Free League Publishing’s ALIEN: The Roleplaying Game will win awards in 2020; there’s no need to beat around the bush because this tabletop RPG is that impressive. Few RPG products perfectly interpret a license like this one does, combining the right art, writing, feel, and engine to make this an experience that really brings up the work of Ridley Scott and James Cameron. Free League provided a review copy of the game so let’s use it to discuss why I loved the ALIEN RPG.
THIS IS NOT MY FIRST TRIP INTO DEEP SPACE
This is not my first time discussing the ALIEN RPG or talking about Free League. For Kenzer & Co’s Knights of the Dinner Table, I reviewed ALIEN: The Roleplaying Game: Cinematic Starter Kit that Free League made available as soon as you pre-ordered the ALIEN RPG. At Gen Con, I played the ALIEN RPG demo, Last Days of Hadley’s Hope, an event my pal, John McGuire, detailed (here). To put it simply, you felt like you were in one of the [better] films. At EN World, I interviewed Tomas Härenstam, Free League’s CEO and Game Director for the ALIEN RPG, about the game and how the license came together. All of this is to say that I have come along on this journey as it headed towards its most important moment, releasing this edition. With all of the buildup, this is like seeing the movie after watching the trailers and reading the novelization. As you can tell, I went into this very hyped for what was to come.
WHO IS FREE LEAGUE?
Why was I hyped? Beyond the previews, I’ve read and played a number of Mutant: Year Zero engine games from Free League Publishing. Named Fria Ligan in Sweden, the publisher’s country of origin, Free League is the publisher behind some of the most award-winning tabletop roleplaying games on the market today:
- Tales from the Loop (5 Gold ENnie Awards)
- Coriolis (Judges Spotlight ENnie Award)
- Forbidden Lands (Origins Awards Nominee)
- Their core game/system, Mutant: Year Zero (1 Silver ENnie Award, Best Roleplaying Game UK Games Expo, Game of the Year – Fenix Magazine, and Best Swedish Game – Spelkult)
MUTANT: YEAR ZERO ENGINE
I expect the ALIEN RPG to add to that list of awards and a lot of that is because of the Mutant: Year Zero engine. For this version of the M:YZ engine, there are some nuances to the gameplay even as it holds true to its core.
The game is based on d6 dice pools formed from an Attribute plus a Skill plus any related Gear plus Stress Dice. A single 6 is a success, additional 6s result in Stunts. Statistically, you will fail rolls, but there’s an option called Pushing that allows you a single re-roll. Pushing has an upside and a downside and they’re the same thing; it causes you to add Stress Dice to your pool. That is the secret sauce of this system,–Stress Dice add to your dice pool increasing your odds for success, but also introducing the potential to cause your character to Panic. 6s are successes on any die, while 1s on a Stress die (only) leads the character to crack under the pressure which can result in the character running out of ammo and/or going catatonic and/or another serious condition. This system treats these bad dice as gains until they go bad. In a system where you’re competing against the monster’s ability to inflict harm and the corporation’s greed, adding the dice’s ability to inflict Panic makes the game seem tilted against your character. Which, in the Cinematic Play mode, means it feels exactly like the ALIEN franchise if your character is not played by Sigourney Weaver.
ALIEN RPG
The 392-page, gorgeously illustrated hardcover core rulebook sets the game after ALIEN, ALIENS, ALIEN 3, and, of course, Prometheus. So, there’s a baseline to work from but you’re not dealing with any disparate threads created by the novels or the Dark Horse comics. Instead, you get a succinct overview of the universe (a subject ideal for a follow-up book that digs deeper into the universe’s mythology). There are the factions, the aliens, the ideas of what life in space in like.
The system has won awards, but does that mean it works well for the ALIEN franchise? In a word, yes. Let’s talk about what ALIEN is to many: Ridley Scott’s slow burn sci-fi horror and James Cameron’s wall-to-wall sci-fi action movie. Those are two different masters with two different agendas. Designing gameplay that can provide both is a tall order. The ALIEN RPG delivers with a system that generates suspense, action, mechs, vehicles, space combat, and more, yet does not turn into Phoenix Command. Characters have classes taken from the movies: Colonial Marine, Company Agent, Kid, and so on. Each class guides your creation without being overly complex and time-consuming. The Engineers and the Xenomorphs get an entire section discussing what’s known of them and their traits in gameplay, yet, again, leaving room for story without having to dwell in endless detail.
Because of the difference in the source material (movies) and the demands of a tabletop RPG (long form narratives), this game offers two play modes: Cinematic Play and Campaign Play. I’ve covered the Cinematic Play for Knights of the Dinner Table so I’ll only summarize it here as high-stakes, one-and-done game play. The demo I played, Last Days of Hadley’s Hope (renamed Hope’s Last Day in the book), was done in Cinematic Play and it felt like a missing chapter between ALIEN and ALIENS.
Campaign Play is, as the title indicates, for campaigns and it offers less lethal options for a longer story. Now, that is not to say it is not lethal, it is, it’s just not as lethal compared to Cinematic Play, which is a meat grinder. How Campaign Play turns down the mortality rate is by introducing deeper stories where you’re not blundering into Xenomorphs during the first scene. Instead, you’re working in space and dealing with the difficulties of life on the frontier as a space trucker or a Colonial Marine before the first facehugger, or other alien, appears.
IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU ROLL
(I’ve got to be the 45,000th reviewer so far to put that tired line in.)
Is this game worth purchasing? If you love the ALIENS franchise or sci-fi horror or sci-fi tension, then this game will not disappoint. The art and layout are outstanding (I spent some greater number of words on that in my Knights of the Dinner Table review and the final product features a depth of stunning images. This RPG feels like an art book with works that feel like they’ve been taken from the production art for a future film. The writing is atmospheric, capable of delivering a tale that feels like a chapter from this universe yet brief in its delivery. The gameplay is well thought out and made easy to game since the book is well laid out, allowing for quick reference.
If you love every chapter of the ALIEN franchise to-date, this game is for you. If you only love the first two films, this game is for you. If you think being in space with horrible monsters sounds like a good night at the gaming table, the ALIEN RPG is for you. Interested in picking up this RPG? It’s available through:
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