Alienation is the latest soldier in Sony’s army of non-AAA exclusives. Developed by Housemarque (of Super Stardust, Dead Nation and Resogun fame), Alienation is a top-down twin-stick shooter that despite its incredibly forgettable story manages to impress through some gorgeous visuals and an addictive progression system.
I think I’m winning?
Alienations’s story is by far its weakest asset, and serves as little more than a flimsy pretext to destroy everything. Basically an alien race referred to as Xenos (orginal!) have invaded Earth and it’s up to you to repel said invasion. Armed with some futuristic weaponry and an exosuit, you team up with up to three other players to battle through twenty story missions that take you to various locales around the globe. The story tries desperately to instil a sense of drama and desperation as you wage what could be the final fight for humanity, but it falls flat in most regards and takes itself far too seriously. It’s not a huge issue seeing as the story turns out not to be a primary focus, however I found my opening hours with the game were quite bland because of it. It’s only after you level up and learn the ins and outs of the loot/weapon upgrade system that Alienation starts to open up, and really it’s this aspect that is the game’s saving grace. That and its top notch visual design, which excels at presenting varied and colourful environments that contain a loving attention to detail, with every space crammed with interesting features. The enemy design is also well done, and you’ll be mercilessly killing aliens both great and small on your journey. Being a top-down shooter, it will be unsurprising that at any one point there will also be quite a bit of frantic gunfire exchanged with the Xenos, and these battles are often gloriously chaotic, with flashy explosions and laser carnage splashed across the screen to good effect.
Shoot all the things!
It’s only after you level up and learn the ins and outs of the loot/weapon upgrade system that Alienation starts to open up, and really it’s this aspect that is the game’s saving grace
Despite its striking visuals, initially the terrible story and slow pacing of the action didn’t really enamour me to the title. If you find yourself losing interest in the action, I would recommend persisting with Alienation, as eventually the action picks up considerably and the RPG-lite/shoot and loot side of the game begins to shine. Gaining levels in Alienation is much like any classic RPG in that killing enemies is the main way of gaining experience points that go towards increasing your overall level. Every level gained allows you to spend a point on either an active or passive skill. There are three classes in Alienation: Bio-Specialist, Tank and Saboteur, and each have their own unique active skills. For instance the Bio-Specialist skills focus on healing powers whereas the Tank is more focused on dealing large amounts of damage with devastating area of effect attacks. It’s good to have a balance of the classes in your team, but really the Bio-Specialist’s abilities become crucial as the game starts ramping up the difficulty and having a couple of those on the team is generally handy. Gaining levels also gives you access to higher level loot that drops randomly from enemies. These include Primary, Secondary, Heavy weapons and Grenades. Your Primary is specific to your class but there’s quite a variation in the other weapon classes and you’re bound to find one that suits your style. Whether it’s the short-range Plasma Shotgun Secondary or the slicing and dicing Boomerang (which goes in the grenade slot), it’s fun to experiment with the new weapons you pick up. In a cool twist you can upgrade certain weapons (there’s a colour-coded rarity system with the rarer drops containing more upgrade slots) using various Cores which increase damage and clip size and the like. Much like any good shoot and loot game you’ll get excited when you see a Rare purple drop, or Legendary orange drop (there’s no stingy Cryptarch to ruin your day here either), which always have superior stats compared to the vanilla guns as well as lots of upgrade slots to make them even more deadly. You can also reroll stats to maximise the gun’s effectiveness using materials you find throughout the missions or by salvaging old weapons.
It’s always 4:20 somewhere
Take that America and England!
Pimp your soldier
Pimp your arsenal
As mentioned previously the opening hours of the game struck me as extremely bland, but once I realised the game really wasn’t really about progressing through the story, but rather maximising experience points earned and honing your arsenal, I started to see Alienation’s pieces coming together. Once you gain access to more powerful weaponry, you start being able to cut through swathes of Xeno with relative ease. As the levels progress the game will throw more and more homicidal aliens at you while simultaneously mixing up the enemy types, meaning you’ll always be seeking to upgrade your super soldier’s arsenal to gain the edge on the Xenos. The progression is fast enough that it doesn’t feel like too much of a grind, and the loot drops are frequent enough that you feel like that the next awesome weapon is usually just around the corner. Better yet, you can ramp up the difficulty to Veteran in order to drastically increase the rate you gain XP and the chance of getting Rare and Legendary drops. It’s worth mentioning that this difficulty isn’t for the faint hearted though. The battlefield can often become an absolute maelstrom of chaos, as bullets fly in every direction and aliens and cars explode all around you, if you don’t have your wits about you then death is never too far away. This is especially true when the warning ‘Hordes Approaching’ is displayed. At this point you’ll face an intensely large wave of enemies, and if you can’t dispatch them quickly enough then before you know it the bastards will have you surrounded and death becomes inevitable. Death is not the end (unless you play on Hardcore difficulty you’ll simply respawn at a beacon), but it does reset your all-important XP multiplier so it’s best to avoid going gently into that good night if you’re keen on levelling up quickly.
Prepare thineself
This big blue thing looks like it needs some freedom…
The campaign’s twenty missions can be completed solo or with friends through either a party or by matchmaking. Once you choose the mission you want to tackle you can see a list of available people to join and it’s fairly painless to find a group of players that match your level and are playing on the desired difficulty. While slaying alien scum cooperatively with friends is definitely the preferable way to play, it’s totally viable to tackle the campaign lone wolf style. Finishing the campaign is only the beginning really, and if you want to climb to rank 30 (and beyond) you’ll be replaying the missions a fair bit. Your subsequent campaign playthroughs will feature tougher enemies that drop better loot and provide more challenge, and with the three different classes to level up separately there’s potentially tonnes of replayability to be had with this title.
The battlefield can often become an absolute maelstrom of chaos, as bullets fly in every direction and aliens and cars explode all around you, if you don’t have your wits about you then death is never too far away.
Final Thoughts
Alienation is a game that gets better as you play it. If you can stick through the slow start and don’t mind that the story is less XCOM and more 2001: A Space Travesty (RIP Leslie Nielsen you beautiful bastard), then there’s certainly an enjoyable top-down shooter to be discovered. If the RPG-lite and shoot and loot elements appeal to you, it’s likely you’ll find yourself drawn into Alienation’s visually-stunning world, and if so there are many hours to be lost as you take it to the Xeno hordes.
- Housemarque
- Sony Interactive Entertainment
- PS4
- April 26, 2016
