Is it worth your $2.00?
You have to ask yourself: do you really like Aliens? If you do, then the low cost of entry might be worth it to you. If you're on the fence, think carefully. Krokodil rots your privates, btw.
The game is mediocre in many respects. It's not terrible, but it's also not very good.
Pros:
The music is excellent. Composer Kevin Riepl took James Horner's (Aliens) as well as Jerry Goldsmith's (Alien) themes and motifs and provided A:CM with an awesome score. While many aspects of the game are disappointing, the soundtrack is not one of them. Give it a listen
here if you're interested, and grab it
here from the composer's dropbox if you want it.
Mods: it's on PC, and as you'd expect, there's a whole community that's developed mods that take this game from a 5 to a 9 or 10! Just kidding. Seriously, the only 2 mods that I know of that elevate the experience are a
SweetFX mod and a
Pulse Rifle mod. Here's a
Youtube video showing off the differences with SweetFX on and off. Unfortunately, playing with this on will make you notice even more how bad the game is. More on that below.
Price: this will be a minus soon enough when it goes back to normal. But for now...
"Honorable" Mention 1: Stasis Interrupted DLC. This doesn't come with your $2.00 purchase but I though I should mention. If only A:CM had started with this set of missions. Iffy storytelling and some bad voice acting aside (both keeping in par with the main campaign), the DLC does capture the feel of the first two Alien movies rather well. It also tries to answer some questionable story elements in the main campaign, or so I've been told.
"Honorable" Mention 2: Bug Hunt DLC. Not $2.00, either, unfortunately. This fun mode is a reminder that developers removing content from the game to sell it to you separately later is a bad thing. If the game had come out with this, it could easily be recommended to you. It's A:CM's take on the horde mode, but with Aliens and familiar locations.
That's it for the pros. Mods aside, notice how the game will potentially cost more if you want to make your experience more complete. Then again, you may try playing the game, not like it, and never consider it.
For cons, there are plenty. This
review explains it best and in more detail, but let me try to sum it up in a more creative manner befitting NeoGAF.
Remember that part in Aliens when Ripley crashes the APC into the atmosphere processing station to rescue the marines, when all the aliens stopped what they were doing and made a beeline towards her, ignoring all of the other marines around them? And remember in that same scene when the marines, instead of helping Ripley out and shooting at the aliens that were now going after her, decided to just stand still and do nothing? Do you recall hating Hicks for acting like a total dumbass and not shooting at the alien when it spawned out of nowhere and slashed away at poor Ripley? And how about when Ripley herself took 30-40 shots to kill an alien because her weapon was highly ineffective and inaccurate? And all those times she had to relive those same moments, just like in Groundhog Day, because the filmmakers thought it would extend the overall experience more by not giving her enough to survive with or a reasonable starting point. Or what about all those parts when Carter Burke called in the Weyland Yutani elite soldiers to fight the marines? They dominated most of the film! I'm surprised it was called
Aliens. Wasn't that movie awesome?
Anyhow, there you go. By the time you finish reading this, maybe Amazon will have run out of keys, or you will have forgotten about it and gone to bed. That's great news! Merry Christmas, everyone!
Disclaimer: before spending my $2.00, I completed the DLC "Stasis Interrupted", a few rounds of the Bug Hunt DLC, and completed the first mission of the game at a friend's. I really like Aliens and really wanted to like this game. I can't with good conscience recommend it to someone who's not a hardcore fan of the movie, has a high tolerance for crap, and has a diverse video game collection.
