Alien: Isolation News

December 21, 2020 Alien: Isolation is free on the Epic Games Store today, so we're digging into the archives to highlight our chats with the devs. This article was originally published January 9, 2014.

Alien: Isolation burst out of Creative Assembly's chest yesterday, splattering previews all over the internet and making us spill our collective cereal - here is my Alien: Isolation preview, in case you're interested in finding out more. The game plays, in the parts we've been shown at least, like Amnesia in space, with only a solitary, highly intelligent and free-roaming xenomorph forming the game's horror centrepiece.

Gary Napper, lead designer at Creative Assembly, and Jude Bond, lead artist, spoke to me about how to create a truly terrifying artificial intelligence, what they thought of recent games in the franchise and how Alien: Isolation hopes to sustain a level of tension from start to finish that doesn't result in heart-stopping fatalities. Come have a look at the words we said to one another.

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What we want from Alien: Isolation 2

Today's Epic Store free game is Alien: Isolation

How Alien: Isolation's retro space station was built with fear in mind

December 21, 2020 Alien: Isolation is free on the Epic Games Store today - which has made us want a sequel even more than we already did...

If Creative Assembly is working on an Alien: Isolation 2 it's being as quiet as Newt in an air duct about it. We were hoping that a sequel would be announced not too long ago but our dreams were dashed with the announcement of Alien: Blackout. Sure, it followed Amanda Ripley in a new storyline but, sigh, only on mobile.

Still, that doesn't mean Alien: Isolation 2 is completely off the cards. Alien: Blackout was actually a good sign as it shows there's plenty of interest in creating more Alien games. Let's just hope it doesn't lead to another Colonial Marines.

Wouldn't it be great if Alien: Isolation 2 on PC was being made? The first game was highly praised and popular so there's precedent for such a sequel. Perhaps we'd get more of the same tight survival horror gameplay, with a xenomorph hunting you down around a space station - it worked once, at least. But there's also the chance to go in a slightly different direction so as to surprise us all, like a gherkin-headed monster springing from a vent.

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RELATED LINKS:

How Creative Assembly designed Alien: Isolation's terrifyingly clever xenomorph

Today's Epic Store free game is Alien: Isolation

How Alien: Isolation's retro space station was built with fear in mind

In space, no one can hear you scream “THAT’S RAD” when you see Alien: Isolation is the latest free game on the Epic Games Store. As their Christmas celebration of daily giveaways continues, you have until tomorrow to grab the fine first-person horror game that’s sorta a sequel to the classic film. It’s a good’un, I say despite having given up on it myself because I’m too much of a spacebaby.

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To mark the holiday season, the Epic Games Store has upped the pace of its usual weekly game giveaways to one a day. The 15 days of free PC games continues apace with today's offering, which is Alien: Isolation. You've got 24 hours to grab your copy.

Let's dispense with the usual throat clearing here: Alien: Isolation is far and away the best Alien experience you can find in games. Even with a few frustrating gameplay elements (hello, rubber-banding xenomorph) and a third act that overstays its welcome, the experience of being alone and hunted as Amanda Ripley in the Sevastopol space station is truly frightening. Developer Creative Assembly put a lot of thought and care into recreating the retro-future environments you'll encounter on the Sevastopol, down to the padded bulkheads and light-diffusing steam.

It's on our lists for both the best horror games and best stealth games, as you'll have to sneak around quietly while the intelligent alien AI searches for any sign of your presence, and will rush to your position if you make a racket. That's when the horror bit kicks in, since failure means finding out what it looks like in first person to have your head cored like an apple by that vicious little set of secondary jaws.

Read the rest of the story...

RELATED LINKS:

How Creative Assembly designed Alien: Isolation's terrifyingly clever xenomorph

What we want from Alien: Isolation 2

How Alien: Isolation's retro space station was built with fear in mind