Aliens: Colonial Marines goofs

Template:AliensColonialMarines This article covers all the known goofs in the 2013 video game Aliens: Colonial Marines and its expansion pack Stasis Interrupted.

The numerous mistakes in Alien: Colonial Marines, especially with regards to continuity with the films that preceded it, were much criticized upon the game's release, especially given Gearbox Software's repeated assurances during development that the game would honor and fit into the continuity of the film series. Several of these goofs were later explained in its singleplayer expansion pack, Stasis Interrupted. However, taken by itself, the main game features several obvious inconsistencies with the movies that came before it.

Continuity

• Before the game, the Sulaco was last seen passing Fiorina "Fury" 161 on its way back to its home base (presumably Earth) at the beginning of Alien³, yet in the game it is suddenly back at LV-426; this discrepancy is even specifically mentioned at the beginning of the game by Lieutenant Reid, before being quickly glossed over by Captain Cruz. Moreover, the Sulaco is completely infested with Xenomorphs in the game. While it is implied that the location and condition of the ship are the result of interference by Weyland-Yutani personnel, who have taken over the vessel, this is never convincingly explained or elaborated upon. The exact reason for this infestation, as well as the ship's return to LV-426, were later explained in Stasis Interrupted.

• Even though Hicks sends a distress call to the USCM, it somehow takes the USS Sephora 17 weeks to reach LV-426; in Aliens, Hicks explains that they can expect a rescue team to arrive after only 17 days, even without them sending a distress call. Stasis Interrupted later revealed that Hicks' distress call was not sent until much later than the main game would have you believe, and far closer to the point at which the Sephora arrives at the moon; while this might explain why it took the Sephora so long to get there, it raises the further question of why Hicks didn't send the message sooner. Regardless of when the distress call was sent, the game does not explain why a search party was not dispatched earlier based solely on the fact that the Sulaco disappeared, although it is possible Weyland-Yutani had a hand in this regard, given their own operation on the moon.

• The various underbarrel weapon attachments in the game are never reloaded; any additional ammunition collected for them is magically teleported inside the weapons.

• The Sulaco's hangar is drastically smaller that it was in the film, and there is clearly no room for the second dropship. The hangar set used in filming was actually extended with a matte painting, and it appears the development team at Gearbox Software overlooked this in the set blueprints they used for reference (although a cursory look at the film would show the hangar's immense size).

• Bishop's legs are found on the floor in the Sulaco's hangar bay, even though they should logically have been sucked out of the vessel when Ripley opened the airlock to expel the Queen. The position they are found also does not correspond to events of the film — in Aliens, Bishop is standing behind Smart Ass when he is ripped in two, yet in the game his legs are found in front of the dropship.

• There are multiple errors with the lockers in the Sulaco's locker room. For example, Tim Crowe's name is incorrectly displayed as "S. Crow" on his locker name plate. The door on Hicks' locker also opens to the wrong side when compared to Aliens, and the photographs visible inside in the film are missing.

• There are not enough cryotubes in the hypersleep bay. In Aliens there were enough to hold the twelve Marines plus Ripley, Burke and Bishop, making for at least fifteen overall. In the game there are only twelve capsules, including the four that have been jettisoned. Like the hangar, the cryo-chamber set was made to appear larger through the use of illusion — large mirrors were used to extend the room because the production could not afford to build enough hypersleep capsules, and Gearbox clearly did not account for this.

• There is little to no fire damage inside the hypersleep bay on the Sulaco, even though in Alien³ we see the entire chamber apparently being engulfed in flames. Furthermore, the evacuated cryotubes (that held Ripley and co.) are at the far right of the chamber. In Aliens, Ripley and the others go to sleep at the opposite end of the bank of chambers, as the far wall is visible close in the background.

• It is never explained why Weyland-Yutani decide to create and study a Hive aboard the Sulaco, even though they have ample Xenomorph research facilities on LV-426. Nor is it explained why they return the Sulaco to LV-426, especially as that is likely to be the first place any rescue team will look for it.

• In Alien³, Michael Weyland is desperate to recover Ripley and the embryonic Queen inside her from Fiorina 161. However, with the revelation that the company is studying an abundance of Xenomorph specimens aboard the Sulaco and on LV-426, including a Queen, he has absolutely no need to do this.

• Once again, Chestburster implantation has been rapidly accelerated. Keyes is discovered almost immediately after his squad is decimated by the Xenomorphs, yet he has already been cocooned and impregnated. Bella is also impregnated in far less than the 24 hours the process should take. In one of the audio logs discovered in the game, a Weyland-Yutani scientist claims the implantation process takes "roughly an hour or so", but even this seems far longer than it takes with Keyes and Bella.

• Bella quite clearly describes the aftermath of a Facehugger attack when she first contacts Winter and Cruz over the radio, yet no one shows any real concern until the Sephora's Bishop later informs her that she is going to die. Given that Ripley gave an account of the Alien and its life cycle when she was rescued from deep space, it makes no sense that the Marines, and especially their commanding officer, would not realise Bella was in trouble immediately. The Marines in Aliens had read this report (even if they did not believe it until they encountered the Xenomorphs first-hand), so it is totally illogical that the detachment aboard the Sephora would be sent in without this information.

• When the Sephora arrives at LV-426, it is facing in the opposite direction to the Sulaco. When looking out from the Sulaco's windows whilst moving through the ship, you can see that the Sephora has suddenly turned 180° and is now facing in the same direction as her sister ship.

• One of the major locations in the game is the colony of Hadley's Hope, despite the fact this location was supposedly completely obliterated by the detonation of its Atmosphere Processor in Aliens. According to Bishop in the film, this explosion would have vaporized everything within a 30 km radius, yet in the game, even the Atmosphere Processor itself has not been obliterated, as a large portion of it is still standing. The colony is also somehow still present, despite the Processing station being, at most, four or five kilometers away; while the buildings have been superficially damaged, many of its structures are essentially intact. This is one plot hole that is never explained.

• Furthermore, the design of Hadley's Hope does not match what we see in the films. For example, the colony has a storm wall completely encircling it in the game, whereas in the film it has a wall only on one side (as the moon's winds only ever come from one direction). In Operations, the vent that the survivors flee through following the assault in Aliens is nowhere to be seen in the game.

• There is an APC (presumably the one from Aliens) parked outside the colony's perimeter wall. However, in the film the APC was said to have been destroyed by the crashing dropship, and this happened close to the Atmosphere Processor, some distance from the colony.

• There are multiple errors regarding the two robot sentry guns found outside Operations (a reference to the Special Edition of Aliens):
  • Neither of the guns is in the position it was in in the film, where they were placed at a junction in the corridors near the main door into Operations, not in a corridor behind the med lab. The guns are also missing their battery/computer control packs, which in the film had to be wired into the guns separately in order for them to work.
  • Both guns, like all of the sentry guns seen in the game, have LCD ammunition counters, even though the weapons in the film did not have these. According to these counters, one of the guns is empty, while the other has only 4 rounds remaining — while this arrangement is correct, the last gun in the film had 10 rounds remaining when it ceased firing. While it is possible another errant Xenomorph may have strayed in front of it at some point between the events of the film and the game, causing it to fire the 6 missing rounds, the gun will not fire when the building is attacked by Xenomorphs, even if one of the creatures stands directly in front of it.
  • The gun with ammunition remaining has a two-digit ammo counter, even though every other sentry gun encountered in the game — including the one sitting directly alongside it — has a three-digit counter.
  • When Winter and O'Neal first encounter the guns, O'Neal says, "Guns are dry. Every last bullet," despite the fact one of the guns clearly still has 4 rounds left on its ammunition counter.
  • When the Xenomorphs launch their first major assault on the Operations building, Cruz orders Winter to recover one of the sentry guns to help defend the area. The gun he picks up is empty, yet when he places it in Operations it suddenly has a full 500 round magazine without anyone reloading it.

• The Operations Center shows no sign of the blast damage that would have been caused caused by Vasquez firing several grenades from her Pulse Rifle inside the room; even the glass monitor screens are intact.

The window to the room containing the Facehuggers in Aliens (top) and Aliens: Colonial Marines (bottom).

• The doorway and window leading to the room where the Facehuggers are stored in the med lab has changed completely, as seen in the image to the right. The room itself is also different — the black stencilled writing on the wall is missing in the game and a metal support structure has become a series of pipes. Finally, the tubes containing the Facehuggers are notably all full, despite the fact Bishop dissected one of the dead specimens and Burke released the two live creatures during Aliens.

• The two Facehuggers that were killed while attacking Ripley and Newt are in the wrong positions. The one killed by Hudson is trapped behind the small table – in the film it falls from the table and Hudson continues shooting it on the floor. The other Facehugger was thrown against a far wall by Hicks and shot by Vasquez, but it lies dead near the middle of the room in the game.

• The design of the derelict on LV-426, like many other locations in the game, differs from what is seen in the film. Most notably, the room containing the Pilot lacks the low wall that the Nostromo crew had to scale to reach the Pilot's chair, as well as the hole burned in the floor that led to the cargo hold.

• Given that he was supposedly killed in Alien³, Hicks' survival is at best very poorly explained in the main game. Stasis Interrupted would later explain how he was still alive, and how someone else (revealed to be Turk) came to be in his cryotube when the Sulaco EEV crashed on Fiorina 161, but the main game completely glosses over the situation.

• We are told that Hicks has been held on LV-426 by Weyland-Yutani so that he can be tortured for information. However, Hicks could not possibly know anything of any importance that the company has not already discovered for itself. Given the state of advancement of their operation, they know far more about the Xenomorphs than he ever did at this point.

• It seems strange that, given how Hicks had become close to Ripley by the end of Aliens (especially so in the extended Special Edition), he does not even think to ask what may have happened to her when he is rescued by the Sephora Marines. While dialogue in the game's ending implies that Hicks already knows of Ripley's death, it is never made clear exactly how he knows this. Stasis Interrupted later revealed that Hicks in fact witnessed Ripley's death first-hand.

• Despite his armor being destroyed by Xenomorph blood and abandoned inside Hadley's Hope in Aliens, Hicks is once again wearing his (undamaged) armor after he is rescued; it is not simply another set of armor that has been given to him by the Sephora Marines, as it is clearly marked with his name on the chest plate and features the heart and padlock motif from the film.

• Alien Resurrection establishes that when Ripley killed the Dragon and the Queen embryo on Fiorina 161, the Xenomorph species was effectively wiped out (at least to mankind's knowledge). This would mean the explosion at the end of Aliens had to have destroyed not only the Xenomorphs at Hadley's Hope, but the Derelict Ship and all of the Eggs on board it as well. This would of course make the events of Aliens: Colonial Marines impossible. While Stasis Interrupted later confirmed all of the Xenomorphs at the colony were killed in the explosion (even though the colony itself was not destroyed), it also made it clear the Derelict and its cargo of Eggs was let unharmed by the blast.

• The layout of the DLC weapon Ripley's Pulse Rifle is wrong — in Aliens, Ripley tapes the weapon together so that the flamethrower is on the left-hand side, closest to her body, and the Pulse Rifle is on the right-hand side. The two weapons are reversed in the game, with the Pulse Rifle closest to the player. The ammo counter on the M41A is also on the wrong side in the game, being on the left of the Pulse Rifle (although this is likely for gameplay reasons, to ensure it is visible to the player).

Factual Errors

• Magazines (for firearms) are incorrectly referred to as clips in-game.

• The Sephora's name is not painted on the vessel's hull, even though the area where it should be written is clearly visible as the player crosses the umbilical.

• If Weyland-Yutani are conducting highly illegal human and biological research at a top-secret facility, why is every crate, desk drawer, baseball cap and cargo container on LV-426 emblazoned with their corporate logo? Similarly, all of the equipment aboard the Sulaco is marked with their logo, as O'Neal actually points out in the game.

• On a similar note, Weyland-Yutani could quite easily have covered their entire operation by claiming that the expedition in Aliens was lost due to the malfunction and detonation of the colony's Atmosphere Processor. Such a story would likely be accepted, making any further investigation by the USCM unlikely and leaving the company free to conduct its experiments totally unhindered.

• Towards the end of the game, Reid is repeatedly sent to do jobs that endanger her life, despite the fact she is apparently the last pilot the Marines have and therefore a vital lifeline to them. This would make sense if the survivors were critically short on manpower and had no alternative, but there are clearly enough Marines left alive for Reid to be kept safely away from the action and under guard.

Revealing Mistakes

• When reloading the M41A Pulse Rifle MK2 with either the U1 Grenade Launcher or U4 Firebomb Launcher attached, it is possible to see inside the underbarrel launchers, revealing them to be hollow.

• After Reid surveys the damage from the explosive decompression at the very beginning of the game, her dropship pulls up and away from the umbilical and passes straight through the Sephora's hull overhead.

Stasis Interrupted

Continuity

• The computer voice aboard the Sulaco is completely different to that which is heard in Alien³.

• Hicks is wearing a T-shirt and pants when he is woken from hypersleep; this contradicts Aliens, where he entered hypersleep in just his shorts and heavily bandaged from his wounds.

• We are expected to believe that Turk, the man who ends up inside Hicks' cryotube in his stead, arrived aboard the Sulaco semi-naked and wearing bandages in almost exactly the same places as the Corporal. While not outright impossible, this seems, at best, hugely unlikely.

• In the game, Ripley has a Facehugger on her face as she is loaded into the EEV. However, a brief shot in the opening of Alien³ shows she does not have anything on her face at this point (even though, logically, she should).

• Alien³ shows us that Ripley, Newt and Turk are ejected from the Sulaco as it passes very close to Fiorina 161. Given that there are Weyland-Yutani personnel aboard the Sulaco at the time, it makes no sense that the company is subsequently unaware of Ripley's presence on Fiorina until Superintendent Andrews sends a message announcing her arrival at the start of the film. It also makes no sense that it takes Weyland-Yutani so long to reach the prison once they learn of Ripley's presence, if they are already operating in the area.

• During the recreation of the ending of Alien³, the distinctive Weyland-Yutani Commandos on Fiorina 161 are gone, replaced by the game's standard Weyland-Yutani PMCs.

• In the level "Redemption", Levy twice has to don a gas mask and enter laboratories flooded with toxic gas. However, if you look at Levy's shadow on the wall, his gas mask is nowhere to be seen.