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| It's Game Over Man, Game over! |
Aliens: Fireteam Elite is a 2021 third-person shooter game developed by Californian-based Cold Iron Studio in collaboration with Disney's 20th Century Games (under the name of 20th Century Studios). In contrast to other Alien games from the franchise like Alien: Isolation, Fireteam Elite is more in line with Aliens: Colonial Marines and focuses on action rather than survival horror. Unlike other Alien games that are often in a first-person perspective, this game is in a third-person perspective.
This review is based on Version 1.0 from the PlayStation 4 retail disc version and all screenshots were captured on my standard PS4.
Story
This stand-alone story takes place after the events of the Alien Trilogy. In 2202, the USS Endeavor received a distress call from the previously thought-destroyed Katanga refinery station orbiting the planet LV-895. They move in to investigate, sending a fireteam of Colonial Marines to board the station. Determined to find answers, the Marines also head down to the surface of LV-895, where they not only discover Xenomorphs running loose but armed Androids and other deadly things.
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| Unlike Star Wars, the Alien Universe is mysterious and very dark. Literally! |
It's not a story-driven game, and the game's story isn't a masterpiece, but it's decent. Believe it or not, it's 5x better than the recent 2017 film, Alien: Covenant. That movie, respectfully, could have been better and didn't offer anything new or exciting to the table. But this game's story did! I won't spoil it because I want you to experience it yourself, but the game added "refreshing" elements to the franchise, both story and gameplay-wise.
There are no cut scenes except at the beginning of the game. After you complete your mission, you'll talk to your commanding officers aboard the Endeavor, and they will brief you on your next mission and so on. Strangely, their mouths don't move when they talk to you. I'm assuming it was for budget reasons, and they didn't have motion capture for the actors. But I would have preferred their mouths moved to give the characters more life.
Throughout the game's missions, you'll find hidden data logs, and when you find each one, you report back to one of your superior officers on the Endeavor. They will tell you the lore and information about the Alien Universe.
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| ¡Hablo inglΓ©s, no espaΓ±ol! |
There are four "campaigns", each with three missions. The missions' story style uses the East Asian story structure, KishΕtenketsu (θ΅·ζΏθ»’η΅), which refers to the introduction, the development, the twist, and the conclusion. And this ties the story together perfectly (If you're into that.)
The characters aren't memorable, but they do have some personality. Their characterizations could've been better, but at least they have more character development than Alien: Covenant. The main ones you'll often hear in the missions via radio are Sgt. Herrera, Dr. Honniker, and Esther.
Sgt. Herrera is your mission's C.O., and she's mostly doing all of the dialogue through the missions via radio. She's an okay character but can act stupid at certain moments. For example, when you enter the ancient Engineer temple, Herrera thinks it's a Weyland-Yutani facility when it's obviously not, even if you haven't watched the films. And due to her token Hispanic heritage, I have no clue what she is saying when she starts saying words and phrases in Spanish (even English subtitles won't tell you what she's saying). Two other token characters on board the Endeavor, JoΓ£o Santos and Ibrahim Savane, often do the same thing. I like Herrera, but they could've at least made her more likable and natural.
Dr. Honniker, Endeavor's "unofficial" scientist, is an intelligent and educated individual who will sometimes show you his geeky side as he's very curious about the mysterious ancient ruins on the planet.
Esther is the Endeavor's synthetic, she and MU/TH/ER, another computer on board the ship, assist with medical, science, and tech. I know she's supposed to be an android, but she sounds and acts too robotic. It would've been better if her personality was more human-like Γ la Bishop.
I don't have much more to say or criticize about 1st Lt. JoΓ£o Santos as he doesn't do much, story-wise, in the campaign. But only tells you advice and lore about the Alien Universe.
2nd Lieutenant Feiyan Ko is a grouchy dropship pilot responsible for transporting the fire team. I've seen archetypes like this before, but she's a very unlikeable character because she just acts like a grumpy bitch the way she is written.
Staff Sergeant Park is the embarkation specialist and fabrication operator. He is also Endeavor's unofficial shopkeeper. His requisition store offers more guns, equipment, challenges, and accessories. However, the character's personality feels boring and out of place as he tries to be a Belethor wannabe.
And finally, Corporal Ibrahim Savane and Colonel Olivia Shipp are just generic characters.
If you get aggravated or tired of listening to the repeating dialogue, you can always turn it off in the settings menu.
I don't mean to nitpick or be a jerk, but I like to point out some things and be assertive. All of the female characters in the game are intentionally ugly ass hell, and the token minority characters are very forced that stick out like a sore thumb. Why? Why did they make them so ugly? It's part of the "Ugly is the New Beauty" thing. This was done intentionally, so men can't jerk off to them. It's also an insult to real women. It's a stupid policy and trend, but if you have a PC, at least you can modify these character models. Thank God the male Marine characters are masculine (this is a military-themed game, after all).
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| Why so Ugly? |
This is part of an ongoing trend from the mid-2010s, mainly from California and major American left-wing cities, mostly from the Millennial generation and modern feminists, since they don't like true feminine beauty. By comparison, the female characters from Aliens: Colonial Marines look 10x times hotter than these ugly bitches. From left to right in the picture above, Colonel Shipp looks like she wants to be a man, Esther looks like she hasn't slept, Herrana has a bulging eye problem, and Ko is a grumpy version of Asian reporter Tricia Takanawa.
Also, the Californian accents are so out of place, and what's up with the forced Spanish fetish? Oh, wait, the game was made by weird Californians from San Jose. Duh! As soon as I first played this game (without doing research on the developer.) I notice the obvious Californian style when I play the game.
I can understand lore-wise your character's military is part of the fictional "United Americas," combining both North and South America as a federation. (In the 1986 film, Aliens, it's the United States.) But it just feels weird and out of place. And there's very little or barely any Cuascasian representation, and that's a little concerning, as there are hundreds of millions of Cuacasians that live in both North and South America in real life. It's like a weird idealistic version of a diverse dystopia dreamland. It's one of those ideas that sound good in theory but will never work.
Will this ruin your game experience? No, not really. Like I said before, this isn't a story-driven game, and I'm very surprised the story itself is not woke. The only thing that is "Woke" is just the ugly aesthetics of the forced female/token characters. That's it, nothing else. This game solely focuses on shooting the hordes of Xenos with your pals.
Gameplay
Unlike the other games from the Alien franchise, where it's in a first-person perspective, Aliens: Fireteam Elite is in a third-person perspective. It is different and new to the series, and I believe it is more fitting since this is an action-orientated game instead of claustrophobic horror. This is more of a horde co-op game than a single-player story-driven shooter, but thankfully you can play it single-player and offline with bots, two Synths named Alpha and Beta.
However, as you complete each mission individually, the next one will get harder via compact rating. If you don't meet your combat rating criteria, it will be difficult (or impossible) to beat, especially on single-player. So, you need to replay the completed missions and earn more XP and money to unlock your classes' upgrades and gear and increase your combat rating to proceed. It takes a while to achieve, but it's fun, challenging, and replayable. It's all worth it.
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| Damage points show how much damage you're causing to an enemy while firing. This is not on by default; you can turn it on in the settings. |
If on single-player, I highly recommend playing the game on Casual difficulty because it will be hard to beat the missions on the other difficulties, and you start out with a low combat rating. Your Synthetic A.I. teammates, Alpha and Beta, are good teammates on Casual difficulty and somewhat on Standard difficulty. However, they are useless on the other difficulties, and you will instantly die. If you lose all your health, you are grounded for a hundred seconds until your teammates heal you. If you don't get healed after time runs out, it's game over if you're a single-player. I recommend being near your A.I. teammates if you want them to heal you. Alpha is the only one that will heal you, not Beta.
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| Weirdly, they don't say gender but "archetype" and don't say male or female, but feminine and masculine. Typical political correctness of a game from California. |
Before the action begins, you customize the appearance of your character first. The customizations give you choices of gender, skin tone, facial, eye color, and hair appearance. However, it does not allow you to customize your hair color or hair in general, and when you change your eye color, you can't see the color's appearance; it's just dark. And you have 10 limited options for facial appearances for both genders.
A positive thing about the third-person perspective is that you can see yourself during gameplay, unlike the first-person perspective from the older games.
Then once you're done with your character customization, you will appear in the Endouvor, and the first thing you will do is talk to Lieutenant Santos and Sagent Herrena as they will brief you on each mission.
Before you begin, you pick a class for your character. There are four classes to choose from at launch, each with its own abilities and perks. Each class also has a primary weapon type, a secondary weapon type, and a backup sidearm. More classes have been added post-release;
The 'Gunner' is a relatively traditional and simple offensive class that focuses on direct damage output. They are equipped with a rifle and a close-quarter weapon, CQW for short (shotguns, SMGs, and light flamethrowers). The Gunner has two skills - Overclock and Grenade.
Overclock increases the fire rate for you and all nearby teammates, and your reload speed, but only for a short time. Xenos will swarm around you and overwhelm your team quickly if you're unprepared, and the Overclock ability will let you take back some control. The second ability is a Grenade that deals heavy damage in an area on impact. It behaves exactly like any other frag grenade in a shooter.
The Gunner's passive ability is called "Stay On Target." This ability gives bonus damage to stack as you continue to fire on enemies narrowed at 10 times. It adds a small percentage to your damage. When it's paired with the Overclock ability, it allows the Gunner to thin out the Xeno horde with ease. However, bonuses quickly decline over time, so you need to be aware of your ammo when dealing with large hordes of Xenos.
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| You can customize your weapons in your loadout, like the iconic M41A2 Pulse Rifle. |
The 'Demolisher' surrenders the chance of team support for raw firepower and crowd-control capabilities. Thus making you a "Walking Tank" that will wipe out anything that moves in front of you. They're equipped with a rifle and a heavy weapon (such as launchers, a heavy flamer, or the Smartgun.) The "Micro Rockets" ability is a shoulder cannon that fires a rocket cluster, and the "blastwave" ability has the Marine create a concussive blast that knocks back close enemies. These two abilities really make a punch when eliminating a lot of Xenos.
The Demolisher's passive ability, "Clear The Room," grants bonus damage for activating the ability and one bonus stack per enemy hit by said ability. Swarmed or overwhelmed by the Xenomorph horde, this damage bonus will save your life. On extremely hard missions, I highly recommend the Demolisher class.
The 'Technician' carries less firepower than most other class kits but can deploy a sentry gun to assist in taking out enemy hordes. For your secondary weapon, you have a handgun (more powerful than the backup sidearm), and for your secondary weapon are CQWs. It also possesses throwable 'Charged Coils' that slow down enemy movement, which makes it really useful for defending positions and buying you time to prepare.
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| This is why I don't camp in Alien worlds. |
The 'Doc' focuses on team healing; its trauma station can heal nearby teammates but has a delimited amount of energy that needs to be replenished by picking up first-aid kits. First-aid kits are around in fixed areas throughout missions. The 'Combat Stims' ability improves the team's weapon handling and boosts their agility. In this class, you only carry a rifle and a handgun. To motivate team cohesion, the Doc's skills recharge faster when they're close to their teammates, and the Doc gains increased damage output for every Marine over a certain health threshold. As a Doc, you should be conservative on using first-aid kits and the trauma station, and only use them if necessarily needed.
A fifth class, 'Recon,' is hidden until it unlocks after completing the campaign. Recon carries a rifle and a CQW like the Gunner, but unlike the Gunner, the Recon focuses on team support rather than direct firepower. They utilize both a "PUPS drone" (the red floating ball in Prometheus) that scans the area to reveal nearby enemies and reduce their damage output and a 'Support Drone' which replenishes ammo and improves weapon accuracy for nearby teammates.
The 'Phalanx' and 'Lancer' classes are not available on the retail version out-of-the-box. You need to update the game online (or an offline .pkg file if available) to use these classes.
Speaking of online, the multiplayer part of the game is unfortunately online only, as there is no split-screen or LAN support like the older Alien games on console and PC. I have not played multiplayer in the game, so I will not cover that part in this review. However, I can say that multiplayer is exactly like single-player, except the two bots are replaced with human players.
The gameplay overall is very balanced as it's strategic and tactical on what to do next to prepare yourself against the Xeno hordes and other enemies.
Despite most of the gameplay being smooth at 30 FPS, I get a few hiccups of audio distortion when there are too many enemies around, and then framerates drop instantly. The audio distortions are very loud and aggravating, but thankfully this isn't game-breaking, and it is only in Giants In The Earth: Evacuate and all three missions of The Gift Of Fire. These distortions only happen in one area of a horde battle, not throughout the entire mission. When distortions start happening, you need to turn down the volume as it is loud. If you have little distortion and the frame rate drops after you complete your mission, close the game and start it again, and the distortions will be gone.
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| A Prowler |
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| A Drone trying to violate me. |
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| Noir Mode is one of the challenge cards that lets you alter gameplay. |
Graphics
The graphics are polished and outstanding, and the developers put a lot of effort into the level of detail that makes the game immersive as you interact in its intimidating world Using Unreal Engine 4. The graphics are obviously 10x better than the rushed and unpolished Aliens: Colonial Marines.
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Music & Sound
This digitally recorded music soundtrack was composed by Californian-based video game composer Austin Wintory. The soundtrack borrows cues and sounds from the first Alien film but has its own style to translate the game's atmosphere and the player's surroundings. The soundtrack uses classical instruments such as an English Horn, Flute, Clarinet, Bassoon, Oboe, and double and electric bass. I don't know how to describe it, but it feels like a "post-modern Californian" style. Respectfully, the music isn't memorable, but it does have a beat to it that fits very well with the game.
The sound mix of the game is imperfect, and the music and sound fx are quieter than typical PS4 games, but all you have to do is turn up the volume, but don't forget to turn it back down when playing something else.
- Great graphics from Unreal Engine 4
- Fun-third person gameplay with different enemy types
- Fun with friends
- The story is decent but better than 2017's Alien: Covenant
- Offline friendly
- Great replay value
- Challenging to Brutul gameplay when playing solo with A.I. bots on other difficulties
- Lack of character development
- Female and minority characters are forcibly tokenized and intentionally ugly
- Californian accents stand out like a sore thumb
- Music has a beat, but respectfully nothing special.
- No split-screen or LAN multiplayer
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