Comments on: Aliens: A Retrospective

By: Of the brood for the brood

Of the brood for the brood — Tue, 05 Oct 2010 02:42:09 +0000

First of all, great article, i remember playing most of those games and they are available through emulations wich still gives me this smug feeling.
I agree with alot of this article and comments, and some i don’t.
The Alien species is facinating and having the chance i’d probably be one of those squishy scientists studying it (the getting eaten part id rather skip but hey); It’s facinating the way it evolved from history to now, and that someone actually gave shape to it, the thought of such a species existing through similar evolutionary paths as us humans, to me is not scary, but curiously interesting, the fact is that it is possible of something similar being out there if you take into consideration environmental inpacts of evolutionary routes, and/or DNA tampering.
The idea that the Aliens are supposed to be bad is in my opinion quite unsatifying, in many ways they are like us, intelligent, top of the food chain and they reproduce to survive, though they are driven by instinct on some levels we are too.
I usedto play as an Alien every chance i got, and i did it well, what you said (or something similar) in another blog that the player must “be” the alien in order to play it well, is what i used to my advantage, the (oddly enough) predatory and calculating instinct of an alien mindset really makes it fun, and helps to understand the creatures, in the games and the movies, for you who havent, try it, watch the movies from an alien perspective, go, on the hunt!

By: thehogmaster

thehogmaster — Fri, 14 May 2010 13:07:40 +0000

Aliens are the badass of the universe.dont think alien 4 was a very good film compared to the rest but thats my opinion great article ALIENS RULE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

By: Maitue

Maitue — Sun, 25 Apr 2010 14:45:44 +0000

Nice, Aliens have always been my favorite with the predator second, but not by far.
What would be cool is if we can play the Queen as first person…. all the things you can do.

By: Abe

Abe — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 02:48:07 +0000

Hell yeah. great stuff.

Aliens FTW

By: AliensCMGame

AliensCMGame — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 16:07:30 +0000

Excellent article. It’s stunning how far the scope of Aliens reaches.

By: NV Misfit

NV Misfit — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 06:02:48 +0000

While Ridley Scott certainly did an excellent job presenting the story to us, let’s not forget the true creative genius behind the story, which was written by Dan O’Bannon cooperatively with Ronald Shusett.Dan O’Bannon was one of the main creative minds behind most of the best sci-fi movies and stories of this century and I am saddened to learn of his death this last December.R.I.P. Dan! You were a genius!

By: Alberto

Alberto — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 05:03:04 +0000

@Edward — You’re welcome, and thanks to you as well. To be specific, what I have is actually Aliens: Outbreak, which is a remastered edition of Aliens: Book One, in full color and with some dialogue changed to put the story in continuity with the movies (though ironically this was before Resurrection, so it kinda isn’t anyway). Fortunately, the changes do not affect the storyline too much, they amount to little more than new names for characters and places. For instance, Hicks becomes ‘Wilks’ and Newt becomes ‘Billie’.
I did see a bunch of pages from the B&W original, though, and I think that maybe it would have been best to keep it like that. After all, it was as originally intended, and perhaps some of the story’s mood was lost in the coloring. I agree that it is quite dark indeed, with some disturbing concepts.

By: The Tingler

The Tingler — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 04:26:24 +0000

Excellent write-up – although that first AVP 1999 screenshot is actually from Monolith’s AVP2.

Alien3 on the SNES was a completely different and fascinating game, although the Genesis version was always my preferred version! Alien: Resurrection was quite a good game too wasn’t it?

And speaking of comics, Batman Vs Predator is one of my favourites!

By: Edward@Sega

Edward@Sega — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 00:06:26 +0000

@Albert — thanks, and interesting comments about the comics. The one thing I will say about the series, especially Book One is that they were just unrelentingly bleak. In a way so were the movies but something about the B&W artwork and the fact that, well, Earth is turned into an Alien Hive more or less make the series seem … on the dark side?

By: Jason B.

Jason B. — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 22:11:51 +0000

Wonderful article. My favorite, by FAR, has always been the Alien, too. Movie-wise, the Alien franchise has always had deeper stories to tell, ones of dread, survival, the unknown. Predator, while powerful in abilities, never dug deeper than pure survival and sci-fi violence (though the “honor system” within the Predator species speaks on that deeper level, but that is only fleshed out in the comics and novels). The Alien is simple, and terrifyingly so; not simple minded, but simple in it’s all encompassing anthropomorphism of pure scary Threat.

Very nice write-up!

By: Matt

Matt — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 19:55:01 +0000

Could you maybe just release the music to America?

Why isn’t you can’t buy any Japanese, South Korean, Chinese or any other kind of Asian music online or in American stores but you can buy Japanese video games, cartoons, movies and other stuff?

I seriously can never find any Japanese music and you know it’s popular. I hate this.

By: Matt

Matt — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 19:53:20 +0000

I love Sega

Are you guys going to bring out 7th Dragon? Because I bought the Japanese version and don’t feel like playing RPGs especially when I don’t know the language and it’s not even a very good one anyway. I say pass on it.

I was going to email sega this but I don’t know where to do that and I’ve already looked. I hate Sega.

By: Josh

Josh — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 19:28:24 +0000

Impressive how you actually mentioned AvP 2 from Monolith. This is the first time I can recall Sega actually acknowledging the game’s existence.

By: Kevin

Kevin — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 18:52:12 +0000

Great article Edward,
However, you almost lost me at you professed love for the AvP films.
Which, for me and EVERY TRUE acid-blooded fan of ALIEN is reheprehensible.
You just cannot have it both ways. To love ALIEN is to know that the AvP series figuratively shit all over the canon that had been established over decades.
And they truly embody the worst of the series from script, directing, al the way through post-production. The AvP name is only respected in the comic and video game mediums. Here’s hoping Rebellion keeps that honor alive.

By: bobbyB

bobbyB — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 18:00:00 +0000

Love the article. My vote for today’s best internet read. ;D

By: DJ Fob Fresh

DJ Fob Fresh — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 16:34:35 +0000

Amazing write-up Edward! I can’t wait to play the new title in the series. To me – it finally seems like the tech has quite up with the horror and pacing of original Aliens series.

By: Alberto

Alberto — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 15:36:34 +0000

Excellent article! I’m a huge fan of all things AvP myself, even the controversial ones; I’m also in it mostly for the alien (though I learned to love the predator as well). I have to agree that the Alien 3 game for Genesis was particularly great (and its Master System counterpart too!) The comics are all good fun, with some true masterpieces in between like Aliens: Salvation. I must admit I didn’t like Aliens: Book One too much, though. Especially for (****SPOILERS!****) the inclusion of the live space jockey near the end.

By: Sharky/Ryan

Sharky/Ryan — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 14:31:08 +0000

Good write up, I’ve been an aliens fan for almost as long as I’ve been a Sega fan.

But we all know the whole point of this was to put subtle rude images on the offical Sega blog… (See any of H.R. Gigers work in headder) =)

By: Mike

Mike — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 13:14:46 +0000

Edward- very enjoyable article! Well done! Thanks.