Alienation Reviews
Housemarque's previous games have always kept me coming back through the strength of their gameplay alone. Alienation adds a straightforward, but enjoyable power chase on top, making its finely tuned arcade action all the more alluring. Its action-RPG elements won't make it a replacement for something like Diablo 3 or Grim Dawn, but they successfully provide a structure for unending, enjoyable alien slaughter.
Housemarque's latest offers brilliant loot and levelling, but it's the moment-to-moment action that truly excels.
The world won't stick with you, but beautiful visuals and excellent twin-stick looting make this a co-op blast…once you figure out what you're doing. You could get lost for weeks in its end-game content, but only the most obsessive will care about climbing Alienation's leaderboards.
A disappointingly bland top-down shooter, that while entertaining enough with friends lacks the finely tuned splendour of Stardust and Resogun.
A deeper twist on twin-stick shooters for the player who doesn't mind some complexity and challenge
Housemarque's Alienation delivers an excellent multiplayer shooter with timeless appeal.
Alienation's plot and gameplay might lack originality, but that's soon forgotten as you get your teeth into its slick, addictive, over-the-top action. Along with gorgeous environments and absolutely spectacular pyrotechnics, the game features surprising depth thanks to its upgradable characters and loot system. It all adds up to a really enjoyable multiplayer shooter that's highly recommended.
Still, Alienation is one of the best-feeling twin-stick shooters I've played, so I can't be too bummed. It wasn't long before I had that realization, and now that I'm 20 hours and several character save files in, I'm even more convinced. Housemarque could stand to flesh out the endgame content and also add support for local co-op, but even if it doesn't, I love what's here.
Alienation is a slick and polished twin stick shooter, filled with huge explosions and seemingly endless enemies to kill, but it's let down in a lot of little ways. It's still a great game, but I didn't fall as madly in love with it as I did with its predecessor.
Alienation is good at what it does and what it does is shooting endless waves of filthy aliens. Even though the game lacks some contents as bosses and some variety in missions, the experience is still fun as a solo players or with up to 3 friends.
Review in Italian | Read full review
Alienation may lack the tactical nuance of Helldivers, but it makes up for it with tight shooting and a tonne of pretty-pretty explosions.
Housemarque's twin-stick shooter aspires to be nothing more than a bit of mindless sci-fi entertainment, and it works
I can't see this game being anywhere near memorable in the long run. It's okay, but it just doesn't do anything anywhere near special enough to make it little more than an aping of games and sci-fi media that have come before.
On the one hand, Alienation is a joyous, punchy co-op romp of a twin-stick shooter, with every on-screen detail a veritable celebration of beautiful chaos. On the other, it's a step backwards in terms of what Housemarque could do. What is undeniable though, is that Alienation is a rather good time.
With beautiful graphics, simple and concise controls, and a decent array of weapons to choose from, Alienation only really falters from a tired plot and lack of character customization.
To describe Alienation as a spiritual successor to Dead Nation is a misnomer – this is a far bigger, deeper game, pulling in elements from RPGs and dungeon crawlers to great effect. The gorgeous visuals and addictive, tactile combat make this a feast for the eyes, with intense action never more than a few seconds away. Grabbing loot and fighting off aliens in co-op is stupendous fun, and the game opens up in meaningful ways the more that you play. If you're looking for some high-octane, arcadey action with a fiendishly gripping gameplay loop, then this comes highly recommended.
With a frenetic gameplay experience, a vast array of customization features, engaging online multiplayer, a good amount of content and very solid performance, Alienation is one of the best shooter games released this year on all formats. The lack of offline co-op might be a detriment for those who don't like to play online, but this is the only flaw of a really solid package. Housemarque definitely capitalized on years of experience, releasing a shooter that's nothing short of impressive.
You'll fall for Alienation's great twitch gameplay, but it's with its RPG-like elements that the hooks really sink in. Alienation has created something that's part twin-stick blaster, part sci-fi dungeon crawler, with all the looting, levelling and upgrading that implies. Limited locations and the repetitive shoot 'em up gameplay might make it a less enticing prospect a few weeks in, but right now it's impossible to resist.
Alienation is a game that dodged my radar, mostly in part to how many other games are vying for my time lately, but I cannot stress it enough, don't sleep on this game. The addictive loot-gathering nature is extremely satisfying, and the spot-on controls and cooperative play really make this a game easy to recommend to a gaming group of friends. For those looking for that supplement to Diablo, Alienation should be right up your alley.
Alienation is another extremely polished game from Housemarque that takes well known game mechanics and combines them in unconventional ways for an experience that is not only satisfying to play on the surface, but has a layer of depth that most other twin-stick shooters cannot claim. While it could do with a deeper tutorial to engage players in the beginning and the story isn't about to win any special awards, it's a game that I repeatedly find myself coming back to, even if it's just a mission or two here and there with random players. It's one of those games that urges you to continue playing beyond the initial offering and it succeeds in giving us yet another genre to loot a bunch of really cool and powerful weapons in.