The game works because it's actually engaging - not just running around in the dark. It doesn't feel scripted, you are given chances to try another route or alternative approaches. (I think other games don't do this enough which mean they are boring / frustrating). This gives you enough freedom without minimising the threat or challenge. The atmosphere is great and feels an authentic addition to the Alien universe.
Fantastic. Takes me back to the good old days of Old Man Murray and their Crate review system. You're all right, Shake Appeal. I laughed a bunch. Of all the LTTP's, this is the OoT: the definitive sequel.
I've updated the OP with some new links to new Alien: Isolation LTTP threads.
What I'm sensing, however, is that people maybe aren't using this index as the encompassing resource it was intended to be. With that in mind, can the mods please sticky this thread?
Finally finished this game. Might as well just echo the general consensus quickly: truest Alien game by far, tense as fuck, androids creepy assholes, game is like 6 hours too long.
Really fucking good. Also has some of my favourite close mic work in a main character. Like, really fantastic. All the little grunts, contained gasps, and "fucks" were great.
I have yet to make a topic, and while I have lots to say about Alien Isolation I'm sure as hell not going to get appropriately lambasted to break that streak. Hah.
I've noticed how often this game gets LTTP threads. It's nuts, but good.
I didn't think it'd be for me, so I didn't buy it, but it piqued my interest and I ended up being able to borrow it from the library. It dragged on quite a bit at the end, but I liked it a lot more than I thought I may when it was revealed to be a stealth game.
Hello, friends. Have you heard about Alien: Isolation? It's a game that a lot of people overlooked on release. But the party continues!
Now, one of the great things about NeoGAF, in my opinion, is that any member can just make a thread on a (relevant) subject to offer their thoughts. So, in anticipation of tomorrow's Steam Sale and the inevitable sizzling discount that will be slapped on Alien: Isolation, here's a look back at some of the hottest and most belated discussions we've had here on GAF about this painfully under-appreciated videogame.
Alien: Isolation |OT| 1 Alien. 1 Ripley. No Jonesy. Author: VisceralBowl Date: October 1, 2014 Review: The grandaddy of them all. The queen, if you will. All the other Alien: Isolation threads are just tremulous, birth-wet hatchlings exploding from the guts of this shrieking mother. A classic joint on point, full of hard facts and anecdotes and gushing praise. Five eggs out of five. I guess not many people read it, though?
Alien: Isolation Spoiler thread - ITT No One Can Hear Your Spoilers Author: Lime Date: October 10, 2014 Review: Every popular game needs its concomitant spoiler thread. Nine days after release, Lime must have thought this one was headed out of the park. Clever title, graphical content, lots of provocative questions, and lots of subsequent discussion 98 posts of the stuff. Hell, it nearly made it to a second page. A thread before its time, lost to time. A pitiable shame, if that's not redundant. Hey, speaking of redundant...
Alien Isolation - better than the reviews indicate? Author: DidntKnowJack Date: December 27, 2014 Review: An early pioneer of the form, this puzzler is less of a LTTP thread and more a hard-hitting inquiry. The author, DidntKnowJack, asks the tough questions, coming at the issue from the perspective of a "prospective buyer." Want to know how what happened next? Spoilers:
A whole bunch of people told him or her that, yes, he or she should buy the videogame.
This one went seven pages, a feat never repeated in this realm, so there are lots of detailed thoughts and commentary on display. Dig in!
Alien Isolation's end scene... (SPOILERS) Author: Amentallica Date: December 28, 2014 Review: Just five scant minutes after completing the game, and less than 24 hours since the last Alien: Isolation LTTP thread, Amentallica took to the forums to let us know all about his or her experience. "Overall, awesome game!" You said it, Amentallica.
Let's talk about a potential sequel to the amazing Alien Isolation Author: Amentallica Date: December 30, 2014 Review: Turns out Amentallica was pretty high on the game. So high that he or she came back and made a second thread about it two days after his or her original venture. This one went 39 posts compared to his or her first effort's 17, so I guess it was a success. Truly, this was the halcyon Christmas period of Alien: Isolation appreciation, when you could go onto the forum nearly every day and open a new thread you'd never read before about Alien: Isolation, the videogame. I loved it. I opened them all.
LTTP: Alien: Isolation Author: Hylian7 Date: January 12, 2015 Review: A new year, a new appraisal. Lots of meat on this one, though the format is a little stale. By the end, we really know what Hylian7 dug about Alien: Isolation and what he or she didn't! This particular user even streamed the game live via hitbox.tv. I can only assume numerous viewers rushed out and bought the title on the strength of that stream.
Alien: Isolation passes 1 million units sold Author: shinobi602 Date: January 21, 2015 Review: A perfectly serviceable news thread, the content of which is kinda depressing given that this is probably not enough sales to justify an actual sequel. In space, no one can hear Sega's damp fart.
Creative Assembly (Alien: Isolation) Should do Resident Evil 3 Author: DedValve Date: January 24, 2015 Review: More a spin-off than a strict genre piece, I include this thread because it's got all the things I've come to expect from an Alien: Isolation LTTP thread: vague, tossed-off impressions, some handwaving about the game's shortcomings, little to no engagement with the existing conversation or canon, and an author who would later be banned. Nine whole replies on this one. A bold crossover experiment, perhaps, but a failed one.
Alien: Isolation has terrified me more than any movie or game I've experienced. Author: Dalek Date: February 1, 2015 Review: February dawned, and with it came Dalek's perspective on the game. At heart it's a rich personal narrative that leans heavily on the author's reportedly jaded experience of horror to demonstrate just how fresh and invigorating Alien: Isolation was by contrast. Lots of nice stylistic quirks, too: the all-caps, bolded "UNBEARABLE" stays with you long after you've read this thread's other 57 posts. Four eggs out of five.
Alien Isolation is fantastic. Just one problem though. Author: brandonh83 Date: February 13, 2015 Review: To save you the click, the "one problem" is that the game has too much graffiti in it. I guess that explains why this game sold few copies and this thread got four replies. Zero eggs.
Alien Isolation is 50% off Author: Soyongdori Date: February 18, 2015 Review: When Alien: Isolation LTTP thread creators really strip back the conventions of the genre, the results can be astonishing. This thread is the perfect example. With incredible economy some might say paucity of language, Soyongdori gets to the crux of the issue so many others have only danced around: the game is cheap now ("50% off"), so should you buy it? Should you? After all, you may have reservations: maybe you're "not a fan" of first-person horror; maybe you usually watch "those types of games" on YouTube. In just a few words, the author skewers the throbbing existential crisis that sinews through the broad oeuvre of LTTP threads: should I do a minute's research and see what myriad others have said about this discounted videogame in an existing wealth of threads or should I forge my own path and just dash off a new post without thinking? A question for us all. Five bloody eggs.
LTTP: Alien Isolation. Ripley gonna need bengay for all this crouching. Author: MormaPope Date: February 22, 2015 Review: Cute title humor didn't help MormaPope score the big hits on this little number from late February, as it only went 51 posts deep. I don't know what MormaPope did to get himself or herself banned, but if loving Alien: Isolation is a crime, then this thread is all the evidence a jury would need to convict! I don't think many people checked this one out, though, because two days later...
LttP: Alien Isolation Author: uncleslappy Date: February 24, 2015 Review: Pretty standard take here. Pros and cons, some reserved praise. The author, uncleslappy, hedges a little here by saying it's "becoming" one of his favorite games, so you may want to keep reading to see how it all shakes out for him, I dunno? Some other LTTP people showed up and made their own posts within it, too, which is nice. A real community effort.
LTTP: Alien: Isolation (Spoilers) Author: Fancy Clown Date: March 7, 2015 Review: Now this is more like it. A colorful header image, detailed impressions, and lots of strong, declarative sentences like this one: "I don't know why I waited on this game, and I don't know why it's taken this long to make a game that captures the vibe of Alien so well." Me neither, Fancy Clown. It's a dang mystery. This one went all the way to a second page, so I give it a hearty three eggs out of five.
Alien: Isolation on PC is 66% off on GMG for 24h! GET IT! GET IT! GET IT! Author: GavinUK86 Date: March 12, 2015 Review: Watch and learn, novices. It's all in the thread title: title, format, discount, timing, and hard, hard sell. GavinUK86 took this one to three pages because he knew what it needed, and he didn't give us nary a spitstain more. No rambling, unsolicited impressions about a slumping title. No limp "prospective purchase" bullshit. Just feverish, benefit-led marketing. A gem. If I were Sega, I'd hire this guy. Or probably I wouldn't, because I'd be fucking Sega and dumb as rocks and bad at selling my games.
LTTP: Alien Isolation (PC) Author: nkarafo Date: March 24, 2015 Review: A staid effort that is nonetheless of some historical significance because it marks the point where I got, like, real surly about all the LTTP threads we've been having for this videogame.
The biggest mystery in Alien: Isolation. Author: delta25 Date: March 24, 2015 Review: A piping-hot take in a crowded field last March, this one arrived just minutes after nkarafo's effort (see above). And boy did it arrive. Headline baits you to click. OP goes hard and fast. With no time to search or Google, this one flashed straight from the synapses of delta25 to the screen of your preferred device. I'll tell you what's mysterious that this thread only snagged 30 replies! In spite of that failure, I give this one four eggs out of five for its audacity. Not many Alien: Isolation LTTP threads can claim to have reinvented the form.
LTTP: Alien Isolation - *SPOILERS* Author: Raptomex Date: March 30, 2015 Review: While this author fully acknowledges that he or she is not a fan of horror games (or survival horror, presumably a subgenre of horror), they do like the Alien series, so they eventually gave this one a whirl. "Overall," they liked the game. Pretty milquetoast sentiment here, but I have to give props for the considerate warning in the thread title, as this six-month-old game is story-based and could be spoiled if you read about it. A post count of 59 puts this about on par with other examples in the genre. Two eggs out of five.
Alien Isolation might be one of the best stealth games ever made. Author: Fantastapotamus Date: May 3, 2015 Review: Just when you think you've seen it all just when you maybe start to get cynical about there ever being any life left in this particular party Fantastapotamus bursts onto the scene and delivers a hypodermic shot right to the butt of the subject. Stealth, my friends: it's a stealth game and a horror game. 49 posts? This thread deserved so much more. Perhaps the imperious presentation an unreadable assault of words with little formatting and zero highlighting or other such concessions to its audience held it back. I still give it four eggs, just one egg shy of greatness. I guess you could say it might be one of the best Alien: Isolation LTTP threads ever.
LTTP Alien Isolation Author: Lightning Count Date: June 10, 2015 Review: A weak, no-frills effort, but it's still early, so maybe the author plans to come back and flesh out their four-line post with some detailed impressions? Or is this just a plug for their Twitch stream? Anyway, I think my favorite line is "IMO one of the best survival horror games released and finally the truly terrifying Alien game we have all bee [sic] waiting for." It wasn't hard to select this as a favorite because, as mentioned, the whole post is four lines long. Like, this review is now longer. In good conscience, I can't give this one a single egg.
LTTH: ALIEN ISOLATION. Author: Bornstellar Date: June 30, 2015 Review: With its artful use of animated imagery and aggressively stylized titling, this late addition becomes almost a metacommentary on the form of the game itself. The staccato interjections of horror and disgust, the careful spacing of its elements, the sudden emergence of ALL CAPS these are the things that elevate Bornstellar's thread above the usual fodder to both describe and meaningfully represent the experience of Alien: Isolation through means other than a raw dump of text. The repetition of "Screw this game" is as memorable a construction in this genre as we've seen in some time, friends. Three eggs and some extra ichor for this one.
LTTP: Alien Isolation... When does the game start? Author: Chao Date: August 8, 2015 Review: With its provocative title rhetoric and sneering tone, this thread marks a sudden departure from the established trend of Alien: Isolation LTTP threads. Choking upon his or her contempt, user Chao didn't even wait to finish the game to go online and let the world know what a letdown this particular videogame is. After three arduous nights of opening doors and only seeing the titular Alien once, they declared that the game is "tedious work," the "pace is horrible" and their money was likely "wasted." In a surprising twist, this inane viewpoint actually resulted in this being one of the better trafficked LTTP threads to date. Sadly, Chao never returned to the scene of their crime to tell us if the game did, eventually, start. It's the suspense that kills ya. Also the androids.
LTTP : Alien Isolation - Ridley Scott would have been proud Author: Game4life Date: September 19, 2015 Review: Just a week or two shy of the game's first birthday, Game4life delivered a thoroughly derivative and unremarkable LTTP thread ("mixed reviews," "love letter," "game has flaws"), the most striking feature of which was a short discussion about whether contrary to the implication of the the thread title Ridley Scott may actually still be alive. I don't want to spoil anything, so maybe read the thread and find out for yourself?
I'm replaying Alien right now and this time I'm walking a lot more. I crawled my ass through the entire game last time and then complained that it took too long. I still don't ever use my items, in case I'll need them later.
