Aliens: Colonial Marines (2013 Video Game) User Reviews

I'll be brief...

[Shanus · 5/10 · 13 February 2013]

Once upon a time the awesome Alien franchise was born... When i switched on my Xbox 360 earlier this week and played this game i quickly realised that the franchise, specifically in respect of video gaming, is dead and buried. The graphics are too sharp yet ill detailed and not at all Alien-esque... The titles are also juvenile attempts at mimicking the movies and are awful. The levels belong on an original xbox or PS2 release and are dreary, tiresome, repetitive and ill conceived. The interface isn't innovative in any way and must have been designed on the back of the blank cheque that Sega wrote Gearbox to bring this high school project to fruition.

I've been playing video games for 30 years and not ever has a publisher spent so much dollar on promotion for such a bland, weightless, empty shell of a concept that has not materialised into any semblance of a 21st century hi-def title.

In conclusion its like playing a several year old platinum title that has no place being in the modern era of video gaming. A poor poor title that'll keep you happy (in anticipation only) for about 10 minutes (if you're a die-hard Alien fan) before the disc is on its way to trade in for store credit.

What were 20th Century Fox thinking?! PS. Give the trailer director credit for clever editing, tricking us all into believing that we were actually buying something of substance.

Average: Finally Tolerable

[TBJCSKCNRRQTreviews · 5/10 · 30 September 2016]

17 weeks after the events in Cameron's film, you and your unit arrives at the Sulaco. Something has gone very wrong, and it's up to you to find out what, and take care of it. You'll face countless PMCs, some Aliens, and more than a few head-scratching retcons in this fan-fic of a story. Weyland-Yutani keeps trying desperately to tame the universe's most drooling killing machine. The villain himself is straight out of a Saturday morning cartoon.

It's important to note that this is no longer broken. Well, other than the occasional hiccup. They patched the crap out of this thing, and fixed almost everything. That they could, that is. Some issues remain and mar the experience greatly. Plot, characters, dialog, writing and execution(do *not* get me started on the acting and lip sync) alike are definitely lacking. And yet, there are definite glimmers of talent. You do sometimes care. The types can be annoying, yet feel like they belong here. And the banter almost all works. Even if it has a tendency to go one line too far, ending on a sitcom punchline. All it's missing is a "wah-wah", or possibly a "that's our (blank)!" This adds a *lot* of customization and compelling new abilities for both species. The numerous guns, while too similar and limited especially for sci-fi, can be changed in a good amount of ways. Silencer, a handful of alternate fire options, stat changes galore. Strong, unique Legendary weapons add replayability. For what they can deliver, and recognizing the markings. Hudson, Vasquez, Different types of Xenos, they're given ranged attacks, tons of improvements on what was there before, etc. The real issue is that you can't practice this at your own pace. You have to improve, and even just learn, via multiplayer. And you will get slaughtered early on. That's when you can even find a match. No players, no server list, limited matchmaking, and I could go on. In two weeks, I barely spent any time in any of the too-similar modes. I hate to direct anyone to 2010's AvP, but that one you can play anytime, gets creative in how you approach it, and lets you try it at your own pace in SP.

The AI is hilariously inept. Maybe that's why your offline buddies are impossible to kill. They will run right into your line of fire, leave you to die, teleport to you if you get ahead, and more. Enemies might freeze in place, or just randomly run around. Their use of wall-walking seems more like they're showing off than their having a reason for doing so. The lack of enemy variety in these is lessened, though the Crusher, a huge one that's not that different from the Queen, is pointless. One spits acid at you, with nice speed and accuracy. Another will kamikaze, exploding in their blood. Thankfully, they can't see you. Which means you have to crouch-walk past them. Or stand perfectly still when they're completely next to you! Did I mention you were weaponless in this section? And that they look like fossilized husks until they start walking, surrounded by actual ones, so you won't know which is which until they start moving? The DLC are a mixed bag. I wouldn't get any of this if it's not on sale. The obvious ones to leave alone, for now, are the ones that consist entirely of MP maps. You can't play them by yourself. And without them, there are 10 to start with, a reasonable amount. They add up to 20 total. Ripley's signature bad-ass rescue facilitator is worth the asking price. Note that anyone you can don the look of are all slightly "off" in the face. There are enough shotguns without the one you can buy separately, and they don't lack ammo, reload speed and the possibility of alteration. Bug Hunt is rarely played. The two energy attacks are worthless. The S.H.A.R.P. Sticks mix things up and are the most interesting part of your arsenal in this whole thing.

Stasis Interrupted deserves detail. You play as a few different protagonists, you really get into it, it clocks in at 2 and a half hours meaning almost half the core product. The plentiful time spent alongside, unfortunately never as, Hicks is sadly somewhat soured by Michael Biehn clearly not wanting to be there. Even if you hadn't heard about that interview, it's plain to see in his performance. And I say that as one of his biggest fans. Compare to Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon where he, as he also says, was having the time of his life.

Authenticity is through the roof. Everything looks, sounds and feels right. All memorable locations are not only visited, they're recreated in tremendous detail and every added section fits in so well, you'd swear you just didn't remember seeing that part in the films. The motion tracker finally works exactly right. You have all the equipment you see used. For some reason, you can carry every projectile delivery system, and even start out with a number of them from the beginning. Of course, you may not realize until after a while, and by accident, like it was for me. It's not common today to carry that many at once. And you can't cycle through them with any key. Oh, you can go back and forth between primary, secondary and which of the three pistols you have ready. As worthless as that is in the face of so much firepower that you basically cannot run out of ammo, no matter how inept you may be. You're stuck with the slow wheel which keeps you from moving, doesn't pause or even allow for it, selects whatever you were resting the cursor on even if you were just checking what had the most bullets left.

I recommend this only to the biggest fans of the franchise, and don't go out of your way to get your hands on a copy. 5/10

Aliens - Colonic Irrigation (It's more enjoyable, honest!)

[Rob_Taylor · 4/10 · 27 May 2013]

I heard dire things before I got hold of a copy of this game (cheaply, I might add) and I feared the worst. But for what I paid for it, I thought even a bad game might be worth it.

Firstly, the good things. It's nice to be able to walk around the colony on LV-426. It looks reasonable and they have paid considerable attention to the movie to get the look right. The sound effects are straight out of the movie and spot on. Also, gameplay isn't at all hard and features no quick-time events.

Right, to the bad. Characters are terribly badly fleshed out. In fact, the term 'fleshed out' implies some substance. There isn't any. For a story driven game (supposedly) the marines have all the charisma and likability of store mannequins. Likewise with the store mannequin analogy, the character facial models are some of the most lifeless I've seen for a very long time. They all manage to look like some kind of doppelganger pod-people. No expression at all.

Finally, the ugly. Bugs, and not the xenomorph kind. In one playthrough I saw a ton of them. Aliens getting stuck in and against things. Aliens not dying despite being motionless and shot at repeatedly by NPC marines. In one instance, you and three other marines get trapped in an arena-like area with a boss alien. You can't progress until you kill the boss alien. So it didn't help when I somehow managed to punch the boss out of the arena with the powerloader. The boss couldn't get back in and we couldn't get out. Hence the game repetitively sent swarms of lesser aliens at us. I could have played on endlessly but instead chose to redo from the last checkpoint, which was the only way to rectify the issue.

Apart from the above there's also a terrible lack of anything like intelligence in both the alien and marine AI. Aliens just run at you. In fact, they seem to target you, happily running past an NPC marine to get to you, and you only. Fortunately, the simple tactic of taking a step forward when they spring seems to work every time to foil their attacks. Don't bother turning to kill them. Just keep walking and most of the levels can be completed without much actual fighting.

As for the marines AI, well, it is even worse. Either they wander off, fail to shoot at enemies, or just stand in the damn way. Don't worry about leaving them behind (the game repeatedly beats you about the head with the "No one left behind" motto) because they all have the ability to magically teleport to your location if you get too far ahead. No, I mean that literally! They appear with a little flash of light, rather like Q from Star Trek Next Generation! Poor structure of missions and a surprising lack of clue as to what to do is also present. There appears to be nothing like a tutorial in the game, so you can lose track of what you are supposed to do next if your attention wanders or you fall asleep for a moment due to excessive excitement.

But, but, it has a story, right? Surely that makes up for it? No, not at all. The story is pretty simple and everything plays out exactly as you expect. The only surprise comes later in the game when they reveal that... gasp!... one of the marines from the movie survived! I'm going to tell you who it is in the next paragraph, so skip it if you don't want that bit "spoiled".

So, one of the marines survives. I was wracking my brains before I caught up with him as to who it might be, mentally ticking off all the marines that you don't actually see get killed in the film. You can understand my "What the f&$k!" moment when it turns out to be Hicks. Yes, you read that right. Hicks. How he ends up there, when we all saw him dead in Alien 3 (and they even mention that fact in-game) is hand-waved away with the comment from Hicks "That is a long story." No, that's it. That's all he says. No further explanation at all! Then again, he is one of the magically teleporting NPC marines, so maybe he just appeared in a flash of light. Good grief.

You can guess I wasn't at all impressed with ACM. It looks like a game still in beta and from ten years ago. If you look at the demo they showed for it, then the actual game is nothing like as rich or detailed. What it is, is a lazy-ass effort that utterly did not deserve the full price many paid for it. As an Indie effort, I'd be lauding the achievement. But for a game studio like Gearbox to take credit for this is totally laughable.

How many years did this take to get out? How much money did Gearbox get from Sega? How much money did they make off poor fools paying full price for a game that was nothing like it was advertised to be? I don't know the answers. Time was, you could rely on certain developers and publishers to produce good games. These days, not so much.

SUMMARY: Hellishly glad I didn't pay anything like full-price for this turkey. Underwhelming in nearly every department and downright insulting in some areas. My advice. Not even worth playing if you can get it for free. Go watch Aliens the movie instead. It's the only way to be sure...

A letdown

[NicolasHunter500 · 11 February 2013]

Since I'm currently based in Australia, I was fortunate enough to play this game before its official release date over in The U.S. This isn't the incompetently thrown together hack job Rebellion's alien vs predator was, but this is simply a toned down shell of a game that had the potential to be superior in comparison to other games based off the alien franchise. In this game, you are able to return to hadley's hope out of Aliens, and many of the locations from the film,surprisingly, you get to visit throughout the game, but, had Gearbox chosen to make a proper squad shooter like they intended to do so years ago, when they first announced this, and not some dumbed down, mindless call of duty style shooter that throws waves after waves of alien (and human) enemies at you constantly, at the expense of a deep, intelligent first person horror shooter it wouldn't be getting a 5 score.

My main objection to this game is not that it deliberately caters to the audience that year after year buys call of duty, or the fact that its a lazy, highly linear and scripted game that lacks nearly any replay value whatsoever, but the fact the Gearbox would blatantly make gamers wait for this for over 7 years, hyping it up,while at the same time fuelling that hype with a huge marketing campaign that makes it sound better then it does, and then, all of a sudden,they dump an enormously mediocre and underwhelming game onto store shelves that barely keeps any of its promises and under delivers in nearly every way. It fails at being a decent entry into the alien universe, it fails at being a horror game, it fails at being a decent action game because the action is bloodless and sterile while the level design is so corridor like and linear to the point you're almost simply going down a set of narrow paths. The graphics look fine admittedly and sound design is above average, but its hard to really compliment this game on anything else. Its inexcusable that this took so long to come out and this is the finished product. Even alien vs predator, which was a depressingly enormous disappointment didn't break my heart as much as this did. Gearbox had enough time and budget to at least develop a reasonably decent shooter that simply gives fans of the alien franchise a satisfying experience. Had they opted to go with their original vision, and not chosen to make a brainless, clichéd ridden game that was clearly pumped out for money and to capitalize on the 12 year old boy infested call of duty market this could have been worth the time. Perhaps they should have just cancelled this years ago, so they could of at least spared many alien fans and fans of decent shooters (like me) the disappointment.

A serious big letdown

[Ekul1021 · 5/10 · 13 February 2013]

Aliens Colonial Marines had so much going, it is to be considered part of the Alien's canon along with finding out what happen to our heroes from another point of view. Sadly, after playing the game through with considerable thoughts and process, I was very letdown and also don't have my $60 since that is the cost of the game. For a PC player, I cannot trade in the game nor get a refund for it. Anyways, here is what I experienced in the game and hopefully help you decide whether to get the game or not.

The storyline is about the marine corp who finally receives the distress call from Corporal Hicks from the movie Aliens. As part of the detachment, I'm to go and rescue any stranded marines since we don't leave them behind. The story does offer a lot of fan services which is very nice especially being part of the Aliens movie, we do expect to see some mentioning about Ripley, Bishop, Newt, and the other characters. Sadly though, there is no Burke mentioned much, would have been nice especially we want to hear how a person like him, a sleazy business men sent hundreds to people to their deaths. Sadly, the story throughout the game was ho-hum and could have been more developed such as O'Neal and Bella could have been more develop to where you actually care for the characters. The voice acting was so-so, Michael Biehn tries to maintain his "marine" calmness but on a computer game, you just don't sense that feel. Lance Henriksen is the cyborg Bishop and his character is just as creepy, but even big name actors doesn't really saves the game's storyline.

Graphic for the game sometimes make or break the game but not always, but here, it seems the game is dated around Half Life 2 or something. For paying $60 of a dated game is way too much and is a complete rip-off. The texture is very bland and very uncolorful, the texture on the aliens when you shoot them, acid supposedly bleeds, is colorful yellow? Is the yellow supposed to be really glowing that bright? I know graphic isn't everything but for a game this old, this is just not acceptable especially for the price you pay and staring at the screen for the next 6 to 8 hours. Just look at the fire texture in the game, either it is because the surface of LV-426 is lighter then air or the developers just want to rush the game out the door.

Weapons in the game is the pulse rifle, smart gun, shot gun, assault guns, but the sound of the guns just sound so bland, it just doesn't have the feel of the game.

Gameplay was what broke the game for me. Instead of squad-based game where you're in charge, commanding your troops, or giving them a free order, it seems like you're playing with a bot from Unreal Tournament or something else. Because you're carrying around 4 to 5 weapons, the game just doesn't seem like you're in trouble or the "poop in the pants" moment when you're out of ammo. The boss fight with the alien queen was an utter disappointment. Unlike the movie where she grabs stuff with her long arms or try and spike you with her inner jaws, your objective is to try and get her in front of this sliding loader to slide her out into space. All the aliens even doesn't seem that interesting, just your standard aliens. There is even an acid spitting aliens that is considered a brand new alien? I thought they had those guys in Alien 4 and they are the same standard alien drones. I would have thought they have the queen's guard or something or even the hybrid aliens. Gear Box was invited to see the Prometheus script? Well, I found nothing that was "prometheus" link in the game at all, I was hoping at least a boss fight with an engineer, but anything Prometheus was not present in the game at all.

What a mess this game is, game over man, no doubt about it that I'm very sad and $60 down the drain for a half baked game. The fan service is good for us Alien fans to point out and say "oh cool, that was in the movie", but even fan service just doesn't justify dropping $60 down the drain. Gaming wise, Aliens Colonial Marines is probably the saddest thing for me in the world of gaming, so much could have been better, and for once when Randy Pitchford, CEO of Gearbox was demoing the game, it looked very impressive at one time, how could this happen? Anyways, if you want to really know the storyline for the game, probably check out the wikis and youtubes as playing through the game just to know the storyline is a complete waste of your money.

Dumb aliens, missing guns, and misleading trailer all in one game!

[legoknight326 · 1/10 · 23 November 2013]

Aliens colonial marines is absolute crap. I bought my version on the xbox and what I saw when I played it for the first time was complete garbage. The budget is low, and the online multi-player and the campaign is littered with game breaking bugs and glitches. The AI (artificial intelligence) is absolutely terrible. The aliens in the campaign are so stupid, they run into machine gun fire and sentry bullets. They don't even attempt to hide, they just jump out and do weird attack animations that look like old men doing a potty dance. And if that wasn't enough, I encountered a rare glitch where my Pulse Rifle wasn't there. The dude's hand was in a position where it looked like he was holding it, but it just wasn't there. This pushed me over the edge, because the only redeeming factor is the iconic weapons. The main guy you play with, O'Neal, is NO HELP WHATSOEVER. All he does is stare at walls and get stuck in spots that you have to move through, but you cant. And its obvious GearBox knows its crap, because they abandoned the multi-player online service, so the online is nothing but hacks and glitches. This game is Xenomorph doo-doo. Don't even attempt to buy it. You will undoubtedly laugh at the stupidity of the aliens. One last thing is the trailer. The trailer shows and epic battle between hordes of aliens vs the power loader. FALSE! This NEVER happens in the multi-player nor campaign. Please save your money and buy another game, this one will disappoint the hell out of you.

(sigh)

[joeyjoey90 · 1/10 · 26 May 2013]

In 2007, Sega announced 2 Alien video games, one was a 3rd person tactical shooter and the other an FPS. Later, Sega canceled the development of the 3rd person shooter and continued development on the FPS. Sadly, they made the wrong choice. A:CM has seen many distractions, delays, and rumor had it that it was canceled, but in 2010 the development continued and eventually a gameplay preview came up. The game showed promise on how it closely resembles the moody atmosphere of Aliens. The game finally released on February 21, 2013, and... well. Its a complete waste of time! This game feels like its still in the beta phase and shouldv'e been released for the PS2. The A.I. is awful, they just run strait at you, completely unaware that you're shooting them! The story is BY GOD TERRIBLE! Weapons are useless and unbalanced! MP... just forget about it. There is absolutely no light in this game! Its a complete embarrassment to the Alien franchise and should be avoided at all times!

Playable but only just

[ratcat0 · 7/10 · 8 July 2013]

The first thing you will notice is the absolutely dated textures, some fancy new design would have been nice as well but they have paid some attention to detail. Admittedly the game does look rather bland in 2D but crank up the 3D eyewear and it looks quite good. Its rather surprising that this game has garnered so many negs as it really isn't all that bad. There are some quite tense moments where you are just waiting for a face-hugger to suck your face off but all in all It looks as though they threw something together just to cash in. Actually playing the game isn't all that bad. Other game manufacturers go all the way and pay so much attention to detail but not so this crowd. For instance a lot of the time you are shooting at an Alien and your team mate gets in the way - other games you would be severely admonished "Hey stop shooting at me"! but this one your team mates don't mind. (so much for reality) NVidia rate this game as average in the 3D rating but I found it virtually unplayable until I downloaded the Helix fix. If you want to play in 3D it is recommended that you apply this fix. You need to be slightly higher than a casual PC user in expertise to be able to extract the fix to the proper directory but it is well worth doing as before the fix, lights from other marines helmets were on the wrong plane and torchlights were in 2D - the whole thing looked messed up. Do a web search for Helix 3d fix etc, its only a tiny 33KB download. Why cant you simply install a game on Steam without having to perform an hour of updates? That is so annoying especially if you only play the single player campaign. The majority of the updates are probably multiplayer fixes. Don't be put off by the negative reviews, its worth a look just buy it when the price has gone down to $20.00 or so, maybe get it from a bargain basement seller! If 6.5 out of ten were there that would be my rating maybe even 7!

Have you ever been mistaken for a Video game ?

[southdavid · 3/10 · 27 May 2021]

I'm not going to take this opportunity to again rehash the story of the development of this game, there are plenty of articles out there which do that. I'm just going to say that I reached the game, running though my Xbox 360 games alphabetically and playing before selling and I managed approximately an hour of this game, before the wonky control system meant that I decided to give up on it entirely.

As a result of that short play time, I'm not going to write chapter and verse about why the game doesn't work - it may well have clicked after a couple of hours - and I'll just never know. I gave up because I felt I couldn't trust the controller to do what I inputted - and it wasn't the physical controller, that's fine - it's just unresponsive and occasionally contrary coding. Combine that with just bad game design, like some areas where I'm not supposed to fight, and just run, but no real indication when I'm in one of those and, for me, still seeing the glitching Alien's occasionally just standing there for no reason - I decided that enough was more than enough.

"Aliens: Colonial Marines" - 7/10

[dee.reid · 7/10 · 22 September 2013]

I need to make it clear that before going into reviewing "Aliens: Colonial Marines," that James Cameron's "Aliens" (1986), the superior, action-packed sequel to Ridley Scott's infamous, landmark 1979 deep-space horror/sci-fi flick "Alien," is one of my all-time personal favorite movies.

"Aliens" is my fifth favorite movie of all time; I grew up with this movie, and I personally consider it to be far better in every conceivable way and fashion, than "Alien" (though I must also readily admit my great fondness for Scott's original masterpiece).

So you can imagine my surprise when news finally came out that a video game billing itself as a genuine sequel to Cameron's "Aliens" was in development. Unlike most people who have relentlessly trashed "Aliens: Colonial Marines" since its February 2013 release, I feel that I'm somewhere in the middle. I at least thought it looked nice, and it was good to see some sort of continuation - however sloppy - to "Aliens." The story to "Aliens: Colonial Marines" basically details a war between the United States Colonial Marines and the Weyland-Yutani Corporation's private army of heavily armed hired mercenaries, who are illegally breeding the hideous Xenomorph creatures using captured Marines and innocent space colonists as hosts.

It all sounds exciting, doesn't it? But it does have many issues...

The game itself has an incredibly clumsy story - which I already detailed briefly - that thoroughly contradicts established events from the film, and game-play that's pretty typical of any high-tech first-person shooter in recent years, since it was stated fairly early on by the developers that the game would feature squad-based game-play (we all thought it was going to be a war game in outer space, like the movie), and would feature the return of genuine flesh & blood performers from Cameron's 1986 action epic reprising their original roles from the film - Michael Biehn (Corporal Hicks) and Lance Henriksen (Bishop); if you could get the additional DLC packs, additional actors from the film - Al Matthews (Sergeant Apone), Mark Rolston (Private Drake), and (?) Bill Paxton (Private Hudson) (?) - would also be reprising their roles.

In terms of basic first-person shooter game-play, "Aliens: Colonial Marines" does feature some of the iconic weaponry from the movie, as well as familiar locales on-board the Colonial Marine space vessel the USS Sulaco, and the ruins of the space colony Hadley's Hope on the desolate planetoid LV-426 (and there's even a sequence in the middle of the game featuring the Derelict Spacecraft from "Alien" and featured briefly in a restored scene from the extended director's cut of "Aliens"). The game does not, however, recreate the claustrophobic tension and terror of Cameron's film (much less feature any of the landmark score composed for the film by James Horner), and most of the game's confrontations feature you gunning down hordes and hordes of approaching Xenomorphs (though you'll have your AI comrades and maybe a robot sentry or two to aid you - somewhat). There are little tasks you have to complete here & there to advance the story, but much of everything in "Aliens: Colonial Marines" consists of the player shooting aliens.

Some of the gun battles where you encounter the alien creatures can be frustrating - and even overwhelming (but not in a particularly good way) - at times, which is about the only authentic thing about them that even comes close to Cameron's "Aliens." Other than that, it's a pretty straight-forward first-person shooter that initially billed itself as the future of the "Alien" franchise in the video game world (which is ironic considering the possibility that "Aliens" has arguably had the single greatest influence on the overall development of the first-person shooter genre).

Despite the clunky story, there are a bunch of little tidbits that reference Cameron's film, which shows that the game developers may have spent too much time watching the movie rather than understanding it and trying to recreate the action and suspense it delivered.

"Aliens" will always rate as one of my all-time greatest movies, and one of the scariest, and most action-packed, sci-fi films ever made. The game that aimed to expand its story and legacy - "Aliens: Colonial Marines" - is not so much. It's a big disappointment, albeit an enjoyable disappointment. I got my kicks out of playing this game, mostly by enjoying the numerous references to "Aliens" (which include having to collect dog-tags of the Colonial Marine characters, among other little items, from the film), which took me back to the moments where it all started.

It's all too bad, really, because this could have been an EPIC, EPIC game-changer...

7/10

Randy Pitchford

[Pepe-arbiter · 3/10 · 18 November 2020]

Besides not paying his employees what they deserve in terms of bonuses (kotaku wrote a story about this awhile ago: it's quite disgusting), Randy Pitchford is a liar. Go back and watch him lie during the demo he presented of this game back in 2012 where he proclaimed how "authentic" the game was and how it was going to blow everyone away.

False advertising aside: the game is just bad. The gun play is weak as hell, the combat against the mercenaries sent by Weyland Yutani takes up an inordinate amount of the game time, the graphics are ugly as hell, the list goes on. And the story is shoddy as hell and breaks canon many times over.

Biggest disappointment I've ever had in regards to the game industry as a whole. Never before was I more hyped for a game, and never again have I been as let down by an end product.

This is all on you Randy.

This one is for true fans of the 'Alien' movie series lore.

[mecheart · 9/10 · 24 June 2013]

I first played a video game set in the 'Alien' universe around 1991 when stationed at an Army base in Texas. There were a few arcade games in the day room of the barracks there. One of them happened to be 'Aliens' which for the time was a really cool co-op 2D shooter. When not on duty down at the motor pool or out in the field, my friends and I would hold small 'Aliens' tourneys as a much needed distraction from tasks at hand. I pumped a heck of a lot of quarters into that game back then.

Fast forward to 1999 and the release of 'AvP' - a game largely responsible for my return to PC Gaming and in glorious 3D at that.

Additionally, I am great fan of the 'Alien' movies, having seen all of them in the theater, yet still unable to decide on my absolute favorite of the four. I am the type who often checks around the net for news of another film in the series ... and have been doing so for many years.

So, I am a big fan of the 'Alien' universe and a follower of the lore, character histories and stories, etc. I've enjoyed most every game released in the series over the years, and thus was quite excited to hear of a game on the horizon that was both going to focus on the Colonial Marines and add to the official story of events surrounding LV- 426.

Admittedly, I am a few months late to purchasing 'Aliens: Colonial Marines' but doing so had been in the back of my head since its release. First thing - as usual before buying a new PC game - was to read a slew of reviews and watch some game play footage.

Based on most every review I read, I naturally presumed the game was going to be utter rubbish, and that a great opportunity for the developers to expand on the lore of the universe had been blown.

Going in with little expectation based on seemingly united bad reviews of the game around the web, I bought it anyway, installed it and booted it up. Seven, yes seven hours later I came up for air and exited the game.

I honestly was and am baffled by the horde of bad reviews revolving around this PC game title. 'Aliens Colonial Marines' is very obviously a game made by developers who adore the 'Aliens' universe for those of us who also love it.

The developers' appreciation and interest in the universe of the films is apparent in most every aspect of the game. From an impressive recreation of the 'Sulaco' which allows the gamer to wander the corridors of that ship and see many parts of it not revealed in 'Aliens', to providing us with a chance similarly to wander the battle scarred halls of 'Hadley's Hope'.

The armor, weapons and other details of the Colonial Marines' arsenal are all well crafted and rendered in sufficient graphical detail. Weapons look, feel and sound authentic and I really liked the way the infamous hand-held motion tracker sounds and is depicted graphically.

Make no mistake, the game is a purely linear first person shooter in the vein of 'Doom' but with the added benefit of large open outdoor areas interspersed with claustrophobic passages in spaceships and the corridors and rooms of the colony and other locations. Added, not required areas are present as well and worth exploration for ammo, armor, collectibles and audio recordings.

What also pleased me immensely as a fan was the voice over work done by Lance Henriksen as 'Bishop' and Michael Biehn as 'Cpl. Hicks'. The addition of these two actors voices greatly lent the overall effort a heavy authenticity and will certainly please fans of the films.

The shooter mechanics overall were competent. Movement seems a bit slow at first, but all controls expected by first person shooter fanatics are present and functional.

Weapon menu control was effective - a radial menu accessed with the 'B' key. Speaking of weapons, the selection in 'Colonial Marines' pleasantly surprised me as there are many more weapons available than in any other game set in the 'Aliens' universe - some of which I am certain are creations of the developers but all are well modeled and fun to use. On top of the great weapons selection is the ability to customize each one with add on components such as optical sights, larger magazines and under barrel attachments ... how cool is that?

Lastly, a feature I really enjoyed was the ability to find the personal weapons of characters from the 'Aliens' movie lying around abandoned on LV-426. Definitely a geek gasmic moment when I found a certain well know Colonial Marine's pulse rifle.

In closing I must reiterate my lack of understanding for the uniform dislike generated around the gaming web by game review journalists. Honestly, the last time I encountered such condemnation of a good but long delayed title was that surrounding the release of Daikatana.

If you're a big fan of the 'Alien' series of movies and you are fairly long time PC Gamer who can appreciate a straight up first person shooter that nicely pays homage to the lore of that universe, I think you will absolutely enjoy 'Aliens: Colonial Marines'.

Better Than You'd Expect

[jackbradlywilson · 7/10 · 18 September 2015]

Despite the negative reviews, this game is actually pretty good and worth playing if your a fan of the Alien movies. It takes place just after Aliens (the second movie) but has a new set of characters on a different mission, however Hicks and Bishop from the second movie both appear as supporting characters and they are both voiced by the actors that play them in the movie (Michael Biehn and Lance Henriksen) which is pretty awesome. The plot is above average, but it is really just there so that the action has reason to play out. The action is great however and the gameplay and controls are good (despite what some users have said about messed up controls). The aliens in the game are well done and there are a good variety of them. The graphics are good but they could easily have come from a game made ten years ago. On the downside, there are one or two glitches every so often (however they don't prevent you from moving forward in the game) and sometimes the AI is a little buggy and it occasionally affects the gameplay in a negative way. Also the game just suddenly comes to a halt and just ends unexpectedly, in a weak and uninteresting way and it may make you angry. Overall, I would recommend this game because, despite its flaws, it is a lot of fun and the multiplayer is well thought out and very enjoyable. 6.5/10. (Additionally, the game does a good job of being scary; particularly when you get to use the Alien radar machine which detects Aliens closing in on you and makes a beeping noise which gets faster and faster the closer they get).

Terribly Underwhelming

[occidentalover · 4/10 · 24 July 2020]

What can I say that hasn't already been said?

At first the game was slightly better than I expected. I was enjoying myself. Then I got to the part where I had to defeat an alien with a loader. I died. And died again. I spent more than an hour trying to get past this part that should have taken me just a couple minutes. I failed and gave up. I even googled how to get past this and the best answer was telling me to glitch the fight. Wow really thanks so helpful. Glitch to proceed. I would have if these aliens didn't keep killing me while I'm trying to pound on the big one. Where did they come from? I'm playing on the easiest setting and yet the the gameplay footage I saw had no extra aliens to kill you in this segment. Just the biggie. So they released all those updates and made this part harder!?! My god you devs who made this game are so so dumb. This game was a disaster and you know it. May Jah have no mercy on your horrid souls for ruining an IP with great potential. Beloved IP for undeserving, selfish developers. That's you. Bad bad bad. Shame on you Gearbox. Shame on Sega for releasing this unfinished, broken trash.

Fudge this game. If the devs cannot be bothered to thoroughly play-test their AAA game before release, then why must we suffer? I hate your team. I want my time back. And I didn't even pay for the game; got it with an Xbox 360 I got from craigslist. I didn't pay anything for this, yet I want my money back. My time is money. Gearbox you owe me $360.

And I was one unforgivable segment from thinking this game was okay. Like a '5' maybe even a six. NOPE. Such a sad disappointment.

I'm not a bad gamer. I've beaten Ninja Gaiden games. But this loader part? Yeah no. Big mistake. Maybe other versions /updates are better, apparently as I've seen online. But mine? Unforgiveable.

A disappointment, sure. But not THAT bad....

[briangcb · 17 February 2013]

I recently finished beating the campaign mode. I'll start by reciting what you've probably already heard:

This game has been in production for years. The fans of the franchise were highly anticipating the game's release ever since the 10 minute E3 demo in 2011. It showed impressive graphics, fantastic atmosphere, menacing AI, terrifying Xenomorph enemies...Then on launch date 2013...we found out that demo was a complete and utter LIE! The true game is an incomplete, unpolished mess. Several of the vent shafts near the floor where aliens emerge are simply black squares. There isn't much carnage or cinematic cuts as the demo implied. It's simply an unpolished run n gun, call of duty-esque shooter. It's very glitchy at times and the AI can be outright mentally handicapped. The aliens quite often get stuck behind boxes and sometimes they'll just stroll right by you. Other times your AI marine counterparts will also just stand there while an enemy is 5 feet in front of them and you figure there's no one left to shoot because nobody else is shooting. Then you approach one of your AI buddies and get shot from the enemy that was standing right by them. There are some WTF moments in the game too. {minor spoiler} Right at the beginning of the game you rescue a cocooned comrade. As you and your two fellow marines are crossing a long corridor from one spaceship to another, an alien begins to birth from his chest and so he detonates a grenade which destroys the corridor and almost sucks you and your other marine right into space. A real dick move wouldn't you say? Why not just shoot yourself in the head?

I haven't played the multi-player much but every time I've tried, I've found I'm automatically on the Alien team. I don't know if that's something I select beforehand or if it's just bad luck. The marine's perspective is first person, the alien's is 3rd person and it's very jarring and difficult to get a hold of. I'm used to the AvP games where the Alien, Marine and Predator were all first person. I found it very difficult to kill anyone too. I tried hacking and slashing and every button combo I could try but I always just fell over dead and never really being clear on who killed me.

Alright...so now that the negative stuff is out of the way, I'll talk about the positives: The sound effects- most of the sound effects are taken directly from the Aliens film. The sporadic automatic firing sound of a pulse rifle on the surround sound always sounds awesome. The aliens sound like aliens. The soft, repetitive dut-dut-dut of your motion tracker, and every time it gets a ping, you do feel your hair on the back of your neck stand up. Atmosphere- I know lots of people are saying it's simple or non-existent. But I found as the game progresses it DOES improve. Some of the effects look very close to what was shown in the E3 demo, then other shots right after looks like it's 6 years old. In the later levels when you're out in the open on LV-426 I found myself getting much more enthralled in the game and actually felt entertained. As simple as the game play was, I couldn't help but enjoy the fact that I was in the Aliens universe. The nods- there's tons of nods to the Aliens films and they all worked and brought a smile to my face. Not only that, but they were accurate too! The game opens with a video log from Hicks (voiced by Michael Biehn no less) who is freshly bandaged up. Aboard the Sulaco you find the lower half of an android in the main cargo bay. You also find all the empty cryo tubes and one section that had been ejected...hmm...In Hadley's Hope, there's the two facehuggers shot up in the exact same spots that they were in the film, there was the over-turned bed, etc. etc...There's also another model of Bishop that accompanies your platoon. Voiced by Lance Henriksen too. The Mysteries- Some people are complaining about plot holes. Such as the game takes place 17 weeks after the film (not 17 days for some reason). It gets mentioned that the Sulaco was last seen over Fury 161 yet it had mysteriously re-appeared over LV-426. This never gets directly answered but some of the characters theorize that it had something to do with Weyland-Yutani's cover-up which also plays heavily in the game. I'm fine with the questions not getting answered (such as why Hadley's Hope wasn't completely obliterated when the nuclear explosion went off). It allows one to make up their own interpretation. The weapons- There's a surprising variety of weaponry to choose from (though I'll always be partial to the pulse rifle) there's some customization but I keep my pulse rifle bare bones, the rest of the guns I don't mind customizing but there's nothing spectacular.

So the bottom line; I wound up giving this game a 6 in spite of myself. The action and even the effects seem to pick up as the game goes along. Multiplayer seems thrown together and forgettable. There's great references to an Aliens fan and so on. The glitches and un-polished sections really put a damper on the enjoyment but after a while you learn to focus on other things. If you're an Aliens fan and a gamer, it's worth a play (but rent it or wait till the price drops, which should be fairly quick) definitely not for full price. If you're strictly a gamer and either haven't seen or don't enjoy the aliens films, you'd likely rate this game as a 3 or 4.

this game underwhelmed me and i wasn't even expecting it to be good

[ohmygodguys · 2/10 · 4 October 2022]

A couple weeks after the events of aliens, a group of colonial marines arrive on the USS Sulaco. Where they run into the xenomorph infestation. First off, how are they alive if at the end of aliens. THEY NUKED THE GOD DAMN PLACE, maybe they just left that place and went somewhere else. But second issue. YOU FIGHT MORE ROBOTS THAN ALIENS. For a game called ALIENS colonial marines, you'd be expecting to fight a lot of aliens. But no, WEYLAND YUTANI SOLDIERS AND SYNTHETIC SOLIDERS. And bishop for the 18th time in the aliens franchise. Also, how are thes mfs breathing on the planet. THEY DESTROYED THE AIR THING IN ALIENS. Also, how did hicks survive, wasn't he confirmed dead in alien 3. This game looks good yet ugly. This game somehow screwed up shooting, IN A SHOOTER. This game is horrible.

Update in January 2021: The bugs are finally fixed and the game can actually be played now.

[robertmaybeth · 6/10 · 16 June 2019]

Here's my original review, written a few years ago, when the game had several game-breaking bugs. The worst of those being, the game was literally impossible to save, or even to exit from without the three finger salute and rebooting the computer:

"Truly awful controls, plus the absolute worst save-game system ever devised...and by that I mean, it doesn't. Save that is. Everything's copascetic when you start playing fdor a while, until you go to quit game and find out, you can't. No, you can't quit the game, because it won't let you. I'm not kidding. It's impossible to do a normal save and quit, or even to just quit, you have to restart your computer to stop playing. If you can find a work-around for that, you might have fun playing this game - I searched seemingly everywhere, couldn't find any mod or code that would allow me to quit and just gave up..."

I finally tried playing this game again, and was amazed to find it actually worked how it was supposed to. Saving the game and exiting were now working as they should have been from the get-go and you could actually play the game. Unfortunately, for me at least, it's too little too late - the graphics are archaic and have not aged well (as they have for other classic games I often replay, like Tomb Raider 3/Last Revelation/Chronicles, Half-life, or Max Payne) and the game play is just average. But if you want to give this obsolete game a try it's ok to do that now.

Why all the hate?

[loudog-69437 · 8/10 · 28 September 2018]

I picked this game up having aliens being one of my favorite movies of all time. A few days later I read reviews that say this game was crap. And I was honestly confused. This game is great! I've played it with many friends who think it's great. So I really don't get all of the hate for this game. It has a decent story, great gameplay, is scary in some places and is one of those games where you look at your watch and you realize you just spent six hours of your day playing it. If a game can get me to do that, that's a good game. So don't take the bad reviews to heart. Please read this, play it yourself and see what you think.

This is a great game.

[jacobjohntaylor1 · 10/10 · 3 February 2019]

This is a great game. It has a lot of action. It is very scary. It also has great acting. It is an awesome game.

The Ultimate James Cameron Experience (Spoiler Review)

[Corporal_Dwayne_Hicks · 10/10 · 17 April 2017]

As we are in 2017 the Aliens/Prometheus franchise has had many ups and downs. Containing spoilers this review will have. You may recall the Gaming Media completely going all out on Aliens: Colonial Marines.

Prometheus was not long behind that was a mix bag with many oh what was it they complained about? "Damon Lindelof"? Okay take this from a real Aliens fan, Prometheus added new life that the series needed badly.

Now Aliens: Colonial Marines came in many "fans" again complained. "E3 Demo". This is a complete mystery still is for 2017. The Aliens franchise was never big budget flicks to begin with. H.R Giger infamously blasted James Cameron Queen design. Image if The Queen never featured in Aliens. The Pinewood Studios crew turned on James Cameron refused to watch The Terminator. Image if The Terminator flopped because James Cameron wasn't "Ridley Scott". Walter Hill turned down anything remotely like "Aliens" for that third film. Vincent Ward wrote Newt out just because he personally never liked her. *sign*

I could go on but to say Aliens: Colonial Marines is the "worst game ever made" when James Cameron himself battled everyone to get his Aliens film made is amazing tale. Yeah this game features everything Aliens fans once asked for Hadley's Hope, Colonial Marines & a lot off new ideas were added.

The Graphics, Sound, Weapons, Story, Characters, Gameplay, Cut Scenes, Dog Tags with mini stories, Easter Eggs, Customize your Male or Female Marine and new Xenos to fight so much packed in.

10/10 The Ultimate James Cameron Experience sadly the Gaming Media don't want you to play at all.

I absolute love it

[skatrwrest-93944 · 10/10 · 27 April 2016]

Welcome to LV426 home world of most nasty parasitic alien lifeforms to ever,scare the crap out of film goers every where.Some will ask why I liked this game even thou the trailer was false.I could say the same for movies where you see something in the trailer and ends up not actual in the film.Or even Sweeney Todd nobody knew that it was a musical from watching the trailer.The most important thing to remember marketing teams are only told to show some footage to the audience.Lack of communication between developers and publisher is still a problem in the industry,rushing a game or a film because of deadlines not giving the teams enough time correct everything.Overall I enjoyed the game level designs make you feel like you are in that world.10 out of 10.

This game is great,critics are idiots as usual

[dregj · 10/10 · 2 October 2016]

Continues on after aliens and unlike the sequels is not a desperate terrible mess that murdered the franchise. Quite simply the game has bags of atmosphere,

just like the spooky ,claustrophobic tension of the first two films. This just feels like "aliens". When this first person shooter looks to be in danger of repeating itself it mixes it up with new monsters ,soldiers and backgrounds.The story opens with a mystery ,the abandoned ship sulaco appearing above LV 426 .A planet it supposedly left after a large nuclear detonation occurred.

This is an absolute must for fans of the films , a true sequel that you get to play

Underrated and has some quite solid aspects

[commanderzr · 19 February 2022]

Beneath this games bad story and AI, mediocre gameplay and graphics plus the worst final boss ever is a neat little game.

The setting and tone of this game is often near perfect, yes it's horror underdelivers aside from the first mission but you truly feel like you are in there fighting aliens, it has amazing collectibles, great multiplayer (not anymore cause uhm no-one plays this game), weirdly enough extra DLC and fantastic customization plus fun new Aliens.

If for whatever reason you find yourself interested in this game or are just a massive fan of the Aliens franchise check it out and you might get surprised.