Alien: Rogue Incursion challenges you to watch your step

The Alien series has been adapted into video games for decades with mixed success. The games often fall into two categories: either emulating the terrifying atmosphere of the original movie or venturing into the action-focused direction of the Colonial Marines. Developer Survios is looking to mix elements of both as it brings Alien into virtual reality for the first time with the upcoming Alien: Rogue Incursion. Shacknews recently had an opportunity to give it a first look.

Survios is no stranger to creating cinematic atmospheres in VR, having cut its teeth with games like The Walking Dead: Onslaught. For Alien: Rogue Incursion, players take on the role of former Colonial Marine Zula Hendricks and are thrown into the middle of a devastated GES facility. The whole area has been ravaged by aliens on the loose. Players must work to rendezvous with Davis, her partner with Colonial Marine training, who is also stranded in the facility.

Players won't be entirely defenseless against the alien threat. The classic pulse rifle will be available over the right shoulder, big enough that it needs to be held with both hands. Reload mags are kept near the user's left front pocket. A revolver is also available in case the action is moving quickly. Players will also have a Motion Tracker available to them along their right hip. The Motion Tracker is key to detecting Xenomorph movement and will help players know when to stand still or when to start raining down bullets. Because some firearms are fairly bulky, the Motion Tracker can be set down anywhere. Don't worry about forgetting it, because everything finds its way back to the player's inventory, even if they don't put it away manually. A helpful tablet will give players the information they need, whether it's a map of the facility or a list of objectives. It can be pulled up via a player's equipment wheel, which also allows for a quick switch of primary weapons.

Just because players are armed doesn't mean the facility isn't dangerous. Facehuggers and Xenomorphs will attack if they hear too much noise. Nearly every action can potentially attract unwanted attention. There's a sequence early in the game where a door leading the way forward is welded shut. The ME2 Hand Torch can pave the way through, but welding is also loud enough to attract nearby aliens.

Xenomorphs will go down after a few shots from the pulse rifle, but they'll almost always score some hits and those will quickly add up over time. If players can go the stealth route, it's often recommended. Of course, staying silent isn't always easy. Keep in mind that while Survios has instituted a quality-of-life feature that allows players to drop whatever they have and not have to worry about manually putting it away, they need to keep in mind that dropping anything on the ground can make a big "clang" noise that will ring through to nearby aliens.

While Rogue Incursion is a solo outing, Zula won't be taking this mission on entirely alone. Players quickly find the CPU-controlled Davis as they move further into the facility. Davis proves to be helpful with taking out Xenomorphs, especially smaller ones that pop up out of nowhere. There's a sequence involving a card reader that requires some fumbling through the equipment wheel, at which point a lone Xenomorph attacked. It scored a hit on Zula, but Davis was able to help dispatch it.

Alien: Rogue Incursion looks to spotlight the best aspects of the franchise, paying particular respect to its heyday. Survios has been growing with the VR gaming space for nearly a decade and the team appears to understand the task ahead of it. There's much more from this game that we didn't get to check out, so time will tell whether it fully lives up to the promise presented by the idea of "Alien in VR." Alien: Rogue Incursion will come to Steam VR, PlayStation VR2, and Meta Quest 3 on Thursday, December 19.

This preview is based on an early demo played on Meta Quest 3 on-site at Survios' headquarters in Marina Del Rey, CA. The final product is subject to change.

Ozzie Mejia

Senior Editor

Ozzie has been playing video games since picking up his first NES controller at age 5. He has been into games ever since, only briefly stepping away during his college years. But he was pulled back in after spending years in QA circles for both THQ and Activision, mostly spending time helping to push forward the Guitar Hero series at its peak. Ozzie has become a big fan of platformers, puzzle games, shooters, and RPGs, just to name a few genres, but he’s also a huge sucker for anything with a good, compelling narrative behind it. Because what are video games if you can't enjoy a good story with a fresh Cherry Coke?