the real time aspect as much as I do
Amps up the stress levels significantly for combat which is key for this game

Yeah, this is real time tactics done right. ,
Also I recommend Chromosome Evil to anyone liking Dark Descent. These two really have much similarities.