Games that do 'ALIEN' well

[Morrus]

With (yet another) new Alien flick on the horizon (please be good!) I was thinking about TTRPGs which do the Alien franchise well.

Obviously, there's the official Alien TTRPG from Free League (2nd Edition coming soon).

There's Mothership, which I hear also does it very well--I get to play that in a couple of weeks, I hope!

Of course any sci-fi RPG can do Alien, but which ones do it the best?

 

[The Soloist]

Not sure which one is the best but we played Free League's Alien and it was just like the first movie. I'm the only one who made it out alive of the station. The others died horrible deaths. I completed my goal of collecting a sample of the alien for Weyand-Yutani.

For me, there is not much incentive to return to the game. It was cool once. Our GM has the Space Marines expansion. Survivability is higher. We have not played it yet.

I'll play a game of Nemesis the board game anytime. It does Alien very well.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I've also heard good things about Hostile, a setting and supplements for Cepheus/Traveller without the Fifth Imperium setting. No idea if it adds a stress mechanic like Alien or Mothership has.

I own some Alien, but have only got to play it once, at last year's GenCon Online. It very much does feel like Alien, but I worry that -- as much as I love the setting -- long term play may turn into waiting for the xenomorphs to show up, since it says "Alien" on the tin.

So, for me, I would probably go with Mothership or Hostile for longterm play, as you can have Alien-style play (both have a retro sci-fi aesthetic and feature a corporate dystopia, as does Death in Space, although its setting is pretty different), but without the Waiting for Godot of it all.

 

[jdrakeh]

I'm not going to pretend that it does it best (or even good), but my entry into this year's One-Page RPG Jam on Itch can do it. It's based on Cthulhu Dark, but rather than a sanity mechanic, has a stress mechanic (so similar to Alien in that regard). Also, players roll all the dice (e.g. anytime they do something potentially injurious - like fighting a xenomorph - they roll their Health die to determine if they've been hurt). Finally, the game is PWYW (even free if you so choose), so it couldn't hurt to give it a look (and, if you do, please consider rating it).

 

[Wofano Wotanto]

Looks like the best of the ones I know of have been mentioned. GURPS (with the right optional elements, such as horror checks) does a solid job of it, although a more dedicated system might produce a better experience. Same reasoning for BRP. The old Amazing Engine Bughunters book was meant to do Aliens (among other space action/horror things) but it's debatable how well it accomplished the task.

But really, the champion has to be Intruder. Nothing stopping you from roleplaying your crew chits' ugly and inevitable demises.

 

[Aldarc]

5e D&D. It does everything the bestest.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Might I suggest…Paranoia!

 

[jdrakeh]

The old Amazing Engine Bughunters book was meant to do Aliens (among other space action/horror things) but it's debatable how well it accomplished the task.

I think that Bughunters does a reasonably good job with the setting bits, but the system is painfully generic.

 

[Wofano Wotanto]

I think that Bughunters does a reasonably good job with the setting bits, but the system is painfully generic.

Pretty much true of the whole AE range. Adequate-to-good settings dragged down by a very basic game engine. When your biggest innovation is that odd "character core" idea where you, as a player rather than a character, mechanically improve over time you might be doing something wrong.

That said, I do have a nostalgic soft spot for Bughunters and Metamorphosis Alpha To Omega, and Kromosome was pretty original for its time. Not a lot of biopunk in gaming then, and the whole "nimble businesses versus corporate juggernauts" thing was a different spin on the usual cyberpunk dystopias. I wouldn't mind porting it to a better engine someday.

 

[MGibster]

I own some Alien, but have only got to play it once, at last year's GenCon Online. It very much does feel like Alien, but I worry that -- as much as I love the setting -- long term play may turn into waiting for the xenomorphs to show up, since it says "Alien" on the tin.

I've accepted that long term play is limited with Alien. It's just the nature of the beast as it were. The biggest problem is that everyone knows you're playing Alien. Even if you start out running a campaign with the crew of a tramp freighter, everyone knows the alien is right around the corner. That's the game we're playing, that's what we're there for. After a while, the horror aspect is just gone. Better to run one shots or short campaigns in my opinion.