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Aliens: Colonial Marines - My biggest letdown of this generation.
Posted on Tuesday, February 19 2013 @ 11:26:44 Eastern


"GAME OVER, MAN! GAME OVER!"

Background: I am a huge Aliens fan. I have played, at one point or another, almost every Aliens game in existence. I even own the original Alien vs. Predator on the Atari Jaguar and Alien Trilogy on both the PlayStation 1 and SEGA Saturn. I bought Aliens vs Predator 2010 on release day and while it was a pretty good game, it just wasn't the definitive Aliens experience that gamers have wanted for years now. One day I knew that just had to change, and I was hoping that Colonial Marines was going to be the game that finally did the iconic franchise justice.

I first heard about Aliens: Colonial Marines about 5 years ago, and ever since I've been following it as much as possible. There was very little information for nearly all of its development cycle up until about its final year when Gearbox Software started heavily promoting the title. Once the initial release date was finally given, I was pumped! Aliens: Colonial Marines instantly became my most anticipated game of 2012, until it got delayed into 2013. Unsurprisingly, it then became my most anticipated game of 2013. What can I say? I'm just a huge Aliens fan.

Launch day: Up until this point, I had not read a single review for the game. A review embargo was imposed so that no gaming publications could post a single review until 2/12/2013 (has a complete review embargo until launch day EVER been a good thing?). Anyways, it is now launch day, and in a few minutes I'm heading down to GameStop. However, it is not to pick up Aliens, but instead to CANCEL my pre-order. Yep, the game that I've been looking forward to for 5 years is now out and I couldn't be any less excited.

The review embargo was lifted and a tidal wave of rage crashed down upon Gearbox. The reviews are BRUTAL. The game is just a complete mess and rumors are starting to leak out from an ex-Gearbox employee that the development cycle was a trainwreck and was eventually outsourced to another developer. Gearbox gave up on the title and paid someone else to finish it for them. This is simply unacceptable and critics let Randy Pitchford know how they feel about it.

IGN: 4.5/10
Joystiq: 1/5
Destructoid: 2.5/10
Eurogamer: 3/10
Game Informer: 4/10
Kotaku: Buy? NO. "There is nothing redeeming about Aliens: Colonial Marines, unless you count the inevitable relief you might feel once it's over.

The biggest brown-eye burner: Randy Pitchford, CEO of GearBox Software, lied straight to us this whole time. I watched those promotional videos he did telling us all how Colonial Marines is the canonical sequel to the Aliens film. Well, it isn't. He lied, plain and simple. Here is why:

"Colonial Marines falls apart almost immediately, taking the established narrative of the Alien films and retroactively altering their events in an attempt to strengthen its own adventure. Using the laziest of approaches —bringing back the dead—the rewrite may have been intended to give some importance to the new group of grunts pitted against the xenomorphs, but it serves no purpose. Gearbox's narrative is a poorly constructed patchwork of moments you've already experienced in the films, with locations and action beats that are, in one fell swoop, both inspired and uninspiring. New to the series? Be prepared for confusion, because Aliens: Colonial Marines does little to explain anything of substance." - Xav de Matos, Joystiq

"As for Colonial Marines’ much-hyped story, there’s clearly a reason why a canonical bridge between the films didn’t exist: Absolutely nothing of any consequence happened. A bunch of no-names walked through the aftermath of Aliens (Nuke? What nuke?), fought some more xenomorphs, and met up with a familiar face in a ridiculous bit of revisionism." - Jeff Cork, Gameinformer

So Mr. Pitchford, you took the single most important concept to Alien franchise fans (the long-awaited canonical sequel to Aliens) and used that as a selling point, when in fact it was nothing more than a complete lie. It simply doesn't exist. So to that I say, F%CK YOU.

Conclusion: The game is a complete disaster and it is painfully obvious that Gearbox gave up on this title long ago when they shipped it off to another developer. It is an abysmal failure.

Here is a summary of most critics: "The story is nonexistent, the graphics suck, the PS3/360 ports run terribly and are un-optimized, the gameplay sucks, the campaign is unbalanced (super powerful shotgun makes the game easy mode, ability to carry numerous weapons simultaneously), the AI is downright horrible, mulltiplayer sucks (survivor only has 2 maps, maps in general suck, full of chokepoints, aliens underpowered), and the game is glitchy."

If you opened up the game case and found an actual steaming pile of **** inside instead of the game disc, you would be better off.

So who is excited for the WIi U port that was shipped to an even different developer than who made the 360/PS3 version? Could it actually get even worse? Will the Wii U version actually be scored Duke Nukem Forever out of 10? I will no longer be waiting to find out.

The opinions expressed here does not necessarily reflect the views of Game Revolution, but we believe it's worthy of being featured on our site. This article has been lightly edited for grammar and image inclusion. It has been submitted for our monthly Vox Pop competition. You can find more Vox Pop articles here. ~Ed. Nick