All images in this article are credited to TemplarGFX. They depict the upcoming V3 version of their “ACM Overhaul” mod.
True disasters in the gaming world occur less often than one might think. To be sure, gamers complain every day about all manner of things; but then again, gamers and geeks will complain about and debate anything that has any semblance of esoteric worth. The bedlam that ensued when Gearbox Software released their Alien-themed FPS Aliens: Colonial Marines back in 2013, though, was nothing short of pandemonium.
Aliens: Colonial Marines was initially revealed back in 2008. After several delays, Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford stated that the game’s development hiatus was due to the team hiring actors from the 1986 Aliens film. An anonymous whistleblower, however, reported to Destructoid that the delays were, in fact, due to Aliens: Colonial Marines team members quietly being moved to the burgeoning Borderlands project (itself the subject of hairy controversy over its visual style). Once Sega and 2K Games caught wind of Gearbox’s deception, Gearbox underwent a series of layoffs in 2008.
Moreover, the game was rumored to have been outsourced to various third-party studios, then hurriedly re-assembled and shipped in an unfinished state. The final version of Aliens: Colonial Marines was riddled with bugs and looked and played nothing like its pre-release footage, which inflamed hordes of gamers who had been waiting for the game for five years. This mess even provoked two individuals – Roger Damion Perrine and John Locke – to file suit against Gearbox back in 2013, where they claimed that the game’s pre-release footage did not accurately represent the final product.
Thus summarizes the sordid history of Aliens: Colonial Marines, the fallout of which is still grumbled about by gamers to this day.
But the more innovative gamers among us are not wont to sit idly by. Their solution for disappointing launches: fix the game’s flaws through the power of mods. And that’s exactly what Mod DB member TemplarGFX has done with what many gamers view as an abomination of a game.
TemplarGFX’s “ACM Overhaul” allows players to, in his words, “experience Aliens: Colonial Marines how it should have been when it first released.” The resulting mod is intended to make the game more exciting, more suspenseful, and most importantly, more fun overall.
It’s also very, very dark. Check out some footage of the V2 version of the mod below:
The list of changes TemplarGFX has made to the base Aliens: Colonial Marines is staggering, to say the least. The most prominent among these alterations are an entirely re-programmed AI for both humans and Xenomorphs, completely overhauled weapons, redone animations and shaders, and general graphic improvements. You can view the full list of changes in TemplarGFX’s articles here.
And he’s not even finished with the mod. The current version available for download is V2; TemplarGFX has stated in his comments section that V3 is “coming very soon.”
Those interested in downloading TemplarGFX’s mod for Aliens: Colonial Marines can do so here. The page also contains several videos of the upcoming V3 iteration, which should be able to give interested gamers a taste of what’s to come.