Alien: Isolation - Aliens, Creative Assembly, and Ripley's daughter

Thinking about save systems as part of the narrative made me want to watch Europa Report again. Without saying more about that film (the connection I’m making is pretty tenuous, but you should see the movie without knowing much about it, go watch it!), and without knowing more about the specifics of Alien: Isolation, I think there’s room for saves to fit with the narrative in a way that acknowledges them without hitting some sort of story-telling uncanny valley, but I don’t know if A:I manages that or not.

I have seen Europa Report and enjoyed it quite a lot, but I’m afraid I am missing the connection you’re making.

Holy shit the bullshit of this alien!

He is killing me in the same zone again and again and again. In fact, because he is killing me again and again and again, I’m starting to be suspicious of his movements, because they suppose incredibly bad luck for me… or it is cheating.

Let’s see, if the alien was predictable, it would be somewhat easy to avoid it, after a time. You would learn his patrol, his timing, etc. Like every stealth game ever.
But the alien in this game is supposed to be controlled by a more random AI that patrol alone, sometimes it stays in a room, sometimes it comes back, sometimes it uses the ceiling vents, etc. You get the idea.

But… it’s also not random. If it was truly random, just loading a checkpoint again and again it would produce different results, in some of them the alien would just happen to go left, in other right, so if you are trying to go to room A, sometimes it would camp there… and others no. But even if he never sees me, he has a tendency of always go after my area, load after load. 8 times I went to A, 8 times he went to that area, and he would camp around the corridor that was the only exit. Then 9th, 10th and 11th times I went to the opposite side to room B… and surprise, these times he went also to that part!
And of course once I get finally reach the next “area”, he chooses to follow me there, even if the previous 11 times he loved room A and B, and not that new area.

Another possible cheat could be he is truly random most of the time, but there are some specific rooms that are scripted by the level designers, and the first time you enter the alien feels attracted there, so you can have a nice standoff between the alien inspecting the zone and you cowering behind a desk.

I suppose we could be nice and think that maybe the alien hears the doors moving or you using a computer or rewiring some cables, that’s why he always follow you… which would suck, given you can’t control the noise of that stuff.
Another explanation could be “pheromones! he smells you!”

Oh, it’s definitely some bullshit with the Alien.

That’s why people are recommending against Hard difficulty, it keeps the alien tethered much tighter to your position than on Normal. I’ve seen numerous posts from people who started on Hard, then later switched to Normal out of frustration and found it much more enjoyable.

Yeah, it was the first thing I will do next time I play. I will post about the difference.

Fucking no-skill alien campers.

That’s disappointing, I haven’t started playing yet but I was leaning towards going with Hard difficulty because it’s always seemed more fun in stealthy/sneaky games to me. Guess I’ll just bump it to Normal to avoid the grief.

Warning: I don’t actually have a point. These are just the scattered thoughts that went through my head when I thought about working saves into the narrative.

I haven’t played Alien yet, so this may have nothing to do with that specific save system, but gurugeorge’s post got me thinking about “narrative saving” in broad terms. There’s simple sci-fi hand-waving like Bioshock’s Vita Chambers, or the pattern buffers from the Marathon series. Bioshock’s actually make a little more sense, you’re being reborn into the world as it was when you died. Marathon’s pattern buffers were theoretically storing a copy of you to create a new version when you died, but in reality it was like most save systems (auto, checkpoint, or otherwise), the whole world just jumps back to the part where you saved, which doesn’t fit the narrative unless you work in some time travel.

Spoilers for Europa Report:

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Then I started thinking of saves as a record of an account being retold to you. There’s still a fundamental schism if you’re both in control of the character, and treating it like a story that’s already happened being revealed to you, but I think that’s subtle enough we don’t notice it in most games (or you can just go full meta with an explanation like Assassin’s Creed’s animus). So within that context, a save point is like a moment where the character stopped and said “okay, here’s what’s happened so far” in some fashion for a later observer. Suddenly the typewriter saves in Resident Evil made a goofy kind of sense to me: I imagine them stopping and typing up what’s happened so far. “And then I shot a zombie! And then I shot a zombie! And then…” That’s where the previous segment’s trial and error up to that point are forgotten and the “actual events” are set in stone (or on paper, whatever).

Which sort of reminded me of Europa Report, and the reveal that they all died, and the only way we know any of this is their accomplishment of transmitting the “report”. They saved their game, their story ends with what they managed to record.
yeah, it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense directly applying that to games, but I haven’t slept a lot this week.

For what it’s worth I’m still really enjoying the game 5 hours in, in fact I’m liking it more the more I play. I get completely absorbed in it. But at the same time I can easily see how others would hate it and get annoyed by certain things, especially the save system - there was one particular part where it caused me a bit of a frustration too (end of Mission 6).

I’m also not sure if I’ll still be enjoying it so much after another 15 or so hours. We shall see.

The revolver does nothing to the alien, right? I mean, not kill him, but it would be cool if you spend some bullets on him, you get him to go away for a while. I tried and he eat my face. :(

OK, I think I get you. Actually, the Resident Evil typewriter ribbon never made sense to me, but when you put it in the context of a story that you, the player, are creating, it does kind of fit together.

Ha ha! You tried to stop the Alien with a pistol!

I just tried to scare him away :(. It isn’t like the game gives you too many bullets, so you couldn’t exploit it.

So, in normal the “tether”, if it’s still there, it’s around 2.5x longer than on hard. Way more relaxed. Also I have the feeling that on normal the alien don’t magically stay for a goddamn eternity in your nearby location investigating the rooms, he investigate stuff but in a less biased way.

Btw, I didn’t comment it, but they nailed the devices. The motion sensor is great, it feels so analogue, so old. The little blinks, mis-adjustments, the visual noise, etc. And the same with the hacking device, so vintage!

edit: ah, it’s strange how the game choose to not pause while you are using items and devices, so maintain the tension… but it pauses while you are looking the map.

Other difference in medium: the game did an autosave in a change of levels, and you can carry one more of crafted items.

I would still recommend getting it during a steam sale solely for the aesthetics of the game. It captures that gritty elbows and grease world of Ridley’s Alien where despite humanity’s achievement of FTL travel, thingamajig are still fixed with wrenches and screw drivers and computer tech is still bound by those big dorky buttons and switches. I can’t wait for the Deadensthrills guy to start making screenies of this game.

You have to mix other factors, like some areas being basically narrow corridors where your stealthy options are already pretty limited, and the save system.

But hey, the game is getting me to hold my breath or to be paranoid about the noises I hear or jump a little when I’m startled by some silly stuff (and usually I’m indifferent to other scare moments in video games). The mix of unpredictable stuff like the alien makes that even scripted “boo!” moments are more scary.

You might want to read this analysis (translated from a guy who did the original in Russian) on the guide part of steam…It does a good job of explaining what he believes the mechanic of alien movement…

I was really enjoying this game until the alien showed up.

The alien seems to be able to jump to wherever the player is. The only safe way forward is to sneak into a room and wait in a closet or under a gurney until it leaves, then proceed to the next room on the way to your objective and repeat the process. If you walk under a vent with saliva dripping down, you’ll get insta-killed, but if sneak past it, the alien teleports ahead. If it actually traveled there through the environment I wouldn’t mind but it cheats.

It’s such a frustrating game of trial and error. It never leaves your side. You inch forward a couple of rooms and it snaps back to you. It removes all the tension. It never disappears or bothers to check out a different area. The alien’s cool-downs after investigating a disturbance are minuscule. You just end up replaying sections over and over again. Progress is as tedious as it gets. This game loves wasting your time.

The rules aren’t consistent. The alien doesn’t react to human npcs with the same intensity. There will be like 3 of them yelling about a trespasser in the area and the alien won’t make a peep, but when Ripley silently sneaks down a hallway using cover, shelter and darkness it will rush to you as if you were making a racket. I’ve even seen the alien run away from their gunfire. It’s never done that with me! Any item that can be used as a distraction just puts it on alert, punishing the player and increasing the likelihood of being discovered.

Such a shame, too. The production values are first-rate and it’s probably the best looking game environment I’ve ever experienced. Check out this awesome art blog from a Creative Assembly employee. If it had a better save system and gave the player some breathing room, it would be amazing.

Thanks, very interesting, it confirms some of my theories.

Mother fucker is so cheater that he will do different behavior if you are hidden in a locker as opposed to just crouched behind something, even if he in principle he doesn’t know you were in the room.

I never noticed the “danger” variable in the motion sensor, I will play with it.