4. Alien: The Roleplaying Game (2019)
When I saw the announcement of an Alien RPG, I was dubious. It was designed by Free League, which was a good thing – I tend to like their lightweight, story-first mechanics – but the wider shared universe of the Alien franchise is a mess. There is no denying its appeal, but for every great piece of Alien storytelling in film, comics or videogames, there’s at least one Alien Vs. Predator or Prometheus. With those peaks and valleys, it didn’t seem like a universe I wanted to explore. Yet somehow, the designers managed to cobble together a compelling tapestry of lore that includes references to just about everything (even including the unplayable Aliens Adventure Game from 1991) without being even a little crappy.
It’s also a (terrifying) joy to play. I’ve run the cinematic adventures for a couple of groups of friends. These are tightly scripted stories, featuring pre-generated characters, secret agendas and, thanks to player knowledge about how Alien stories work in film and elsewhere, an incredible sense of tension. This is heightened by a panic mechanic that gives players a small edge while also very likely complicating matters in dramatic fashion. The system has delivered so many memorable moments it is difficult to pick one, but picture this: two characters on a space walk on the hull of a ship, off to fix something. One starts to change and rages out, attacking the other, who tries to shoot them, but panics and misses, dropping the gun, which starts to float off into space. What followed was a series of attempts to retrieve the gun and kill the monsterperson that was foiled repeatedly by failed die rolls and changing panic reactions. When the encounter finally resolved with the monster dead and the player character somehow unharmed, the whole group was out of breath from screaming. And that was just the first act.
