Previously we've taken a look at how various NPCs
work off camera, mainly from the Resident Evil series including Jack Baker and Mr X but in this
video we're moving away from Resident Evil to one of my favourite survival horror games to date it is
the awesome Alien Isolation and in this one we'll be taking a look at what that ridiculously scary
Alien gets up to whilst the player is cowering away under a desk or in a corner somewhere. including what happens to the Xenomorph, after it leaves t
he map and also how there can be two
of these things hunting the player down! Which is terrifying to think about and I'll also go into
some brief details about the Alien A.I and how it works. [Music] + [In Game Sound Effects] We're going to start off with our
first proper encounter with the Alien though this is a scripted
event, however just in case you were wondering what happens off camera
when Ripley hides under the desk... Here it is. [In Game Sound Effects] Of course there are plenty m
ore scripted
events that happen throughout the game So I'm not going to be showing all of these
but you'll probably notice one thing a lot of these events have in common. Which is that
the Alien spawns into the scene just before it needs too and then disappears out again just
out of shot from the camera. No surprise there. Though again some of these scripted events
do have some little secrets and differences to how they work, that are worth looking at
so I will show some of these throughou
t the video. [In Game Sound Effects] However I guess what we really want to
know is, what about when the Alien is free to roam around the ship? Well to give a brief explanation,
I'm going to be showing you a program that some of you may have heard of. It is the ultimate modding
tool for Alien Isolation and it's called OpenCAGE. It's been put together by an incredible team
and I'll leave a link to more information in the description. But this tool basically lets us
view the behaviour trees f
or the NPC's and alter their characteristics and difficulty levels and so
much more beyond that too. It's a fantastic tool if you really want to play around with the settings
far beyond what the standard game allows. You may want to learn how to use this. So I'm just going to give a brief explanation about the AI of the Alien before we continue, just so you know what
I'm talking about when I use certain terminology. When the Alien is outside of the vents and could
potentially be seen by the
player, this is what's known as 'front stage'. When the Alien is inside
the vents and the player can no longer see it. The Alien is in what's known as 'backstage' makes
sense right? Now there are two different A.I. systems running at the same time. One being the Director A.I. which constantly knows the player's position and of course the Alien A.I. There is also what's known as the 'Menace' gauge. So as the Director AI knows exactly where the player is at all times it sends the Alien closer to
them. Therefore the Menace gauge increases, however from then it's up to the Alien to to hunt the player down using it's own AI. Once the Menace gauge peaks, so long as
the player hasn't made any silly mistakes like sobbing into the microphone on the Xbox version. The director AI backs off the Alien to a safe distance, lowers the menace gauge and the process starts again! Now that is as deep as I'm going to dive into the AI system because we're here to
look at what the Alien does off camera.
Rather than learn about its AI. Plus there is already
a fantastic video by 'AI and Games' Who explains all of this in much deeper detail than I want to
dive into for this video. So if you'd like to know more about the AI, again,
check out the description for links to his channel. So back to the mission at hand, when front stage as we've seen the Alien
will walk around the map hunting down the player. Sometimes to increase the Menace gauge and
sometimes to back it off and cut the player some
slack. Allowing them to progress. However what
about once it goes backstage? What I've managed to do here, is find the Alien waiting patiently just
outside the map but it doesn't always do this! In these clips I've locked the camera onto the Alien
as it moves around up here, so where the Alien goes the camera follows. And as you can see it seems as
though the Alien traverses around above the map waiting for any reason the player should give it
to drop down out of the vents again. So you rea
lly are never safe from this thing, no matter where
you go during these unscripted segments of the game! [In Game Sound Effects] Now you may also be asking why sometimes
does it disappear when inside the vents. Well, I guess this could be due to making sure
that the Alien's tail or any other body part for that matter, doesn't clip through
the ceiling. Also in various locations,
of course there are windows that the player can see out into space. Therefore it wouldn't be a great idea to have
one of these things
floating around outside in a default pose. It... could... somewhat... break immersion! However when the Alien is within the map or where the map would be loaded, if the player was to move there. The Alien is still visible. [In Game Sound Effects] All right so I just wanted to show
some more of these scripted segments which you may be wondering about how they work
or work the Alien comes from? The first one being when the Alien grabs hold of Dr Kuhlman
and drags him into t
he small Corridor. [In Game Speech] Oh God! One thing to note during this scene, is an
old but gold developer trick that they use to make sure the player doesn't see beyond the
doorway. Which is to have a blackout texture appear just before the door opens. This is also used in various other places, such as the vent openings. [In Game Speech] Oh God! If you thought one Alien was scary enough as it
is, then you may not like this but last of all I just wanted to quickly show you how during one
of the final missions, there is a possibility of having TWO hunting Aliens present in the map at once! Now during a couple of missions, there can be two but usually one or even both of these, are scripted to appear and then walk away. However at this point in Mission 18 both of
these Aliens end up being in the vents above the map and either one is waiting up there to reappear
and pounce, at any given opportunity... Pretty scary stuff! [In Game Sound Effects]
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