My half hour with Alien Isolation 2 wasn't supposed to end like this. I've spent the last few minutes crouch-walking through a wrecked spaceship. It's dark in here – too dark to see more than an arm's length ahead. A storm buffets the vessel, the yawning groan of metal sheets slowly being pulled from the ship's carcass by strong winds – or straining beneath heavy, unnatural footsteps – setting my teeth on edge. Electrical sparks land in pools of stagnant water. Nearby, a control panel flickers weakly, just long enough for me to spy a slippery onyx-black tail slither out of the room just behind it.
My mission is to reroute the ship's power while avoiding a sinister presence stalking my every move. Sensing an opportunity, I make a break for a newly-unlocked door and promptly get a tail between the ribs. The music stops – wait, there was music too? – as my character gurgles a surprised gasp, staring down at the barbed and bloodied thing that's erupted from her chest. She falls to the ground. Blackout. Game over.
It's a shocking moment, pulled off with the kind of cinematic flair I've only seen in the original Alien Isolation. With a dangerous outdoor environment as well as the nerve-shredding sci-fi interiors we all know and fear, developer Creative Assembly is widening the playing field while bringing back some of its favorite toys for Alien Isolation 2. Including, apparently, all the colourful ways you can die at the many pointy ends of a xenomorph.
I hate the great outdoors
Developer: Creative Assembly
Platform(s): PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PC, Nintendo Switch
Release date: TBC
I was wondering how Alien Isolation, a series known for heaping near-constant pressure upon the player as you're pursued through the winding metal interiors of a contained spaceship, might fare in open terrain come the sequel. I needn't have worried – the upcoming horror game doesn't have a release date yet, but it's already an expert at making open spaces feel suffocating.
As soon as I land on the alien planet, the sensory onslaught is brutal. Rain roars down in heavy, angry sheets as protagonist Blake and her crewmates emerge from their pod to find a wild world determined to wash them away. It's disorienting, to say the least, but the game makes its point known: you might be able to flee to the great outdoors in Alien Isolation 2, but don't expect a walk in the park.
Every element has been cleverly placed to amp up the feeling of overwhelm, but special props go to Creative Assembly's sound designers and engineers. From foraging for abandoned flare guns left by the unfortunate crash-landers before us to following sparks in the rain-soaked gloom, trudging across rocky terrain only to find more rocks and burning foliage around the wreck site – I've never been more thankful or more terrified to enter a xenomorph's domain if it means escaping the assault on my senses.
It's tight, linear, and incredibly effective, telegraphing the cinematic underpinnings of the Alien IP itself. The only aspect that pulls me out of the immersion is how one of Blake's co-workers is ever so slightly overanimated compared to his colleagues, gesticulating with wild abandon as if larger movements will make me hear him better.
By the time we reach the wrecked spaceship, I'm grateful. Picking through techie detritus on a hunt for electrical parts with which to repair a nearby fusebox is positively meditative in comparison to weathering the storm outside. Powering up the generators to open a sealed inner chamber will definitely lead me straight to the survivors who definitely survived the crash and who haven't been offed by some other entity, after all. Instead, it all goes to hell.
The horror icon makes its entrance in a manner befitting its caliber: with broken glass, gnashing teeth, and fear in its wake. Blake's breathing immediately goes shaky, and paired with the first-person perspective, evokes hints of Resident Evil Requiem's Grace Ashcroft. Tense, I wait for a moment to step out from my hiding place beneath a desk, picking up bottles with which to distract the enemy and an assortment of items I hope might come in useful – if I survive long enough to use them.
I try three times to escape the xenomorph before my time with Alien Isolation 2 runs out, and fail all of them. I really messed up by trying to make a run for it, I'm told in an interview after the fact.
The game's lethal pursuer is every bit as clever as it was in the first game, always listening to your echoing footsteps somewhere in the darkness. Its AI pathing is even more attuned this time around, too, and the xenomorph will pay special attention to patterns in your movements, behavior, and strategies. Counter it one way, and it'll be ready to Uno-reverse it later on, for example. Rain might make it easy to hide, but robs you from hearing it coming at all. Hiding inside the ship might feel safer for a time, but there are only so many places to hide in a shredded tin can. Whether inside or out, it is hellbent on hunting you down.
I love it. I am terrified of it. I cannot wait to play Alien Isolation 2. I only hope the devs were sincere in telling me they don't want to give anyone a heart attack – even if they're more than happy to bring us dangerously close for a while.
