Savior Gaming

After the heartbreak of a game I will not mention because I spent yesterday shitting all over it- ok dude it was Colonial Marines, and it really really shitty- I was really really skeptical when it was announced we were getting another alien game a tad bit over a year later. But I can tell you from the opening trailer I was hooked. Alien: Isolation takes place between the first and second movie, following Ellen Ripley’s daughter Amanda who has grown up not knowing what happened to her mother. An engineer, she learns from a Company synthetic Samuels, that a ship docked at Sevastopol Station carrying the Nostromo’s flight recorder. She boards the Torrens on a journey to retrieve it. After disastrous events trying to cross into Sevastopol via space-walk, Amanda finds herself alone on a station that has seriously seen better days. Ravaged inside, graffiti plastered all over the walls, bodies in the halls, Ripley is immediately afraid. She has a brief encounter with a guy named Axel who explains to her that bad things that gone on, riots, looting, the Joes, and something else…Ripley soon discovers what it is. A creature of unknown origin that is damn is faster than any human, cunning and extremely hostile. Beside the alien hunting Ripley and the scared shitless looters, the station’s synthetics the Working Joes have gone mad and begun not only murdering the survivors but actually protecting the creature. Every turn Ripley discovers there is nothing she can but try to outsmart the treachery and discover her mother’s fate, discovering her mom’s similar experience.

I’m not a fan of stealth games really but I have to say this is the closest we’ve ever had to experiencing the original film. The atmosphere, music, and details are miraculously recreated for the game, even the alien’s design is beautifully rendered from Giger’s original work. The story is drawn out a bit too long in places but the plot is well told, and Amanda Ripley is a good, vulnerable heroine that we feel push herself to overcome the insane odds against her. Rather than shooting your problems away, you have to craft items to outsmart the dangers of Sevastopol. The AI for this game is top notch; when the alien is hunting your ass down it feels like a real animal is chasing  you. My only real complaint is that the controls are a little clunky and at time the rare save points can be a major pain in the ass. Also, as Savior pointed out in his list of Disappointing games, if you aren’t a major fan of the franchise, you may find much harder to get in to. There is a lot of walking around and many of your objectives get tedious after a while but I found the game intriguing and suspenseful. If you guys played it, what did you think- comment down below. If you love Alien, I seriously recommend it or if you like good stealth horror games, pick it up. As always, may the gaming gods be with you and…

  don’t run…or shoot…or screw up or yanno…kisses!

Released a week after Alien: Isolation, I was n horror geek nirvana when this casserole of madness and blood hit the scene. Created by the man responsible for the original Resident Evil, we’re thrown back to the origins of survival horror gaming- disturbing monsters, lack of ammo, frightening atmosphere, and a lurking sense of dread behind every twist and turn this and Isolation capture beautifully. We get omages to classic Resident Evil with a play style reminiscent of 4, nods to Silent Hill, Saw, F.E.A.R, all thrown into a blender with a book of acid and it’s awesome. We follow Sebastian  Castellanos, Krimson City Detective with a haunted past, his partners Joey  Oda and Juli Kidman as they investigate a massacre at a mental hospital. In the camera footage Sebastian sees a scarred man in a white hoodie is the perpetrator-than the headache and the light. Suddenly he’s hanging upside down by his ankle amongst other bodies by a grisly sadist. He chases us through his complex liar with a chainsaw, until, wounded we break free only to be greeted by a massive earthquake that devastates the city. Suddenly Sebastian is thrown into utter madness by Ruvik (voiced brilliantly by Jackie Earle Haley I might add) whose out to rewrite reality in his twisted image via STEM device, making us ask at the end, what really is real?

I’m a huge fan of this game, but I’m not not blind to it’s flaws. Grapically it’s gorgeous, the loading screens are eerie as hell; the game play is difficult but fun. Besides enemies, there are booby-traps littered throughout and much like Dishonored we can play the game a variety of ways which was really cool. The score is creepy and I love the opening theme song. What I found found really original is having to cross a whole other dimension to save and upgrade yourself and gear, Claire de Lune will never be the same for me because of this damn game. Now, the negatives. With the exception of Haley as Ruvik, the voice acting is stiff and even bland. Sebastian may as well be ordering his morning coffee while being chased by the demonic memory of Laura, Ruvik’s sister. At a point the game starts to drag around chapter 13 or so and there are bullshit deaths around the game. In the end it doesn’t have much of a replay value in my opinion, after beating it on PS3 and unlocking new game +, I put the game down and haven’t played it through since early 2015. Overall, it’s a flawed masterpiece but definitely worth a go. If you’re a horror fan and like Resident Evil, you’ll enjoy it…caution, this game is freaky.