2 hours ago
12
Let me paint a picture: it is day three of Gamescom; I have seen dozens of fantastic games, spoken to many enthusiastic developers. I am excited and energised by it all, but also at the point of slightly delirious fatigue (not helped by the Gamescom flu determinedly setting in). It is, in other words, a less than ideal time to be seeing a game as relentlessly, overwhelmingly intense as Alien Deathstorm. But play it I did - and half an hour later I found myself walking away thinking I might just have seen one of my favourite demos of the show.
Alien Deathstorm, as you might have suspected, is not a game with especially exotic ambitions. It's a sci-fi horror FPS built around dynamism, where emergent encounters impact the ebb and flow of its tense action with each playthrough. But foundationally, it's so singular in focus, so confident in its vision, everything you really need to know about it is right there in the title: it's got aliens (lots of them) and a cataclysmic deathstorm, and together, in just 30 minutes, they felt like they'd make my brain explode.
As for the set-up, you play as a Combat Engineer - a "highly trained" first responder - who's dispatched to a remote, off-world colony in order to figure out why everyone's stopped phoning home. Spoilers: it's because of the big bloody aliens and the big bloody deathstorm. Chuck in some beefy guns, and the whole thing sort of reminded me of a furious FPS spin on Dead Space - where a shopping list of stuff to fix keeps getting interrupted by all the sci-fi horror going on. Only there's no slow, anticipatory build-up of terror here; as it starts, you get a minute or two to acclimatise yourself, then it's just aliens, aliens, aliens swarming in from all sides. Developer Rebellion hasn't included a 'wipe visor' button for nothing.
As my demo begins, a voice rings out across the tannoy. They are Scottish, which pleases me. I'm urged to investigate the outpost's wonky reactor, which turns out to be the first of many systems that, inconveniently for me, have all decided to go spontaneously wrong. And even before we get to the shooty stuff, Alien Deathstorm is a wonderfully moody little number, all stark shadows and flickering industrial lights as the storm rages on: sand eddying through the air, shredded cloth flapping violently in the ceaseless wind, rain torrential, and great chunks of outpost debris skidding across water-slicked walkways and tumbling into the unknown.
It's a noisily intense opening few minutes as I brave the raging elements and chart a course for the outpost's "venting zone". And once inside, there's comparative calm. Ominous red light cuts through thick shadow, careless tangles of chunky cables snake in all directions along the floor, door mechanisms and bits of nonspecific machinery announce themselves with exactly the right kind of sci-fi thunk and whirr - but crucially, no aliens. I flip open a few crates, snag a blueprint and some credits, pocket a medical injector and a couple of grenades too. Then I find myself at the flame-spewing heart of the reactor's core, which I know because that's what the big on-screen overlay - with its cheekily Bladerunner-esque typeface - tells me.
I'm trying to paint an ambient picture for you now, because in about 30 seconds, after I've located a nearby terminal and downloaded some schematics, it all kicks off and the rest of my playthrough is a bit of a blur. Alien Deathstorm does not muck around, and I die several times in rapid succession as I try to find its relentless rhythm. This is a game where threats - skittering ankle-high things with a propensity to hurl themselves at your face, huge hulking Predator-like things with viciously flailing arms - come screaming in from all sides, meaning survival depends on constant movement and momentum.
Pretty soon, I'm locked into a sort of backward-bounding dance, whirling desperately whenever a shriek suggests a new presence, or a flicker of movement catches the corner of my eye, SMG unloading with a satisfyingly bassy rattle as lights flash and sirens blare. Alien Deathstorm isn't entirely relentless, but its rhythm is an unpredictable one - sudden new surges obliterating apparent lulls as I scramble from objective to objective. And the outpost's labyrinthine layout feels deliberately designed to confuse. I've got a map and an objective marker, but the route from point A to B isn't immediately clear, so I'm also trying to get my bearings and navigate to my next task while everything else is going on.
From here on out, I remember flashes of a prefab canteen, a snack machine gleaming cheerfully amid all the extraterrestrial gore. I remember finding a 'Remold' machine for, I think, upgrades to my pistol, shotgun, and SMG. I remember an item station, where credits can buy new medical injectors, ammos, and grenades. And I remember heading out into a vast maze of cargo crates as rain slams against my visor, eventually finding my way underground - picking through the half-light among dangling wires and broken machines.
Somewhere in all of this I spy a lever, yank it and - behold! - yet more subsystems fail, yet more screeching arachnids come skittering in; their needly limbs lunging toward me as I continue to shoot, exploding in a shower of grue. And all the while I'm following a trail of dim lights snaking along the murky ground. Then another lever, more aliens, more levers, and still they come. Until soon, my entire world is lost in a blur of gunfire and bullets, a relentless soundscape of squealing things thudding against my brain. I die, I should say, a lot at this point, and I suddenly become aware of a Rebellion employee lingering over my shoulder, watching my endless deaths with a look of slight concern.
As my demo wraps up and I prepare to leave, he quickly steps in to reassure me, 'We'll have an easy mode in the full game'. And while my Alien Deathstorm demo is undoubtedly an absolute mind-melt of screaming murder and arterial violence, as I wobble shellshocked out the booth I think: I wouldn't have it any other way.
English (US) ·