Quite disappointing. I haven't had the opportunity to play the video game Alien: Isolation myself, but I did check out a good chunk of a YouTube playthrough of it some years back. I could tell that it's a very well put together piece of entertainment with an interesting story and I'd like to give it a play at some point.
This digital series takes the game's cutscenes and mixes them together with in-engine footage to recreate the game's narrative. On the whole, I think watching an actual Let's Play of the game is a far better experience. The plot here is jarring and difficult to follow with some strange editing choices. Large chunks of story are removed and it's hard to keep track of the characters, let alone care about them. The difference in visual quality between the pre-rendered cutscenes and the in-engine footage is massively different and really takes you out of things.
It's also noticeably how weak the voice acting is - interestingly, that doesn't feel anywhere near as much an issue in the actual game, but somehow really stands out as awkward here. Perhaps the transition of media from interactive game to preset television story just doesn't work.
It's worth noting that there was some new footage created for this series, and that stuff is actually pretty good. It enables Amanda to act as a narrator of sorts to smooth out some of the storytelling elements and I believe it also adds a new ending coda which wasn't a part of the game.
I'm really not sure why this project was done and the end result is nothing to get excited about.
Review by LeftHandedGuitaristBlockedParent2019-03-01T23:50:35Z
Quite disappointing. I haven't had the opportunity to play the video game Alien: Isolation myself, but I did check out a good chunk of a YouTube playthrough of it some years back. I could tell that it's a very well put together piece of entertainment with an interesting story and I'd like to give it a play at some point.
This digital series takes the game's cutscenes and mixes them together with in-engine footage to recreate the game's narrative. On the whole, I think watching an actual Let's Play of the game is a far better experience. The plot here is jarring and difficult to follow with some strange editing choices. Large chunks of story are removed and it's hard to keep track of the characters, let alone care about them. The difference in visual quality between the pre-rendered cutscenes and the in-engine footage is massively different and really takes you out of things.
It's also noticeably how weak the voice acting is - interestingly, that doesn't feel anywhere near as much an issue in the actual game, but somehow really stands out as awkward here. Perhaps the transition of media from interactive game to preset television story just doesn't work.
It's worth noting that there was some new footage created for this series, and that stuff is actually pretty good. It enables Amanda to act as a narrator of sorts to smooth out some of the storytelling elements and I believe it also adds a new ending coda which wasn't a part of the game.
I'm really not sure why this project was done and the end result is nothing to get excited about.