Aliens: Colonial Marines

Aliens: Colonial Marines gameplay info · 06-25-2009, 05:30 PM

22 years seems like a long time to wait for a movie tie-in. But, then, not every movie is the genre-busting horrorfest Aliens, James Cameron’s all-action sci-fi sequel to Ridley Scott’s similarly brilliant Alien. If Aliens: Colonial Marines is even half as thrilling an experience, the double decade wait will have been worth it.

It’s not exactly a tie-in to Aliens - instead Colonial Marines takes place after Alien 3, with a squad of the aforementioned grunts on a mission to locate the Sulaco spacecraft and figure out where Ripley, Apone, Hicks, Burke, Gorman and the rest of Aliens’ ill-fated cast have got to.
This month, both Official PlayStation Magazine UK and Official Xbox 360 Magazine UK were lucky enough to witness Colonial Marines in action, while visiting developer Gearbox. We’ve gathered together some of the juiciest new info morsels:

- There’ll be a range of both claustrophobic indoor combat and less-restrictive outdoor conflict. Art on show in Gearbox HQ shows city areas, too. Though we’ll probably be happy about being cooped up in a dingy colony base, with plenty of room to hide, when it’s time for the Make A Stand scenarios.
These pre-determined moments see you first holing up and preparing a location to defend, with bomb-traps or auto-turrets, or by sealing doors with hand-torches. Then, the aliens begin to swarm your position. We’re wetting ourselves already.

It will feature four-player drop in co-op. With either system link, split screen or online multiplayer support, you’ll be able to face the horde of xenomorphs alongside your buddies. Or run away and leave them to deal with the mess. Whichever.

- It has quick-time events. But, fortunately, instead of huge button-icons appearing on screen and destroying the brooding atmosphere, subtle colour-coded tinges to the edges of your view will alert you to a required button press. Though OPM rekon it takes some getting used to.

- Gearbox haven’t put the acid blood in yet. Eventually, the acid blood splurged from wounded aliens will scar and damage the environment - though not quite so much that the floor will fall out from under you.
But when OPM saw Colonial Marines, the blood wasn’t wreaking this sort of havoc, though Gearbox assure us all that “there will be acid blood in the game”.

…there will be acid blood in the game…
With thanks to gamesradar.com for the article.

Ripley · #2 (**permalink**) 06-27-2009, 12:11 PM

There will be acid blood. Well it wouldn't be an Aliens game without it. Let's hope that it can melt through the scenery though. If you could carve a path with a blasted alien that would be toooo cooool.

Neverfate · #3 (**permalink**) 06-27-2009, 12:45 PM

If acid were that corrosive, you'd eventually find your own way out of the Sulaco and it wouldn't be the good way. Nuh-uh.

Viperish fall · #4 (**permalink**) 07-07-2009, 01:02 PM

There better be acid blood, its one of the main features of the aliens. If they get rid of that then who knows what they may get rid next. Facehuggers? Chestbursters? The Newborn?

Although the last one would be for the best