Alien: Isolation

Alien: Isolation is a great game, nailing the atmosphere and tension of Alien. It’s stressful, it’s suspenseful – but “fun”? No, and yet, I enjoyed the experience so much, I had to ask: Does a game have to be fun to be engaging? It seems like a strange question. In the games industry, a lot of effort is expended to “find the fun.” It’s not an easy goal. Fun is this subjective, ambiguous thing that arises from a balanced confluence of rules, challenge, reward, presentation, and more. You never quite know if you’ll find the fun at all…

In a way, playing Alien: Isolation is like that. Time is against you as you creep along darkened corridors, trying to find your goal in an unknown environment, hoping you won’t be snatched into a ceiling vent. It occurs to me now that the familiarity of this metaphor may have taken the edge off the game for me. I’m not into horror, I don’t go out of my way to get scared. Generally speaking, I’m not very interested in coming home after a long day and popping in a game that will only ratchet up my stress level. And yet I was compelled to complete the game.

The other thing is, I’m kind of fascinated by the Alien movies, even though I prefer the bright, optimistic future of Star Trek in my science fiction. The cynic in me finds there’s something that rings true about the world of Alien. It’s a world in which space exploration is driven by corporate interests, and if you do happen to encounter alien life, it’s gonna be extremely dangerous and utterly implacable. And as an excellent game should, Alien: Isolation gives the opportunity to inhabit that world.

This, at least, is arguably a lot of fun – like wandering the set of a movie. The retro technology seems too anachronistic at first, but anything else would seem out of place in the industrial environment of Sevastopol, the space station where the game takes place. Everything has a real, satisfying weight to it – door locks, levers, equipment. And it’s all supported by pitch-perfect sound design, which is critical in Isolation – so much so that I’d say the game grows from it.

You cringe at every sound you make for fear of summoning the xenomorph – from cutting through a door panel, to the soft beeping of your motion tracker, to knocking over a beer can. You can hear it moving in the vents, and you’ve developed a Pavlovian response when you hear it drop down: hide, scan the area, and whatever you do, don’t make a sound. When you finally find a flamethrower, you’re less afraid of the alien; but when you run out of fuel you’re back to being a terrified mammal in the air ducts (just hope you don’t hear the alien scrambling through the ducts after you).

Fun? No. And definitely not after you’ve died a few times trying to get through an area, sometimes due to bad luck. But the game just barely avoids becoming tedious. There are some fantastic ‘wow!’ moments, some of which aren’t scripted at all. Take, for example, a situation in which you come upon a group of scared humans. The situation aboard the station is so bad, they don’t trust anyone – so they shoot at you. The alien appears, drawn by the commotion. You cower in your hiding place, waiting for the screams to stop as the alien picks them off. And you know if you make one peep, or make one wrong move, that you’re next. What’s worse, humans and the alien aren’t the only threat. Rogue androids patrol the station and their inhuman strength, emotionless faces and relentless, zombie-like pursuit of you can be scarier than anything else.

I’ve never played a game that has such cool moments and, at the same time, is so stressful. This, in addition to the lengthiness of the game, saps replay value from it. When I get a game, I usually like to play through the story again, see what I might have missed, what other routes or tactics I can use, and sometimes I even chase achievements. Alien: Isolation? I might play the game again in a year, maybe in half a year.

Even with that being the case, my playthrough of Alien: Isolation convinced me that a game doesn’t have to be strictly ‘fun’ to be enjoyable. Much like the world of Alien is a counterpoint to the optimism of Star Trek, so too may Alien: Isolation be a counterpoint to making sure every game is fun. If someone were to ask me if the game is fun, I’d say no, but I’d still highly recommend the experience of playing it.