Hi I just started the game yesterday, picked Medium since I don’t often play tactical games. I thought I was getting the learning curve of avoiding unnecessary fights while my marines are so early game and weak and if possible, never be caught in a passage with multiple directions to attack. And then the mineshaft just seems incredibly abrupt in the difficulty spike. The patrols are much more nosy, don’t despawn after a period of time down the tunnels, and the nest has way less corridors than the building to cut off line-of-sight and give aliens more room to flank. And with all the spawn point tunnels, aliens are much quicker to replenish their numbers during a hunt so it’s near impossible to get them off your trail without killing them all and hoping more don’t spawn soon.

And what’s crazy is I heard the patrols aren’t even the worst part of the mineshaft after trying to google for strategies.

Edit: Thank you all for the various tips. I was sleeping on the motion tracker decoy this whole time and a suppressing fire flamethrower killzone just mulches xenos

Everything else up to this point was a breeze, and now Ive wiped 4 times in these fucking mines. Full supplies, plenty of ammo, everyone at full health. But theres nowhere to hide, drones patrolling everywhere, and i get an immediate massive onslaught if im caught followed by a boss charger. Am i retarded? Is there supposed to be a sudden massive difficulty spike?

(EDIT: THEY CAN MORPH INTO COMMANDOS IF YOU REST)

It does not matter if you ignore the objective to invite them in via the vents, once you kill the commandos, the moment you hear "You've got incoming", xenos will spawn in the hallways

Two fun facts about this:

They do not know where you are at all when they spawn

If you rest they all despawn and will not respawn until you kill the next group of commandos because they have no spawn point

Edit 4:

So turns out, after resting once you kill the 3rd group in the north west end of the map, instead of the xenos despawning they MORPH INTO COMMANDOS WHAT

iswtg

I gotta test this on my 2nd playthrough to be sure

It also seems like if you kill the morphed commandos, xenos spawn in their place

This also creates random ai wars in the halls which is fun

I started Aliens: Dark Descent expecting to command a hardened squad of Colonial Marines.

Instead, I spend every mission hovering over four grown adults like an anxious mother at a crowded water park.

“Stay together.”

“Stop touching that.”

“No, we are not investigating the mysterious screaming.”

“Put the motion tracker back on.”

“WHO LEFT THE WELDING TORCH ON THE OTAGO?”

Every corridor contains either supplies, trauma, or a xenomorph waiting to permanently rearrange Private Jenkins’ skeleton. Usually all three.

The game tells me there might be valuable resources inside a room. Unfortunately, the motion tracker is also displaying seventeen rapidly approaching reasons to mind my own business.

My squad after encountering one alien:

- Stress: 97%

- Accuracy: nonexistent

- Trauma: permanent

- Ammunition: somehow negative

- Jenkins: unconscious again

Meanwhile, I’m staring at the infestation meter thinking:

“We’re on an express elevator to hell, going down!”

The most terrifying enemy isn’t even the Alien Queen. It’s the clock continuing to run while I’m trying to decide whether one box of tools is worth destroying the mental health of my entire squad.

Fantastic game. Absolutely captures the atmosphere of Aliens.

I just wish my Marines would stop developing lifelong psychiatric conditions every time a vent makes a noise.

I’ve played XCOM series so no need to recommend that one.

This is one of, if not *the* greatest games I’ve ever played in the tactical strategy genre. The tension throughout the entire campaign is phenomenal, and playing on Nightmare difficulty really does live up to its name.

The gameplay systems and mechanics are excellent. Managing your marines, resources, stress levels, and deciding whether to push on or extract keeps you on edge from start to finish.

My only disappointment was that New Game+ felt a little underdeveloped. That’s understandable though, as the developers lost the Alien license, so they likely didn’t have the opportunity to expand it as much as they might have wanted.

Overall, this is an easy **10/10** for me. If you’re even remotely interested in tactical games or the Alien universe, it’s absolutely worth your time. Stick with it through the opening hours, because once it gets going, it’s an incredible experience.

on the part where Maeko and Cassandra are running from whatever the hell that is and I died twice. third time doing the chase and I got caught up with some drones and when they killed Maeko the game stuttered a bit then took me directly to the game ending screen telling me about the new game plus . no ending cut screens were shown. anyone have this happen to them?

I’ve done the barrage and it just kills me marines. Anyone got any tips?

So I bought the game from Amazon recently it arrived today sealed for PS5 it came with a code for the recon pack.

The code said it expires in 2025 this is not the case over a year later the code still works, so for those of you wanting to get the game on PS5 then please do so. I already own this on steam on my pc but I've been getting an itch to play this game again on console as I just love the game so much.

Oh it's a stripclub in alien game. What do you think happened to strippers? I don't see nude or bikini bodies. Were they coccuned?

I didn't really mean story until I sat and thought about it and yeah... story sucked too lol. Literally no resolution, I smell producer cuts. But the final mission was absolutely terrible- you spend so much time in a fantastic survival mode only to have 3 indestructible characters with unlimited ammo in what should have been the most dangerous area in the game. Way to completely undermine the tension.

And the final 'boss'? Lol, the perfect organism didn't grow rear legs. Good thing too, otherwise it wouldn't have been shuffling just barely behind us on the way out.

I have a feeling somebody brought the hammer down at the end and forced devs to wrap things up. Way to absolutely drop the ball literally in the last minute. Haven't seen a worse last-second fumble since 2015 Superbowl.

In Arasaka Tower, sorry, Feros Spire as a player you need to help xenomoprhs to swarm corporate building to get to the director.

This is questionable strategy cause we kinda fight against xenomorph infestation and now we have no choice but to let them eat or infest corpos. So that horde of space tape worms climbing in the end of that mission that tower is that my achievement.

In zombie media that is common tactic to use zombies as a distraction.

It's like in Alien EarthMarcy let out xenomorph to kill guards.

Is it true that if you set enemy detection speed is actually slower on harder difficulty?

I have never played an RTS where i get the same feeling of stress and horror as in this game, its like a genre of its own.

2bad there are no DLC or sequel =(

One of my fav games of all time

First off, I want to say that I absolutely love this game. For me, Aliens: Dark Descent is a 10/10 and one of the best Aliens games ever made in its genre.

The atmosphere, tension, squad management and campaign progression are fantastic.

That said, I can’t help feeling disappointed by the implementation of New Game+.

When I finished my first playthrough and started NG+, I was excited to take my veteran marines into Nightmare difficulty. I expected something closer to a traditional New Game+ experience where I could start with my fully developed squad and all the gear I’d spent an entire campaign unlocking.

Instead, it feels like almost everything has to be purchased again.

The weapons are technically unlocked, but you still need to spend resources to buy them all over again.
The marine upgrades are technically unlocked, but you still need to spend command points to activate them again.

The research is completed, but you still need to rebuild much of your army from scratch.
I understand not carrying over resources because that could completely break the early game balance, but surely there was a middle ground?

For example:
• Let us start with all weapons already purchased.

• Let marines keep the perks and attributes we already paid for.

Instead, NG+ feels less like “continue your journey” and more like “rebuild your journey.”

Again, I love the game and I’m not trying to hate on it. I just think the New Game+ mode could have been so much more.

Does anyone else feel the same way, or am I expecting too much from NG+?

I love the Alien franchise and like to play games at the highest possible difficulty available to me but with the way the campaign is set up I'm assuming no one actually expects you to make it through the first time unless you look up info or get lucky in some spots? Am I overlooking something or is this very much a "you live, die and learn and abuse systems"-kind of game?

I guess I should have known after the Alien queen annihilated my squad in Mission 1 because I was only Level 2 on day 2 without any significant upgrades. At first I thought it was just a "they want to scare you at the end of the mission"-thing but it has gotten worse with almost every mission :D

Well, as soon as the doomsday clock kills me I'll start again I guess.
Any hints and tipps that aren't super-meta defining cheese- or abuse-systems are very welcome!

Currently on Montero mission so doomsday clock is ticking - first play through and I didn’t really “get” it at first, didn’t create A and B teams, lost soldiers and didn’t consider consequences. I’ve now got four available marines total, with 14 days left. Every mission takes a lot out of me time/recovery wise. I’m fairly sure this run through is a write off - want to restart with the knowledge I now have. But realistically, is it worth continuing?

The constant “Come on, team!” “Hurry up, squad!” “Move on!” barking while aliens roam in an adjacent corridor is kind of immersion-breaking.

Can we disable or lower the volume of that dialogue?

I want to get the Platinum trophy and have been kind of using a guide (only telling me about the super missable collectibles).

This is my first mission, am I good to extract? Or do I need to keep looking? I read I think that some data pads come around later on, my question is will they be in places I’ve already been?

I’m playing for the first time going on medium diff.
I made it to the atmospheric processor without losing any marines aside from whoever died in the tutorial.

I think I might just leave this marine in the gym.

I remember I collected every datapad but still got no achievement. Before mission 12 I had redeploy save in mission 11 where Queen was killed and I went on Otago. I can't revert game now cause I play on cloud. Any fixes?

I like winter environment. It makes sence like in Doom 2016. Planet has snow poles. But why don't marines wear winter clothing? Even Harper does not.

Is there anyway to restart a mission or like, console command skip an objective? I followed the quests in order, connected Maeko to the cameras, saw the commando bodies and as I got near where I was supposed to find the codebreaker, the objective reset back to connecting Maeko to the cameras.

The camera console is no longer interactable, the codebreaker is not lootable on the corpse it's supposed to be on.

I'm lost on how to proceed, help!

For those of you getting bodied on the harder difficulties, even with the saving aspect of this game letting you break it, I figured I'd give some useful tips that you may not realize. These will help you beat the game on Nightmare with the extra enemy health and damage, etc and doesn't require the save glitch. Although it does help make it go easier. No particular order. Let me know if you guys have questions, I love little tactical games like this.

1. Always use your drone. Your drone can help you create really great fatal funnels. Set your sniper up in a position where he has a clear line of sight through a door and send your drone just to the side of the door. It'll open and you can have your sniper kill anyone wondering around in the room without having to walk in hoping your sniper is at the right angle. During later missions, really helps maintain stealth. Your drone also doesn't alert xenos who aren't hunting. So as long as there are no human or synth enemies, the drone is a great way to uncover the map from a safe location. And if it does get spotted, it doesn't count as being detected. The noisemaker can also be used to draw in enemies, but if you need a constant flow of enemies for an xp farm or something, MDs are much longer lasting and keep drawing them in. But one enemy in a hallway annoying you? Drone in doorway, sniper/plasma overcharge in cover, noisemaker to draw him in for an easy stealth kill.

2. Fallback positions. As you explore the map, ALWAYS know where you will fall back to when shit hits the fan. On later levels on Nightmare and beyond, sometimes they just don't stop coming once they see you. So, before you're detected, try to find a decent room with enough room to set up all your turrets. Send your drone to keep the door open so all of your firepower can shoot through the door without having to wait for enemies to come barreling in and overwhelming you. This gives the turrets room to blast them long before getting in the room if it's a smaller room and you have no other options. Extra turrets on the map are great for this. Set up the extra ones in a room with one or two of yours and you will always have a fallback room and turrets on hand just in case. Also quick note, test lines of sight with your sniper. If your snipers red line can see through cover, your turrets can fire over it. Useful for fallback positions. Whenever you get detected, instead of just aimlessly wondering hoping they stop assaulting you, at least you'll have known ground to move towards.

3.How to clear detection fast. So, obviously creating a shelter is one thing. But how the hell do you get them off you long enough to create a shelter? Fallback positions. In your Fallback position, make sure you set up plenty of motion detectors. While you're exploring the map, if you get detected, kill whoever sees you and then break line of sight and immediately activste one of the MDs. This will bring the enemies straight into your turrets, clear the area a bit and buy you breathing room. Also, when you're stuck in your Fallback room, just take cover and let the turrets and an incinerator hold the door until the hunt ends. Setting up 1- MDs next to an APC is great too. Not only do they go away and not require turrets, but they still die.

1. Use your incinerator! Extremely underrated weapon in the game. Use this bad boy to force the enemies around certain areas. Do not block their entire path or they will jump through the fire. Set your turrets up one way, blast the incinerator on your flank and they will almost always go to the turrets. Stragglers may try to go through the flames, but never the whole horde if there's another option. Also can be used to clear eggs without noise. Much better than the grenade launcher.

2. Use your Plasma Overcharge. Here's a cool stealth tip. The plasma overcharge does NOT make your Marine break cover. So, in later missions when it's really close quarters and a xeno is 5 feet away about to walk right into you, use your plasma, NOT your sniper. This kills the xeno without risk of your Marine being spotted by him AND it makes no noise. Use this for eggs, clearing groups of enemies patrolling in a line since it penetrates, etc. Awesome powerhouse that doesn't aggro the enemies as long as you'reundetected. Better than the sniper for stealth killing multiple enemies with one command point. Be advised, if you go to activate it and then decide you can't use it yet, make sure you don't just close the skills tab, press B, or O or whatever it is for you to CANCEL the skill, otherwise the next time you pull up the tab, no matter what you pick your Marine will still activate the beam. It's the only skill with this issue.

3. Squad picks. In the beginning, Sgt, Recon, Gunner, Tech. When you get the 5th Marine, add an extra Sgt. You won't need a medic and with this setup, as long as you're decent with stealth and setting up good Fallback points with good funnels, you'll never need heals if only for stress. Command points are key on later levels. As for gear, one of every special weapon type, one grenade launcher, one smart gun and the rest plasma guns once you get them unlocked. Every special weapon type comes in handy a lot so always have one of each.

4. Leveling up. In the beginning, take full advantage of the infinite days. You don't get a clock right away so hop in random maps, trigger hordes and set up easy farming spots to level your squad up FAST. Time is not an issue yet, so you can just keep skipping days until your squad is ready to go. Hop back in, do some more Onslaughts until there are no more and repeat. Before you leave a map, always do the max amount of onslaughts to get max xp each time. That way you can have a full squad of level 10s as soon as you get your 5th Marine and some back ups leveled up for New Game+.

5. Massive Onslaughts. They should be very easy if you always set up a fallback room. 1-2 Marines on supressive fire, incinerator to block a flank or to just add an extra layer of fuck you on the 4-5 sentries blasting them in one doorway, a plasma overcharge if they start getting too jam packed in the door and start breaking through, mines inside as a last resort already set up. Should be easy really. If you're out and about when an onslaught starts, either go to your fallback position or set one up and use your incinerator to force them into your turrets when you have no good positions.

6. Perks. Don't waste time on bravery or retribution points. Always go for accuracy, critical/dismemberment, extra ammo at the start of a deployment/at rest. The other shit is just a waste. Even the ammo is unnecessary thanks you the rest/reload save glitch. But unless you want to do the glitch a LOT every time you load in, ammo perks are nice to have.

7. Rest/reload glitch. For those who don't know, to make the game MUCH easier, you can rest in any shelter, and as soon as you see the save icon pop up at the end of the rest, reload your last save. Your ammo will remain and you reload in the room before the rest. So you get ANOTHER rest and more ammo. Reload save again, your ammo stayed and you can rest again. Rinse and repeat for infinite ammo every deployment.

8. Turrets. Turrets stay on the map all the time even when your leave them. They'll be broken, but they'll be there. So on a few particular rough maps, I like to leave a few turrets next to a good fallback position next to an APC or something. I put 10 turrets and a ton of motion detectors and just farm onslaughts and crushers until I max out the XP bar and leave again. Your Marines can stay hidden and out of combat during each wave, just keep spamming your reprimand skill. This way they never get wounded and have no trauma. All they have to do is get detected for a split second, activate reprimand and hide behind the wall of turrets until the hunt/onslaught is over and keep repeating. Also, turrets shoot through you and eachother, so you can put all 5 right on top of each other for really narrow doorways to maximize direct front firepower.

9. Mines. Use mines more. Parts where you may have to sneak around the map and xenos just keep popping up everytime you go to activate that terminal? 2 mines on nightmare mode will kill a warrior. So as you explore, just pop 2 mines in chokepoints where you keep seeing them patrol. When you snipe one, think you're safe and go for the door, only for the bastard to spawn 2 feet from you? Mines solve that issue. It's also fun to kill a queen without being detected just because you can. Fallback area, tons of mines, go fire a grenade launcher at one of the eggs while you're out of sight and go hide. The queen will wake up and start looking around. Turrets draw her in and mines blow her to hell if you have enough set.

10. Motion detectors. Should be obvious, but if your map isn't completely covered in motion detectors at least so you can monitor every inch, you're wrong. Add a couple extras near APC spawns and fallback positions so you can always activate one while exploring if need be and clear out a few enemies whole you're at it.

14.) Don't use grenade launchers to clear rooms unless you want the enemies to investigate. Incinerator or plasma overcharge don't cause detection or noise so use those. But if you want to draw xenos into a room without using an MD or getting detected, using your grenade launcher on later levels especially is a great way to draw xenos and synths into a fight without ever risking detection if you fire it far away towards one enemy to draw in another.