When we talk about truly scary games, Alien: Isolation always comes up. Even today, few titles can match its unique terror. What’s surprising is that the game’s creators themselves now admit the Xenomorph, its iconic monster, was perhaps too smart. This led many players to spend far more hours in the game than originally planned.
Dion Lay, one of the writers for Alien: Isolation, recently shared his thoughts on this during an FRVR Podcast. He confessed that the team never intended for the game to be so long. The reason for its extended playtime came down to the Xenomorph’s incredibly intelligent artificial intelligence. This alien relentlessly tracked players throughout the game. It also learned and adapted to how players behaved, making every encounter feel fresh and deadly. This forced everyone to move carefully and slowly, turning what might have been a quick journey into a tense crawl.
Simply put, the game’s story was designed to move at a brisk pace, without much fuss. However, the sophisticated AI dramatically slowed everything down. Lay even reflected that it would have been much better if they could have made the game shorter. He shared these details in a report picked up by PCGamer.
The challenge was that the story was already complete while the highly detailed AI was still being developed. By the time they fully realized the AI’s impact, it was too late to go back and shorten the game. Still, this unique blend of careful storytelling and groundbreaking AI helped Alien: Isolation become a beloved horror classic. Gamers still talk about its intense atmosphere and smart enemy today.