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[Danielsan]

I broadly agree, and I love the game, and I hate that games journalists struggled with it, but I do think they could have toned down the constant proximity of the Alien, especially on Hard. It's a little silly, and sometimes it drains tension just because you become so used to it. They could have stolen some more "quiet moments"/downtime with ambient horror from Amnesia.

Agreed. I actually decreased the difficulty halfway through from hard to normal. Having the Alien constantly in your proximity gets old after some time. Especially when it's clearly going far away, only to quickly pop back up near you again. I'm currently in chapter 14 and I've really been enjoying the fact that they have been switching it up a bit in the last 3 chapters.

 

[Toa TAK]

Cannot wait to try Nightmare mode.

 

[RCSI]

Just in time for me to start playing it in Oculus Rift mode, because that really will be a nightmare.

 

[tassletine]

Weird, I've heard people recommending to play it on Normal or Easy because the Hard difficulty was too unforgiving and not fun. It seems odd that they'd double down on that for a game that's apparently a real slog to get all the way through.

I think they may be referring to the games length. It's very fun on Hard, less so on normal but by the end I switched to normal because I got bored with the length of the game -- and by that point it was just repeating it' self.

The game's only real problem is it's pacing, there are many great set pieces but there is far too much padding. It's a real shame because it could have been perfect with about a quarter trimmed off. You get so used to the alien by the end that death doesn't mean much anymore.
Still, it's a great game and thoroughly recommended.

 

[Sodding_Gamer]

I love the alien behavior in this game. The first time my friend played the game, he was wandering around this hall and saw some drool coming from a vent. Like a moron, he goes "What is that?" and wandered under the vent and looked up. There, the alien was sprawled out and hissing and descended to abduct him and kill him.

We laughed because it was the most cliche movie death you can imagine. Everybody always assumes they'd be smarter than people in those movies, yet he acted out the sequence perfectly without meaning to.

That is amazing. I did the same thing once and didn't really think of it that way haha but you're on the money with this one.

 

[tassletine]

I kinda hate to say it, but a little more scripted appearance would have done wonders to me. Not as much as the whole thing, but make single sections Alien encounters, and other sections exploration-like. The on-off thing can be bad as well (see Outlast) - but a finely tuned system would have been neat.

I agree. By the end of the game it can become pretty tiresome.
It would have been great to see some more animations from the alien. I can't for the life of me work out why you don't encounter it more in the vents seeing as it spends a lot of time there (I had 1 encounter the entire game) or why it doesn't ever try and grab you from below from the floor panels? To see it hiding, uncurling from various places or crawling across the ceiling would have been awesome for a surprise or two.

I also couldn't work out why the Working Joes didn't attack the Alien as it was a plot point that their aggression had been turned up. Although I did like the way they commented on the alien as it passed.

 

[The Jackdog]

I agree. By the end of the game it can become pretty tiresome.
It would have been great to see some more animations from the alien. I can't for the life of me work out why you don't encounter it more in the vents seeing as it spends a lot of time there (I had 1 encounter the entire game) or why it doesn't ever try and grab you from below from the floor panels? To see it hiding, uncurling from various places or crawling across the ceiling would have been awesome for a surprise or two.

I also couldn't work out why the Working Joes didn't attack the Alien as it was a plot point that their aggression had been turned up. Although I did like the way they commented on the alien as it passed.

Agreed, more ways for the alien to kill you would of been great. Walking along and seeing the alien uncurl from the vents was consistently the scariest parts of the game for me. Eventually you figure "okay it has only x number of ways to attack me". It would of been great if halfway through the game it starts coming through the floor panels or found new ways to kill you.

I hope the next game (if there is one, and there should be) has the alien "learning" a little more. Like if you keep using the flamethrower it adjusts its strategy or something

 

[Deleted member 59090]

Are there posters like those for all the difficulty levels?

 

[Renzoku]

Scream like a bitch, eh?

For a moment there I thought that the new difficulty level would be called "Scream like a Bitch" and that would be wonderful.

I'm a wuss, so I'm going to dive into "Novice" mode.

Missed opportunity not calling Nightmare Mode "Scream Like a Bitch Mode."

If they did that, there would be a 400 page topic about how CA is misogynistic.

 

[SharkJAW]

I probably wouldn't recommend it unless you're someone who really really enjoys a challenge and doesn't mind dying ALOT. With no prior knowledge of the game there's probably too many handicaps here to make this an optimal first playthrough.

It would definitely be the best way to start for a certain kind of gamer but unless you're really looking for a super challenging and potentially frustrating first playthrough I would recommend sticking to Normal or Hard.

Cool, thanks. I think I'll do normal and, at some point in the future, I'll do nightmare.

 

[EGM1966]

I agree. By the end of the game it can become pretty tiresome.
It would have been great to see some more animations from the alien. I can't for the life of me work out why you don't encounter it more in the vents seeing as it spends a lot of time there (I had 1 encounter the entire game) or why it doesn't ever try and grab you from below from the floor panels? To see it hiding, uncurling from various places or crawling across the ceiling would have been awesome for a surprise or two.

I also couldn't work out why the Working Joes didn't attack the Alien as it was a plot point that their aggression had been turned up. Although I did like the way they commented on the alien as it passed.

The Joes and Apollo are working to preserve Alien in same vein as Ashbin Alien. They're harfly going to attack it. They're killing humans when they get in way of those orders or when it's felt they could be a threat to the Alien.

It's all in the logs and narrative.

 

[Vitten]

I also couldn't work out why the Working Joes didn't attack the Alien as it was a plot point that their aggression had been turned up. Although I did like the way they commented on the alien as it passed.

Didn't you see that big cutscene at the end of mission 13 where you access the Appollo AI ?

Spoiler

Weyland Yutani bought the Sevastopol station 2 days before Amanda's arrival because they became aware of the xeno's presence there and sent a 'special order' to the AI to reprogram the Joe's to make sure to preserve the creature and eliminate all threats to it.

 

[IcyEyes]

This game is one of my goty and one of the most fun game I've played lately.

This update is pretty cool !

 

[Hasney]

I wish novice mode had a ball you could throw so the Alien would fetch it, or keys you could jangle.

 

[red731]

welp

give me -50% again lord Gaben