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Alien: Isolation

J_C

One Bit Studio
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Project: Eternity Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. Pathfinder: Wrath
So I finished the game afterall.

Once I got used to the small frustration I've been mentioning in this thread, it was a pretty good experience. But I still uphold that the game is too long for its own good. It is artifically padded. There are a lot of locations which look great, the artists really did a bang up job with it. But there isn't any meaningful story or varied gameplay to fill up these locations, so in the end I started to get a bit bored, I just wanted to get over with.

Still, overall I enjoyed it.
 

adddeed

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Would've been a much better game at half the length i think.
But still for a fan of the alien franchise its a treat.
 

adddeed

Arcane
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I felt it dragged on expecially because its a slow paced game and because it was tense all the way through which makes it a but exhausting to play.
 
Joined
Mar 18, 2009
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7,308
There's plenty of things to criticize in this game if I wanted to but being a massive Alien fanboy I couldn't help but love it anyway. I even liked it enough to replay and it was still scary the second time, something that usually doesn't happen to me with horror games.
 
Joined
Jun 13, 2019
Messages
632
There's plenty of things to criticize in this game if I wanted to but being a massive Alien fanboy I couldn't help but love it anyway. I even liked it enough to replay and it was still scary the second time, something that usually doesn't happen to me with horror games.

I don't get it, these games aren't scary to me whatsoever, only annoying because the alien's actions run like clockwork and it's a slog navigating the levels once you learn its patterns (and this happens quickly). It's literally a hallway walking simulator, but in space. It also doesn't make sense for the alien to be indestructible to weapons - a very hamfisted way of conveying how "powerful" it is. Once you get to the flamethrower sections it becomes little more than an ammo management sim ontop of the hallway walking.
 
Joined
Oct 19, 2010
Messages
3,524
The game has flaws (my main one was the unnecessary latter sections with space walk etc.) but this is still one of the best horror games and my personal favourite of its kind.

If someone could deliver this same kind of authentic low key horror game with other classic movie settings I would jump on it . Things like the Terminator, Predator, The Shining, The Thing etc. There are so many possibilities
 

Ash

Arcane
Joined
Oct 16, 2015
Messages
6,235
Alright, I'm done with this game. I'm just fucking tired that every animation locks you into position and you can't break out of it until the animation is ended. This is what is wrong with fucking AAA games nowadays. Everything has to be smoothly animated.

The alien is just around the corner, coming closer, but you have to show the player the computer login animation for the 100th time. Oh, the alien has just entered the room and you should hide right now. Sorry, we have to finish the box opening animation. Fuck! You! But wait, the alien is coming, but for some goddamned reason the Press E to Climb prompt is not showing when I'm standing in front of a vent-hole, and can't enter. Then the alien gets me. Fuck You Too!

I'm not wasting my precious time when there is Psychonauts 2 waiting for me.

This is how bad A:I is, even JC hates it. Yet there's tons that claim it is a good game. It plays like absolute shit wtf are people on?

this is still one of the best horror games and my personal favourite of its kind.

Please, no, stop! How many horror games have you played and why were they all walking/jumpscare sims?
 

JDR13

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Nov 2, 2006
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The Swamp
Would've been a much better game at half the length i think.
But still for a fan of the alien franchise its a treat.

I agree. I've always said that survival-horror works best in the 15-20 hour range. I think that's why most of the RE games feel about right length-wise.

AI is the longest horror game I've played. I still enjoyed it, but it should have been a little shorter.
 

Ezekiel

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May 3, 2017
Messages
5,374
Would've been a much better game at half the length i think.
But still for a fan of the alien franchise its a treat.

I agree. I've always said that survival-horror works best in the 15-20 hour range. I think that's why most of the RE games feel about right length-wise.

AI is the longest horror game I've played. I still enjoyed it, but it should have been a little shorter.

My first Alien: Isolation playthrough was 19 hours long. Hard mode. I agree that it was too long and should have been short and sweet, due to its lack of variety, limited enemies and stretched out story. But if it takes some people more than 20 hours to beat it, then I don't think they should blame the game so much as themselves.
 

JDR13

Arcane
Joined
Nov 2, 2006
Messages
3,930
Location
The Swamp
Would've been a much better game at half the length i think.
But still for a fan of the alien franchise its a treat.

I agree. I've always said that survival-horror works best in the 15-20 hour range. I think that's why most of the RE games feel about right length-wise.

AI is the longest horror game I've played. I still enjoyed it, but it should have been a little shorter.

My first Alien: Isolation playthrough was 19 hours long. Hard mode. I agree that it was too long and should have been short and sweet, due to its lack of variety, limited enemies and stretched out story. But if it takes some people more than 20 hours to beat it, then I don't thiink they should blame the game so much as themselves.

I bet every gamer wishes they were as gud as you.
 

J_C

One Bit Studio
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Project: Eternity Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. Pathfinder: Wrath
Would've been a much better game at half the length i think.
But still for a fan of the alien franchise its a treat.

I agree. I've always said that survival-horror works best in the 15-20 hour range. I think that's why most of the RE games feel about right length-wise.

AI is the longest horror game I've played. I still enjoyed it, but it should have been a little shorter.

My first Alien: Isolation playthrough was 19 hours long. Hard mode. I agree that it was too long and should have been short and sweet, due to its lack of variety, limited enemies and stretched out story. But if it takes some people more than 20 hours to beat it, then I don't think they should blame the game so much as themselves.
Played on Hard, took 23 hours to finish. Didn't rush it but I didn't got stuck in the game, so I was progressing in a good pace. Tried to explore every location and find terminals, some collectibles.
 

Ezekiel

Arcane
Joined
May 3, 2017
Messages
5,374
Would've been a much better game at half the length i think.
But still for a fan of the alien franchise its a treat.

I agree. I've always said that survival-horror works best in the 15-20 hour range. I think that's why most of the RE games feel about right length-wise.

AI is the longest horror game I've played. I still enjoyed it, but it should have been a little shorter.

My first Alien: Isolation playthrough was 19 hours long. Hard mode. I agree that it was too long and should have been short and sweet, due to its lack of variety, limited enemies and stretched out story. But if it takes some people more than 20 hours to beat it, then I don't think they should blame the game so much as themselves.
Played on Hard, took 23 hours to finish. Didn't rush it but I didn't got stuck in the game, so I was progressing in a good pace. Tried to explore every location and find terminals, some collectibles.
I collected everything later, but can't remember how thorough I was on my first playthrough. It was seven years ago. I just wrote the time down on my list of played games.

As a comparison, my first Resident Evil 1 playthrough, having never played the original or any fixed cam RE before:

FCD31D1838617D758339B4315A103315DF0A5FBC


So, not sure about this talk of 15-20 hours for Resident Evil either. RE4 comes closer.
 

JDR13

Arcane
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Messages
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Location
The Swamp
So, not sure about this talk of 15-20 hours for Resident Evil either. RE4 comes closer.

No one said Resident Evil was 15-20 hours. I said I think survival-horror works best in that range. RE 1 is one of the shorter games in the series if you only count playing as Chris or Jill but not both.
 

toughasnails

Guest
This game imo stretched its subgenre as far as it can go. I mean this subgenre of horror games built around avoiding the monster or monsters you can't fight reliably if at all, only hide or at best slow it down. Frictional's games, Slender and bazillion games in that vein.
This game had most "game" in it of all of them, both the substance and the length. It pushed that concept as far as it can go, maybe beyond the point of breaking, peppered it with fight against other, killable enemies and added additional systems. I don't think this subgenre has anywhere to go from that. Not that it is going anyway in terms of new games like that being made, smaller tittles of this sort will remain popular with indie devs and players for obvious reasons, but this was its high point.
 

Caim

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Dutchland
Horror games cannot be long by nature. A few tense hours is good fun, but going at it for 10-20 hours the scariness either gets tiring or stops being scary.
 

J_C

One Bit Studio
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Project: Eternity Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. Pathfinder: Wrath
Great game right up until you get the flamethrower. After that it gets boring.
I argue that the game is still fun after getting the flamethrower, but it really lost its tension, because everytime I met the Alien, I just sprayed it with a bit if fire and it ran away. At that point avoiding the higher level androids was more tense.
 
Joined
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Messages
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I argue that the game is still fun after getting the flamethrower, but it really lost its tension, because everytime I met the Alien, I just sprayed it with a bit if fire and it ran away. At that point avoiding the higher level androids was more tense.
Agreed and for the entire game I found the androids more unsettling, probably the whole zombie schtick.
 

mastroego

Arcane
Joined
Apr 10, 2013
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10,250
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Italy
I think it's kinda supposed to feel that way.
Anyway, when you have to deal with multiple aliens at the end, it gets scary again because you feel like you can be taken from every direction.
 

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