I love Aliens. It's one of the best action films ever made. A masterpiece of the genre. James Cameron killed it. But I'm sick of Aliens video games. At Summer Games Fest 2022, Focus Home Interactive revealed Aliens: Dark Descent, which developer Tindalos Interactive describes as being "inspired by our favourite CRPG games and packaged in nerve-racking, real-time action." After a lengthy cinematic we see roughly five seconds of gameplay, revealing it to be a squad-based tactical shooter.
I'm not dumping on Dark Descent itself. I haven't played it. It might be great. The mention of CRPGs has me intrigued, and I'll definitely be checking it out whenever it launches. But I sincerely wish developers, publishers, and whoever else comes up with these projects would expand their horizons. There's a whole world out there beyond that movie. I don't know if anyone's ever told the industry this, but you're actually allowed to make Alien games based on films other than Aliens.
Look, I get it: it's a movie that features hordes of aliens, an arsenal of neat sci-fi weaponry, and wisecracking marines. A video game slots into that format perfectly. You don't have to change a thing. But my problem with it is that it's been done. So many times—and not just in Aliens games, but in countless other sci-fi shooters. I know stepping into the combat boots of a veteran Colonial Marine and mowing down xenos with a pulse rifle is a powerful, enduring fantasy. But it's time to move on.
In 2014, Total War creator Creative Assembly was brave enough to buck the trend. It developed Alien: Isolation, a slow-burning horror game that finally did justice to HR Giger's creature. No longer was Hollywood's scariest monster idiotic cannon fodder flinging itself at your shotgun; it was formidable, terrifying, intelligent, and could kill you in the blink of an eye. This developer looked somewhere other than Aliens for once, and the result is easily the greatest horror game ever made.
But there's more to Alien than the original movie. Alien 3, Alien Resurrection, Prometheus, and Alien: Covenant—whatever you think of them—all bring something new to the mix. They're still fundamentally movies about a giant penis murdering people in a corridor, but each has its own perspective, aesthetic, and flavour. That's why it's such a shame when a new Alien game is announced and, once again, it's steeped in the familiar atmosphere and visual design of Cameron's sequel.
It was incredibly naive of me, but I quietly hoped Disney acquiring Fox, and in turn the Alien series, might give the video games a creative shot in the arm. But between co-op shooter Fireteam and now Dark Descent, it's clear the series is stuck in the same rut it's been in for decades now. Those heroes at Creative Assembly threw it a ladder, but Sega kicked it away before it could climb out. It described Alien: Isolation's 2.1 million sales as 'weak' and basically gave up on it. I'm still mad.
I hope Dark Descent is good. Despite everything I've just said, a good Aliens game is still better than a bad Aliens game. Lord knows there have been enough of those. But developers, I beg you: watch another Alien movie. This is a series you can take in any direction. Look at what Ridley Scott did with Prometheus. Sure, some people hated it—but it was surprising. It wasn't just more soldiers gunning down xenomorphs. There's more to this series than that, and I wish its games would reflect that.