Aliens Colonial Marines Review · 3:46pm Mar 13th, 2020
Some of you already know I am a huge fan of Aliens, I love the first two films, I think they're classic masterpieces, Alien 3 I will admit, looking back, I was a bit too harsh on the movie, honestly it's an okay movie, but still a disappointment. Alien Resurrection... was just shit, honestly, it was just... what? That's my honest opinion, maybe ya'll like the movie, and if ya do, that's fine. But! We're not here to talk about the movies, sort of. Instead, we are talking about the PS3 game.
Now around the time I bought the game, I had no idea if it was good or not, I honestly picked it up because one, its Aliens, and two, you get to play as the freakin' Colonial Marines! That's awesome, right?
... Wellllll... Well okay, let's actually talk about it. This is Colonial Marines.
Aliens Colonial Marines follows a new marine named Winter, who's platoon is sent to investigate the Sulaco, and LV-426 to deal with the Xenomorph infestation once again. That's the summary, which I'm gonna keep there, cause we got a lot to unpack.
Now before we even begin, I just wanna say this. THIS... all of the things that happen in this game, was approved by Fox, so it's sadly canon. And I wish it wasn't cause there is just way too many problems with this game as a whole. But, before I even get down into that, I do wanna talk about the pros, cause, believe it or not, there is quite a few pros in this game.
Now I'm sure around the time, the environments looked amazing, and to be fair, they still do. There's an okay amount of detail put into the levels, outside of a few odd textures here and there. If there's any cred I can give, it's that the game absolutely nails the atmosphere. It's darkly lit both outside, and inside the base, it does help give a little bit of that on edge feeling. 
And one level in particular I think is absolutely great, the Raven level is amazing, it takes away your guns (which is kind of sad) but it makes it work by having you needing to evade a threat you aren't gonna be able to defeat, especially when you're running into the sewers. It has that feeling of you trying to flee for your life and get out alive, which is a big part of Aliens! It mixes action and suspense together perfectly which is what makes this level perfect.
Hell, one of the cool things about the level is that it introduces new types of Xenomorphs, like the ones in the sewers; these ones are blind and cannot see, but rely on movement, and if they find you, they will freakin' explode like a bomb and kill you if they can. That's some freaky as hell stuff right there.
And during one of the levels, I do appreciate this, they did actually include a boss fight with a Power Loader so I do like that.
But we're gonna have to come back to that a little later...
Another thing this game does well is it's sound design, the music, the voices, the sound effects, it's solid as hell. Also, one of the new things the game introduces, which works really well is the weapons system, they give you the option to make some new weapons and upgrade them, which is a great feature, and the aliens look amazing, they fit right in like they always existed.
Hell, one of the things that I absolutely love that they included which felt geninuely nice were collectables, throughout the game you can find audio logs that give a bit more backstory on some things, some military dog tags, but the best thing for me... was finding the legendary weapons. The guns used by the marines in the original film, I was searching like mad just like Angry Joe to look for 'em. Hick's shotgun, Frost's flamethrower, but the one I personally love... is Vasquez's smart gun.
God, I love the usage of the smart gun, it is amazing. But... again, more on that a little later.
Now another thing I do wanna bring up is I don't know how challenging people found the levels themselves, but I thought they had enough challenge... for the most part. Another thing we'll have to get back to verrry later.
Character models are... very outdated and stiff, I swear they look like the models used in Fallout 4, but they're serviceable enough.
And that's all I got. Now let's get down to the problems. Cause let me tell you... we have a ton of issues.
First thing I've noticed just like with everyone else who's played, the AI coding is awful! The Xenomorphs, the creatures known for stealth and hiding in the darkness, mostly coming out at night, they don't take you down by sneaking around, most of the time it's them crawling or charging you out in the opening like morons! 
Or... get super glitchy.
Hello my baby, hello my honey, hello my ragtime gal...
Send me a kiss by wire, baby my heart's on fire!
Just give him a top hat and cane, it'll be perfect.
But even the Marines AI is awful. The guy you have to run with throughout the whole game, horrid! O'Neal is just awful, he will get in the way, he'll leave your ass behind, will shoot at nothing, he's just awful! And why does he have the smart gun, how about you give ME the smart gun, unlike him, I am actually HITTING something!
And adding on that, the characters in this game... are not characters. There is no way to describe any of their personalities, it's impossible. Basically, we got three guys, two girls, and Bishop. None of which are interesting in the slightest.
Could it have bothered the developers to install a freaking map!? I am wandering around like a moron most of the time cause I don't know where the hell I'm supposed to go! I mean yes, you're supposed to be in the dark, but most of the time I'm wandering aimlessly with no idea of where I'm supposed to go!
And back to the weapons, I mentioned they're pretty cool. But there's one that pisses me off to the core. You do get to use a smart gun, yes, but the total time I got to use it is around 6 to 8 minutes! In the whole game! This is just insulting, the smart gun is just as iconic as the pulse rifle, and they couldn't have spread it out throughout the game? Would it have killed you to allow us to use it a bit more developers? Would it?
And the story!? Ohhhh let's talk about the story.
The biggest problem for me, this legit pisses me off, after you learn how the game works after the tutorial, you are suddenly fighting... HUMANS. ... Humans. Weyland Yutani mercanaries. Instead of, I don't know, the ALIENS!? The game is called Aliens, not Call of Duty! For most of the game, you are fighting these Weyland Yutani guys, and it's not fun! I wanna shoot up Aliens, give me some of those guys, please! And they show up right at the start of the second level.
Now, look, I wouldn't mind them so much, but couldn't you have used them for much later near the end? That could have worked! Just as you've been pushed back against the wall by these monsters, you've got almost nothing left, you're almost about to die, until these guys show up and save you... only for you to find out that they are bad guys and they're a problem you have to deal with as well. But not at the start, come on, man. I think Angry Joe said it best.
"It's like there was zero respect for the Xenomorphs here! In ALIENS!"
Yeah, basically. This is the equivalent of playing Transformers except you don't even get to play as the Autobots, you're stucking playing as humans! How about you focus on what the audience actually paid for, huh developers? Hmm? The game even has a plot twist... one that it thinks is sooo clever. Now I will be honest, I thought this could be good... except when we find out the truth. Apparently a Marine from the original Aliens movie is still alive. Now based on what we saw in the movie, who do you think survived?
Hudson, Apone, Dietrich, Spunkmeyer, maybe? Characters we definitely didn't see die? ... Nope, it's none of them. Instead... it's Hicks. Who died in Alien 3. In game, you barely get any explanation as for how he survived, but apparently there is a DLC that explains this... and the reasoning there is even dumber, and still has too many holes. I'm pretty sure the reason they brought him back was because of all the backlash for Alien 3... but you know what, with the crappy explanation they gave here, I will HAPPILY take him dying in Alien 3 over this! Cause this explanation was just weak! This is fan-service done wrong!
I'd like to remind you that Fox approved all of this. And it's clear that they did not give any of this a grain of thought. And the arrogance from the game developers on how great their game is in the behind the scenes video does not do this game favors.
And the final boss battle... that's not a boss battle. It's no battle. You don't do any actual battle. Now I get that you can't do jack against the Alien Queen with your little guns, that's fine, but would it have killed anyone to have programmed a freaking Power Loader into the final boss!? At least actually give us a chance to fight her head on, at least try to represent Aliens right just a little more! It's like they gave up! Literally all you have to do is press a few buttons, wait for the Queen to get in the middle of the hangar and press a button which will launch her right out of the hangar a la catapult! ... That's it!? That's all the effort you can give?
This is just as bad as the final boss in the 2016 Ghostbusters game where all you have to do is sit in a corner and keep shooting at Rowan and you'll win, that's it! Oh and lets not forget the Marines we left behind on the planet, stranded with Xenomorphs! And don't give me bull on how everything we fought for was worth something, it wasn't! The ending was not satisfying in the slightest, not one bit.
Okay, last thing I wanna say. Angry Joe summed this up for me, but I feel it bares repeating. In total, the game has eleven levels, including the tutorial and boss battle. But if you take away the tutorial and crappy boss battle, the total focus of Aliens in Aliens Colonial Marines is to THREE levels. Three levels where you actually focus on Aliens. Most of the time you're fighting Weyland Yutani, three levels devoted to them, with three more devoted to them and Xenomorphs fighting you and each other. It's pathetic.
This spent time in development hell, and this is what we get? Pathetic. Could it have bothered anyone to spend more time to fleshing this all out? Cause it should have spent a bit more time in the oven before it was done.
Honestly as a regular game, it's average at best. But as an Aliens game? Awful. Awful AI, horrid story, terrible shifts in gameplay, it's just... ughhhhh. Luckily it's not a whole loss, as we did get Alien Isolation which I am soooo eager to get back to playing. I am very excited for that.
Aliens Colonial Marines as a whole, gets a 4 out of 10 for being Aliens, but as a game on it's own? 5 out of 10. It's just... not good.
Either way, hope you enjoyed the review, and hope ya'll have a great day!
Welcome to the curse of Aliens, Four. After the first two movies, everything basically started to succcccck...
Not a bad review. And as rants go, it's nowhere near as insane or mean as other stuff out there, so I don't think you really went too over the top here.
Glad that I never played this though.
Sadly the game's hype was far far far better then it's reality. I recall being..very upset when i played it.
There's a mod which fixes most of the technical problems (especially spelling error broken AI) in the game, but it's only on PC.
*cough*
*slowly places this*
5219518
That goes for you too. Trust me.