HIVESEEKER'S

ALIEN TRILOGY

STRATEGY GUIDE

For the Sony^® PlayStation^TM

(Sega^TM Saturn^TM version similar--CODES available)

(PC version similar--DEMO, CODES, and some TECHNICAL SUPPORT available)

>>> STRATEGY GUIDE VERSION 6.0 <<<

Your breath comes in ragged gasps as you approach the next corridor. You grip your pulse rifle closer to your chest. That last group of warriors almost ended it for you . . . and that facehugger managed to get far too close! You push these thoughts from your mind and press forward, forcing yourself to continue for what you know will seem like another eternity. But you don't dare stop. You must move on, and above all, you must not allow them to take you alive . . .

This is Alien Trilogy, one of the few games to ever elicit genuine fear from my pounding heart. If you like first-person shooters, this game is good. If you are a fan of the Alien movies, this game comes closer to putting you in the thick of the action than any other console game available. Brought to us by Acclaim and Fox Interactive, this is one game that actually manages to capture the dark atmosphere of the films it is based on.

This criteria applies only to games that are based on a pre-existing concept (such as a movie, book, or television show), and this is where Alien Trilogy truly shines. There are a host of authentic artifacts from the movies: the space jockey from Alien (with chestburster opening correctly placed on the right side of the body--something missing from the graphically advanced PC game Aliens vs. Predator!), the APC from Aliens, and the crashed EEV from Alien 3 are just for starters. All the weapons are movie-authentic, and so are most of the enemies. In fact, the only missing enemy is the queen chestburster from Alien 3. There are also lots of little things that show good attention to detail--the company synthetics, for example, have white blood! Any Alien fan with a sharp eye will not be disappointed!

The levels are each, for the most part, quite unique. This is one game that doesn't leave you with that "I've done this one before" feeling. There are lifts, drops, moving walls, ramps, slides, pools, stairs, switches, secret rooms, and hidden powerups: plenty of diversity for making each level different. The glaring exceptions, and the primary reason for a sub-par score, are the identical powerup and almost-identical PILOT'S CHAMBER levels scattered throughout the game. With the PILOT'S CHAMBER levels, however, you are returning to the same location to gain access to a new part of the boneship, so this repetitiveness is somewhat offset by the storyline. The environments of Alien Trilogy showcase some nifty 3-D touches, as well. Kill an alien on a ramp or stairs, for example, and it slides down! Facehuggers jump down off crates and tables, young dog aliens run across beds before dropping onto the floor, and warriors hop up onto railings or tables as they scurry after you. Overall, the levels are original and convincingly recreate the settings of the movies.

Unfortunately, this is the one area in which this otherwise-excellent game actually manages to fall short. While the environments look good, the enemies are very pixellated, especially if you have already played Alien vs. Predator for the Atari^® Jaguar^TM. After the first time you get facehugged by the pixellated mass in Alien Trilogy, you may decide that having a chestburster pop out of you a few days later is not the worst part of the experience! There should have been a noticeable improvement in the PlayStation's^TM xenomorphs, but there isn't. While you do get side and rear views of your enemies (unlike in Alien vs. Predator), a dead enemy always looks the same no matter what angle you view it from. [By the way, you might still be able to find a Jaguar^TM system PLUS Alien vs. Predator for less than you might pay for a Nintendo^® 64 cart alone if you can find a store that has both items in stock and on clearance--try Toys R Us, Electronics Boutique, or even search the eBay online auction site. If you are an Alien or Predator fan, it might be worth your money just to play that one game, particularly now that Fox Interactive recently delayed--and possibly cancelled--work on Aliens vs. Predator for the PlayStation^TM.] On the other hand, the animated sequences throughout the game are superb and fit right in with the very plausible storyline. There are also some pretty cool death animations--make sure you die them all! (The way-cool death animations could only have been better if there had been more of them: dying by a chestburster or facehugger gives the same ending, as does dying by falling, acid burns, steam vents, exploding barrels, fire jets, or hot grates.) In the end, the other merits of Alien Trilogy help compensate for the graphics, making this a game that is still very definitely worth a look.

This game has good sound and excellent music. Many sound effects, particularly weapons fire, were reportedly sampled directly from the movies. The music is superb and lends a great deal to the eerie atmosphere and excitement of the game (if you don't agree, then you might try putting one of the movie soundtracks into the PlayStation^TM after the game has loaded; just remember to swap again before loading another level). Good as the music is, however, points get docked because the same tracks are played repetetively on different levels. More originality for the background music (as well as some of the alien sounds) would have resulted in a higher score here.

The control in this game is dead-on, and movement is smooth and precise. The only real complaint is that your character will stop completely (rather than sliding) when moving or sidestepping too close to walls. This is especially annoying when backpedaling from approaching aliens. The other problems are extremely minor. Being able to toggle an "Always Run" option on would have saved me from holding down the "Run" button for the entire game. And while more gameplay variety is added by being able to look (and shoot) up or down, the ability to jump is noticeably absent. With all the walls, towers, catwalks, and lifts that you traverse, jumping could have added a great deal of depth to the gameplay, as well as a way to avoid alien acid on the floor. While very few other games at the time offered a fully customizable control scheme, this would also have been a nice touch. But the bottom line is that Alien Trilogy allows you to move precisely and accurately with no guesswork at all.

This score is not a mathematical permutation of the numbers above, but a simple measure of how much fun Alien Trilogy is to actually play. Factored into this is replay value--i.e., how likely you are to play the game again once you have beaten it. On the minus side, there are always the same number of enemies, regardless of difficulty setting, and they are always in the same place. In Alien vs. Predator, most enemies (as well as many powerups) are redistributed every time you reload the game. This really increases the challenge and suspense of the gameplay (although in Alien Trilogy, knowing where each bad guy will rear his [or her] ugly head does allow you to master each level more quickly). On the plus side, the HARD difficulty setting makes your gameplay strategy entirely different (due to reviving enemies), and anyone who has defeated the game on the EASY or MEDIUM settings has not yet experienced the true challenge of Alien Trilogy. This challenge should keep most gamers coming back for a long time. In the end, in spite of some faults, and in spite of the bumper crop of newer and smoother shooters available, Alien Trilogy remains one of the finest movie licenses around and the very best console game yet for Alien fans. HIVESEEKER gives Alien Trilogy an 8 out of 10.

This may seem a bit early to begin discussing difficulty levels, but you will soon find that the HARD difficulty setting can make a tremendous difference in how you will plan your entire game strategy. After hundreds of hours of gameplay, it seems to me that the changes in difficulty are NOT accomplished by increasing the number of enemies, their damage to you (except for acid), or the number of hits required for a kill. What sets each difficulty level apart is presented below. Although my instruction manual shows a difficulty level of "EASY" in one screenshot, the names for the different settings in my version of the game are more creative:

1. ACID REIGN (= EASY) -- Contrary to this level's moniker, the acid from dead or expiring aliens will NOT hurt you at this setting. You can see your weapon's shots just like tracers, making aiming much easier. Similarly, you can also see enemy fire directed at you, making dodging bullets quite a bit easier. Dead aliens stay that way--you can leave powerups behind until you need them, then retrace your steps to grab the required item without consequences. This lets you maximize your health, armor, and ammunition.

2. RAGING TERROR (= MEDIUM) -- The ONLY difference here, as far as I could detect, is that the alien acid will burn you. Acid will spray onto you from aliens being shot at close range and you must be careful to avoid walking over any alien cadavers. This level adds some challenge but still lets you explore freely after dispatching all the bad guys.

3. XENOMANIA (= HARD) -- Playing at this difficulty can discourage additional exploration! Dead enemies come back to life if you leave and then re-approach their corpses (except for eggs and the 3 queens). After playing a particular level several times, you will learn exactly where and when the dead enemies you left behind are reactivated as you retrace your steps, and you will learn how to avoid reawakening more foes than necessary. Sometimes you can even see the "dead" body sliding along the floor (or up or down stairs or ramps!) at you before popping up for a renewed attack. Watch out: if you step in the spot where a resurrected alien corpse WAS lying, you will receive an acid burn even though you can't see anything to let you know it is there! I don't know if this was intentional or not. One plus is that human enemies that yield powerups upon termination will bring fresh goodies back from the dead with them. To permanently eliminate an enemy takes a DIRECT hit (no carcass left) with a pulse rifle grenade or seismic charge. There are numerous areas where you will definitely want to eliminate any chance of certain enemies coming back for you. On this difficulty level, you will need to weigh the value of grabbing a particular powerup or ammo when you first see it against the number of enemies you will have to re-kill if you choose to go back for it later. You cannot see your weapon's shots, making aiming, especially at longer ranges with the pulse rifle, much more difficult. Enemy bullets are now invisible, also, making dodging them a real trick.

Level passwords are 32 digits long! Sony^® succeeded in selling me my very first memory card this way. If you don't own one yet, you'll want one real soon. If your PlayStation^TM is like mine, it will recognize the card if you insert it immediately after initial boot-up or at the Options menu (the Memory Card Management option lights up when you do so), but not in between. After this, the system will continue recognizing the card until shutdown.

[NOTE: HIVESEEKER STRONGLY recommends that you format any memory card before saving games to it! Most of the memory card problems I have encountered have been eliminated by formatting. Alien Trilogy just so happens to be one of the few PlayStation^TM games that offers this option (at the Memory Card Management screen). Make sure that you do not have any important save files on a card prior to formatting it, as all data is erased from the memory card during the process.]

The MISSION ASSESSMENT screen comes up after completion of most levels. The exceptions are all of the timed powerup levels (which contain secrets but no aliens and no real mission outside of grabbing as much as you can get before the clock runs out), and the PILOT'S CHAMBERS levels in the third stage of the game. It is a definite challenge to complete each level with a 100% in each category. Rise to this challenge and go for it!

1. ALIENS -- Getting 100% on this one can be pretty hard at times. Levels with lots of enemies (such as the queens' lairs) can be hard to complete without missing a critter or two. On other levels, once you reach a specific location during play, an enemy will materialize somewhere else in the level where you have already been. You will have to go back and kill it to get full credit. Some of you might not insist on getting a perfect score here every time. But hey, you saw the movies--do you really want to leave any behind?

2. SECRETS -- Some secrets took me quite a while to figure out. Most are opened by seismic charges or grenades, some by switches, some by the Action button (just like a door or switch), some by weapons fire, and some--lifts--by blowing crates or barrels sitting on them. On a few levels, you may have to open the secrets in a very particular order to get full credit. For some reason, exploring every secret area in the "wrong" order may result in a deficient score. You might be able to tell how many secrets you have missed by your score: a 75% suggests 3 out of 4, while a 66% may indicate that 2 out of 3 (or even 4 out of 6) secrets have been discovered. Your auto-map is indispensable for finding secrets (usually a bright green line will indicate a secret wall or door). Another big hint is blips on your motion tracker (usually accompanied by alien sounds) on the other side of a wall.

3. MISSION -- One nice thing about Alien Trilogy is that it is more than just a shoot-'em-up. On each level, you have specific goals. True, those goals often involve killing all the enemies, but there are enough other mission objectives to make things interesting. If you have trouble hitting the top of the scale here, review your mission and then make sure you find all the secrets, kill all enemies encountered, activate all switches, grab all pickups, and blow all crates and barrels.

This one's in the instruction manual and is extremely convenient for console gamers who want to restart a level, but merits mention because the option is easy to overlook. To exit your current game without having to kill yourself (by standing in acid, letting a warrior beat on you, or lobbing seismic charges at objects in close proximity) or--worse yet--actually getting up to hit the Reset button on your console, do the following: at the in-game pause screen choose OPTIONS and then select EXIT GAME. When the ARE YOU SURE? prompt appears, joypad left or right to toggle between YES and NO prior to making your departure. You may find yourself using this option quite a bit once you reach the more difficult levels.

DISCLAIMER: This site neither condones nor condemns the legal purchase and use of commercially-available emulators. Individual gamers must decide whether or not a product, even if legally available, violates the property rights of the system it emulates. The purpose of this section is only to provide public information already available elsewhere regarding Alien Trilogy alone.

The Connectix Virtual Game Station^TM (for Macintosh), a PlayStation^TM emulator, is reportedly capable of playing Alien Trilogy. I have been unable to confirm this, but am aware of reports that even with the latest update this game will not run. You can visit Connectix to download their latest Virtual Game Station^TM update at http://www.virtualgamestation.com/. Upcoming patches may eliminate this reported conflict.

Currently, the bleem!^TM PlayStation^TM emulator (for PC) is unable to play Alien Trilogy. Bleem is, however, providing free software upgrades for their product on a very regular basis. You can download updates from their site at http://207.71.8.31/. You can also vote for Alien Trilogy as a game that you would like to see work with bleem!^TM at http://207.71.8.31/gamesurvey/gameform.html (please do not spam this site if you wish your vote to be taken seriously). It is possible that future updates may make Alien Trilogy playable with this product.

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USE THE REMOTE UPLINK BELOW TO ACCESS THE REQUIRED DATA

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IMPORTANT NOTES ON THE LEVEL WALK-THROUGHS

For a PRINT-ME version of these Walk-Through Notes only (black text on white background) CLICK HERE.

1. Spoiler alert! Alien Trilogy is a game loaded with secrets. In addition, there are many nuances to the gameplay itself. Both facets of this experience may take days to uncover and weeks to master. While not all gamers may be this determined, to maximize your enjoyment I would modestly suggest giving each level in Alien Trilogy a thorough workout before defaulting to the pertinent walk-through. And be sure to take time to admire the cryotubes along the way . . .

2. These walk-throughs stand alone. Even though maps are available for each level, these walk-throughs are detailed enough in their directions and in descriptions of locations to function independently of the maps. The maps, however, do make navigation significantly easier (and often more efficient) and are highly recommended.

3. These walk-throughs are all written for the HARD difficulty setting. They will minimize backtracking in order to avoid reactivating previously-killed enemies. They may occasionally tell you to lead enemies to places where you can kill them and avoid reactivating them later in the game; ignore this on the EASY and MEDIUM settings. On these easier settings, you will want to retrace your steps to maximize ammo, health, and armor by using them when you really need them instead of when you find them. For example, if your armor is already at 92, don't grab that acid vest just yet--kill enemies until your armor is running low and then back up and get it. I have given the most efficient route I found (in terms of picking up powerups when most needed while at the same time reawakening the fewest enemies) for completing each level, although in many cases going in a different direction first was just as good. I assume on many levels that you already have ammunition (particularly seismic charges and grenades) stockpiled from previous levels; if you run out of these prematurely, you will have to rearrange your route to grab the powerups available on that level before they are needed. Without previously-acquired explosives, you may also have to settle for re-killing enemies that revive because they weren't explosively incinerated the first time they were encountered.

4. These walk-throughs are extremely detailed and many are QUITE long. While some may find them a little tedious to wade through, nearly any problem that might be encountered while playing the game will be covered. Unless you are simply checking the location of a secret or two, it will be easiest to print out a copy of the PRINT-ME VERSION of each of the three walk-through parts (via the link at the top of each section) or of individual levels (via the link immediately below each level title) and work from a printout. Attempting to print directly from any non-PRINT-ME web pages may result in either no apparent printout (your printer will "print" white text on white paper) or costly white text on black background printing!

5. There are a number of SEQUENCE-RELATED BUGS in this game. On certain levels, for example, if you do not explore the secrets in a very specific order you will receive less than 100% for SECRETS. This particular SECRETS-related bug is fixed in ALL the walk-throughs presented here. However, on other levels you may need to kill the aliens or acquire certain powerups in a particular order to score 100% for ALIENS and for MISSION, respectively. These ALIENS- and MISSION-related bugs are more difficult to account for. The reason for this is that these walk-throughs are written (and proofed) for the HARD difficulty setting. If you go through a level on HARD and revive (and re-kill) 10 aliens, you may still score 100% for ALIENS even though you completed the level in the "wrong" order. The additional aliens killed may "mask" the fact that on the EASY or MEDIUM difficulty settings (with no revived enemies) you may receive less than 100% for this category even after actually killing every single alien. MISSION scores may be affected in the same way. If you are collecting ID tags as part of your mission, for example, re-killing 1 or 2 extra ID-carrying humans may provide you with additional ID tags and a 100% score. The same exact route on EASY or MEDIUM settings may leave you deficient, even if every required item is actually retrieved, simply because you collected them in the "wrong" order. Where I have detected this problem at the HARD difficulty setting, I note it in the walk-throughs. However, if you follow the walk-throughs exactly at one of the 2 easier difficulty settings and still come up with deficient scores, alter your route to locate the "correct" sequence.

6. If you have any problems with these walk-throughs (you keep getting lost because the directions aren't clear, you encounter an inaccuracy, you just can't beat a particular group of enemies, etc.), please E-MAIL me to let me know. I want to make any corrections needed to render these walk-throughs accurate and complete.

IMPORTANT NOTES ON THE MAPS

For a PRINT-ME version of these Map Notes only (black text on white background) CLICK HERE.

1. YOU WILL NEED A MAP KEY! CLICK HERE to get it.

2. The circled numbers on each map correspond to the numbered steps in the pertinent walk-through. Note that there may be duplicate numbers on the same map. For example, if you need to activate a particular switch and then run to a timed lift that the switch lowers, the same number may be used to designate both locations. There may also be duplicate numbers to identify different points along the same path, the doorway to a particular room and then the room itself, or alternate paths (only one of which you may have time to explore on some of the timed powerup levels).

3. Powerup locations may be somewhat relative. In order to use a large, easy-to-read font size in the somewhat small and crowded maps, text identifying some powerups has been shifted slightly to accomodate nearby text that designates either other powerups or walk-through sequence numbers. For the same reason, multiple powerups of the same kind and in the same area may be listed together rather than individually (6 derm patches, for example, might be listed as "6R"). Similarly, adjacent powerups may be seperated by a slash rather than spacing in crowded regions of some maps (2 shotshells and 3 derm patches might be shown as "2S/3R"). However, in all cases powerups will always be in the immediate vicinity of the location shown even if they are not in the precise location depicted.

4. Many powerups are located inside crates, lockers, or other containers that must be broken open before the powerups can be obtained. If you reach a location that a map indicates should hold powerups but none are present, shoot open any nearby containers. Note that powerups located in crate barriers that act as walls may be depicted on either or both sides of the barrier as space allows.

5. Maps are not to scale in relation to each other, even in cases where single level maps are divided into 2 parts. While each individual map is itself accurately proportional, it may not be to the same scale as a different map. All maps are sized only to give the largest printed image possible without conflicting with individual printer margin settings.

6. These maps have been ENHANCED! In some locations, particularly those with canals or elevated walkways, even the automap powerup may provide very little detail. These maps have been enhanced to reveal this information, making navigation much easier.

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COMPLETE LEVEL WALK-THROUGHS AND MAPS

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LEVELS 0-11 NUMBERS 111-162 ANALOGOUS TO:

LEVELS 12-21 NUMBERS 211-263 ANALOGOUS TO:

LEVELS 22-34 NUMBERS 311-391 ANALOGOUS TO:

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RANKING

RANK: CARTER BURKE
Exit with under 100 health points.

MEDALS OF HONOR
RANK: ALIEN EGG Exit with 100+ health points.	RANK: FACEHUGGER Exit with 200+ health points.	RANK: CHESTBURSTER Exit with 300+ health points.
RANK: WARRIOR Exit with 400+ health points.	RANK: QUEEN Exit with 500+ health points.	MOTHER OF ALL QUEENS Exit with 600+ health points.

If you have played the PERFECT GAME (NO CODES ALLOWED!), you can actually exit with the following:

(1) The absolute maximum of 647 health points (but 2 derm patches could not be obtained in the provided time on Level 353 [INORGANICS 2], and the nefarious unopenable secret area on Level 371 [DROP LIFTS] may also have contained some derm patches). The 647 health points listed here represent normal play in which all the SECRETS, including one that requires a 5-health-point fall, are explored. The health points listed here also require completing the game without a single facehugging after acquiring the first adrenaline burst!

(2) The full 200 points of body armor. (This is extremely tough to do in that last queen's lair on the HARD difficulty setting due to invisible acid puddles all over the ground from revived facehuggers, not to mention the revived 'huggers themselves, but it IS possible.)

(3) Full ammo counts on ALL weapons, including pulse rifle grenades. (Once again, this will be quite difficult on HARD because in the last queen's lair the only powerup left after exiting the corridors is a single flame thrower canister--you have to kill any revived 'huggers in your path with the flame thrower first and then grab the canister to exit.)

(4) Approximately 90 seismic charges. (This will vary quite a bit, but players at the EASY and MEDIUM settings will have a lot more since they are not using seismic charges to permanently prevent killed enemies from reviving. The flip side is that a HARD player can keep reviving enemies that carry seismic charges to rack up the counters. The 90 charges listed here represent normal play without doing so. An additional factor will be whether pulse rifle grenades or the smartgun were also used in addition to seismic charges for opening secret areas.)

Your task is finally completed, and the tightness in your chest eases. But it still leaves you somewhat disturbed. Victims of facehuggers seldom have any recollection surrounding the event. You are exhausted; can you be certain about your own condition? And in that last queen's lair . . . there were so many of them . . .

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