VideoGamer has dug up demo footage of Aliens: Colonial Marines, apparently from a demo shown off last year, and compares it scene-for-scene with what we ended up with in the final product. The results are fairly shocking; the graphics, resolution, and the presentation itself are significantly better in this demo in almost every conceivable aspect.
It’s hard to say where development went so wrong on what will likely (and unfortunately) be SEGA’s biggest game this year, but this video speaks for itself.
One day maybe we’ll learn the full story…
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Truth be told, Gearbox probably won’t suffer all that much for this. TimeGate on the other hand, I could see them getting shut down even though it isn’t entirely their fault as to why this game is so bad/different from the demos.
I just don’t get why Timegate…or whoever, was involved, at all. This was supposed to be a Gearbox game. Who let them outsource this project, and why did Gearbox not seem to care that their game was going down the crapper?
I just……I just don’t get it.
Companies outsource portions of games all the time. Even old SEGA games where outsourced some. But it seems Gearbox decided doing Borderlands 2 and its DLC was more important then finishing a game you took a contract for 6 years ago.
It’s typical to see ports outsourced, sure. And maybe some bits here and there. But to outsource an aspect of a game so crucial as an entire single-player campaign? I dunno man, I don’t see Treyarch outsourcing their campaigns.
Gearbox doesn’t deserve their name on the cover.
Gearbox needs to keep their name on the cover in big writing so everyone knows.
I’m going to change my opinion from what I said earlier today in the Comments under the other Aliens story. I still am disappointed that Sega released this game. That said, I’m reserving judgement on the role they had in the game themselves or how much control they had over it until more information’s known about it.
Clearly though this was a screw up that took multiple parties to create.
Oh man the difference between the demo and the final product is unforgiveable. You can’t do that and hold prodiction on the game for so long and not produce anything close to what you proposed to do. The difference is just too glaringly bad. How did SEGA allow this one out of the oven? When SEGA eventually releases another Aliens game I hope they put a more responsible team behind it because it looks like they wasted a lot of money here publishing it.
And not only a better team but keep a closer eye on the game. If the team’s not working out, fix the issues or get a new team.
What exactly were you expecting them to do? Flush down a multimillion dollar investment? The entire game’s development was a clusterfuck. From what I’ve been able to gather, an entirely new game would have had to be made at this point.That would have been tens of millions more dollars in investment, and lord knows when the Aliens license runs out for SEGA, they might have had to spend millions renewing that too in the meantime. At this point, the only move SEGA really had left was to try to recoup SOMETHING from the investment.
And when a team isn’t working out, it isn’t simply a matter of flicking a switch to fix the issues or get a new team. I don’t know much about game development, but I know it’s more complicated then that.
Frankly, I hope SEGA drop the Aliens license and never works with Gearbox again. SEGA shouldn’t keep throwing good money after bad like this. As if the mediocrity of Aliens vs Predator wasn’t enough.
It’s a real shame to, because the closed demo session was so DAMNED impressive. Can’t believe it was scripted. Makes me relieved I wasn’t able to write about it.
A screw up like this is so bad it’s not even funny.
The problem is that I was hyped on the vids alone. Now I want a new Aliens game. One that gives the same feeling the vids did.
“That would have been tens of millions more dollars in investment, and lord knows when the Aliens license runs out for SEGA, they might have had to spend millions renewing that too in the meantime. At this point, the only move SEGA really had left was to try to recoup SOMETHING from the investment. ”
———
No, not “at this point.” “At this point” is too late, I think development should have been stopped years ago if it was clear to Sega that Gearbox had no interest in the game.
By many accounts, development actually had stopped at times. But not for quality reasons.
Here are my thoughts about this. It is
Such a Damn shame the Game turned out the way it did. I was going to get this Game considering I loved Aliens. But it looks like i’m going to consider waiting for a dramatic price drop. Crazy thing is I actually am seeing reports about some people already modding the Game visually to make it look at least close to how the E3 demo looked. So those are my thoughts right now about this mess of a situation.
p.s. Gearbox and Pitchford have a lot of explaining to do to Fox and Sega.
I’d love for Gearbox to comment on this. I really would.
But they seem to be busy tweeting about Borderlands 2 redemption codes.