Development Journal - ALIENS
I was hired by Gearbox Software to take over Syd Mead’s workload on the game when his contract expired. This was both a thrill and intimidating because I needed to continue the aesthetic created at the time of the film (mid-1980s vision of the future) and carry that forward for this project.
The game is a direct sequel to James Cameron’s 1986 film. We return to LV-427 and find, to no one’s surprise, that the colony somehow survived a thermo-nuclear blast and continues to be overrun with xenomorph aliens.
[main project page]
Using the ample photos from the live-action sets and visual fx models provided by 20th Century [Fox], I explored what the landscape and surviving architecture would look like. Much of the model work was heavily obscured in the film with dim lighting and atmospherics, so part of my job was to develop new props and environments that matched the high-level of detail the effects artists put into those models.
AND COLONIAL MARINE HARDWARE
My initial assignments were to flesh out some of the sketches that Syd had come up with early on for the interior of the Sulaco, beyond what he created for the film. I maintained most of his aesthetic for the remainder of the colonial marine hardware so that there would be consistent design language.
For many designs, I directly referenced some of his older sketches and the newer material he created for the game. From there it was a quick extrapolation to create something new.
BOARDING SHIP
For this ship, I again stayed as close as I could to the functional military aesthetic while leaning in on Syd’s Sulaco design. The ship’s base inspiration was primarily a lamprey as its purpose was to board a host ship externally. Always turn to nature first…
MOBILE LABS
In the course of the game, the player encounters mobile labs sent by the nefarious corporation that are instantly set up to research the alien critters. These had to be modular in design to maximize variety, so there was a symmetrical base that could be augmented with external detail.
HEAVY-LIFT SHIP
To maintain a consistent design language with the film, I heavily referenced both the film designs and real-world military equipment to add a grounded level of detail. I drew inspiration from the giant Sikorsky Sea Dragon helicopters favored by the US Marines (Camerron’s favorite military branch) and then scaled that monster up to the size of a small jumbo jet so that it could carry its large cargo.
My thinking of the designs for the game was to reference real-world aeronautical companies which have contracts with a variety of clientele. The logic here was that Weyland-Yutani owns both military and commercial ship manufacturers, so there would be a cross-over in the form language of the ship designs to offset production costs.
FASTER-THAN-LIGHT (FTL) SHIP
One of my tasks was to design an original ship that would be a locale for part of the final act of the game. It was to be a flagship for Mr. Weyland (which was voiced and modeled after Lance Henriksen who played the android Bishop in the film (we were referencing the initial Alien trilogy timeline. Pre-Prometheus).
Due to time constraints of the production schedule, I was only able to land some marker sketches and a SketchUp model to establish proportions before I handed it off to the modeler to create the in-game asset.
