'Alien: Fireteam Elite 2' is a good old-fashioned bug hunt, ironically plagued by bugs
Sometimes, you can just tell when six extra months would've done a game a lot of good, and it's obvious that Fireteam Elite 2 will be in a much better place by spring.
Key points
- It's been 40 years since Aliens first graced the big screen, but Fireteam Elite 2 manages to refresh that mix of horror and action well enough, despite sharing much of its bones with the original game.
- Another glorious day in the Corps (Image credit: Daybreak Game Company) Believe it or not, another colony has fallen prey to the Xenomorphs in Fireteam Elite 2.
- Alien: Romulus (2024) and Alien: Earth (2025) have reestablished the acid-blooded Xenomorphs as bona fide horror icons, while games like Aliens: Dark Descent bet on tense real-time tactics and squad management; Rogue Incursion spooked VR and non-VR players alike; and we even have Isolation 2 's pure survival horror to look forward to.
The first Aliens: Fireteam Elite was among my favorite Alien video games, and there were a lot of reasons to be excited for a sequel.
Rough edges aside, Aliens: Fireteam Elite 2 is a necessary return to mindless shooting and treating the Xenos as a relentless horde, dropping the stalking and slasher-inspired murders in favor of sci-fi shootouts and macho one-liners.
Additional details
- Recent Star Wars games have achieved just that, and even if Fireteam Elite 2 misses some of its shots and has….
- Months later, Aliens: Fireteam Elite 2's debut has been difficult, mostly due to glaring tech issues.
- This isn't first contact; the Marines are more than used to bug hunts by now, which means there's less exposition to cut through before getting to the Xeno-blasting chaos.
- At its best, Aliens: Fireteam Elite 2 understands why James Cameron's masterpiece still holds up.
- Fireteam Elite 2 is smart enough to sidestep fake tension and just hit the ground running.
How this summary was made: extractive summary — built from the sources' own reporting. It is drawn only from the reporting of the sources listed below — read the originals for full detail. How we summarize →
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