Aliens: Colonial Marines Message Board older than one year ago

- story is set some 17 weeks after the film
- the Sulaco that was thought destroyed has mysteriously re-emerging in orbit
- Syd Mead's been involved in some small capacity
- Lance Henriksen reprises his role as Bishop
- multiplayer features objective-based modes
- Extermination is an open-ended skirmish that has aliens working to protect egg nests while marines work to destroy them
- XP system that goes towards armor unlocks
- lurkers that linger in the shadows and are quick to strike
- soldiers that excel close-up
- spitters that are more of a ranged threat
- weapons like the pulse rifle, shotgun and smart gun

Recently, I had the chance to play Aliens: Colonial Marines and I’m going to try and write more than one thousand five hundred words about the experience without quoting Aliens once. Will I manage to describe two varieties of multiplayer from the perspective of both alien and marine without once using the words of Hudson or Hicks? Will I convey my thoughts about the small portion of campaign I experienced without inserting a Vasquez line or two? Probably not.

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Aliens: Colonial Marines is sending you back to the barren moon of LV-426. Gearbox talk about working the Aliens' universe.

The stranded squad of space marines makes hasty preparations amid the flickering lights of a ruined former colony's command center. A scrounged sentry turret sits idle in a corner of the room, slowly scanning for signs of non-human life. Raging storms outside mask the sounds of creatures scuttling through air ducts, but the ever-present rhythmic beeping of motion trackers fill the air with ferocious frequency as the alien menace approaches.

Murky shapes take form as they leap into the light, slick, inky-black creatures with pronounced ridges lining their bodies. A shotgun burst drops the first attacker in an instant, its inert body slumping to the floor as a burst of acid blood sprays over a nearby squaddie.

Gearbox Software is a studio of many talents, but the developer's biggest success on Aliens: Colonial Marines may well end up being how accurately it's managed to nail the feel of the famous sci-fi series. This is vital, as anyone who has seen the movies can understand. There's nothing in the science fiction genre quite like the franchise's Xenomorphs, a race of highly aggressive and agile beings with acid for blood and the ability to reproduce through something akin to a cross-species infection. Xenomorphs in Aliens: Colonial Marines slide through the environment with the same sort of ease that they do in the movies, as we learned during a recent hands-on demo of the game's campaign. An unseen network of air ducts connects every room and corridor, so any alien that slips out of sight will eventually emerge elsewhere. Probably behind you.

#aliens The challenge Gearbox faces in making Aliens: Colonial Marines is twofold. First, since this is an authorized product, they need to make a game that seamlessly slides into Aliens continuity. Given the way that dev studio CEO Randy Pitchford can quote chapter and verse from the movie franchise timeline, this problem seems to be well in hand. More »

How many waves of Xenomorphs can you and your friends survive against?

Gosh. A trailer just fell out of a vent in my study and upon inspection it appears to contain footage of yet another multiplayer mode for Gearbox’s Aliens FPS, Colonial Marines. Along with aliens vs marines deathmatch and a co-operative campaign mode, objective-based team combat has also been promised, and Survivor, along with the already announced Escape mode offers just such a thing. One team controls aliens, which now come in different classes, and the other controls marines, who grunt and occasionally panic. And panic they should because they are doomed. Alien players respawn, marine players do not. Or if they do, they probably respawn as aliens.

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- colonial marines crash land onto the surface near Hadley's Hope on the moon Ancheron LV-426
- your rescue team arrives 17 weeks after the atmospheric processor exploded
- references to the movies, such as the APC vehicle Ridley drove, and a new android Bishop (voiced by Lance Henriksen) accompanying your party
- begin setting up motion sensors and one of them is knocked out by some Xenomorph aliens
- aliens appear from all directions and begin their assault on your tea
- later in the game, board the USS Sulaco
- start out at the bridge of the Sulac
- a hull breach is imminent
- the player has to dislodge a bullet that held a door open
- you'll encounter employees of the Weyland-Yutani Corporation, who are enemies
- Lance Henriksen will also be voicing Weyland
- Marines can earn experience in both single and multiplayer
- Marines and Xenomorphs have different upgrade paths
- experience earned as a Marine won't count towards developing your Alien
- Xenos are playable only in multiplayer

- Xenomorph players have a third person perspective
- trajectory indicator shows where you'll land after a leap
- HUD shows time left in the match
- Xenos are equipped with sight-based radar
- this allows you to see marines through walls if they are close enough
- you can also see which direction they're facing
- Escape is an objective-based mode
- Marines must try to complete certain goals
- Xenomorphs try to rip them apart
- one map has you defending airlocks and opening blast doors
- cannot shoot while using the motion tracker
- complete objectives to see the next one pop up on screen

Here’s a good idea for a game. There’s this giant alien, like, the size of a suburb, and it’s eaten all the locals. You are a member of an elite squad of marines, and you must enter its intestines to save them. It’s called Alien’s Colonial Marines. And that, ladies and gentleman, is the difference an apostrophe can make. Another joke I would like to tell at some time in the future is when Aliens: Colonial Marines becomes cheaper but not quite cheaper enough, and I can say, “I’ve got a bad feeling about this drop.” Meanwhile, the best I can do is alert you to the knowledge that you can now pre-order the game, and that there’s a trailer telling you to do so.

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So it's Left 4 Dead's competitive multiplayer, but with Xenomorphs instead of zombies? Sure, I'd play that!

Aliens: Colonial Marines Arises from The Grave... by TheGamerAccess

I have fond memories of Aliens vs Predator 2 multiplayer, in which I most often played the part of a terrified marine, a coward really who should never have signed up, abandoning my team and shooting wildly at shadows whenever anything resembling an alien jittered across the screen. Shown at PAX Prime, Colonial Marines is bolstering its multiplayer offering with a mode which is inspired by Left 4 Dead. Four marines must escape, booking it through a level while player-controlled aliens, some with special abilities, attempt to eviscerate them. A trailer skitters in the darkness below.

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A trailer detailing the new competitive multiplayer mode of Aliens: Colonial Marines, which pits four Marines against four Xenomorphs.

#aliens Sometimes you stand and fight. Aliens: Colonial Marines new Escape multiplayer mode, debuting this weekend at PAX Prime, is not one of those times. More »

The latest trailer out of Gamescom for Aliens: Colonial Marines has it all: Gruesome scenes of H.R. Giger's creations terrorizing marines, and a little behind-the-scenes on the upcoming release. The trailer talks about both the tension buildup that's so important to the Aliens franchise, and the freedom that Gearbox had to both make use of the movie's most familiar locations, and also create their own in new and interesting ways.

Oh, and there are some weirdly extraneous "action" shots of the game's creative team, mixed in among the commentary and game videos. Gearbox's Chief Creative Officer Brian Martel is a standout offender on that one. Nice hat tip there, bud.