To 'appease the people who thought the game was too long,' an Alien: Isolation modder trimmed the campaign length down to a svelte 46 seconds
Here at PC Gamer, we're willing to admit our admiration for those who can maintain a personal grudge for a decade or more. It's a rare dedication to the art of being a hater; keeping your contempt at a steady simmer for that long takes a lot of discipline. I'm not talking about the kind of curmudgeon who deals in cheap dunks. I'm talking about those who write negative Steam reviews after collecting 8,000 hours of evidence, or—in the case of Alien: Isolation modder Matt Filer—publish mods for a 10-year old game just to mock its reviews from 2014.
Alien: Isolation is justifiably remembered as a triumph in videogame horror, one that imbued the xenomorph with an aura of terrifying lethality that it had otherwise slowly lost through however many sequels and spinoffs. However, as delightfully horrifying as evading the interstellar apex predator might've been, there was a common complaint from critics when Alien: Isolation released in 2014: It's maybe too long for its own good.
As our Fraser Brown recently wrote after finally finishing his decade-long dance with the xenomorph, "Alien: Isolation's first half is truly exceptional and terrifying, and there's an argument it should have ended at around the 10-12 hour mark. You defeat the xenomorph, time to celebrate. But no, there's more."
Thankfully, Filer's on the case. Just in time for this year's Halloween, the modder published a mod to pacify Alien: Isolation's detractors. Where before it might've taken 20ish hours for a typical Alien: Isolation playthrough, Filer's Impossible Campaign mod brings the story to a conclusion in less than a minute. Are you happy now?
"This mod substantially shortens Alien: Isolation's playable length by introducing Xenomorphs to LV426," Filer writes in the mod description. "As a result of the inevitable fatalities, Marlow's team never discovers Ellen Ripley's flight recorder, and subsequently never arrive on Sevastopol to cause the Xenomorph outbreak. The game usually ends in under a minute."
Efficiency in storytelling. You love to see it.
Cheeky though it might be, Filer's mod is also a showcase for his OpenCAGE toolkit. Developed by Filer, OpenCage is an open source modding suite for Alien: Isolation that enables editing of the game's assets, scripting, and more. With those tools in hand, he's been meddling with Alien: Isolation for over a year, swapping the xenomorph for Thomas the Tank Engine or setting it loose on Counter-Strike maps.
If you missed out on Alien: Isolation in 2014, you're in luck. It's currently on sale on Steam for only $10. Although that price might be a little steep if you're only going to play it for a minute.