TDG: Alien: Fate of the Nostromo 

The designer himself has a neat suggestion for elimination on bgg. Every time you encounter the Alien take morale damage but then draw an encounter card. If its an Alien card then that character is eliminated then reshuffle. Because of the lost signal card that puts the Alien cards back in the deck, the xenomorph gets more deadly as the game goes on. It certainly adds that missing ingredient for me and the card draws are incredibly tense.

My thoughts EXACTLY about player elimination. But toned it down so that it's not just straight unlucky and you're out. My House Rule: First time: you run away 3 spaces. Second time: you get dragged to the nest (hmmm I wonder why) Third time: You die at the 3rd activation. (Your Chestburster says hi!) 😱😉😬

Mod rule. For alien encounter/surprise attack roll the die: 5-6 flee 3 spaces, 3-4 cocooned in nest with chance of being rescued, 1-2 killed. Equipment gives roll modifiers. Prod +1, flame +2, gun +1.

Agree entirely, with Legendary you're pooping from the first hive card. This one had us laughing as the the alien tried to get us, not in a nasty way, but in a buddy buddy way. I'm fairly sure it's light for exactly that reason, family fun. Theme isn't there. You could do the same thing, insert a large mansion and have a jocular Jason Vorhees on the hunt.

LOL! I love these intros! Thank you for all the content you do... really appreciate the time and effort!

Отличная игра! Полностью с вами согласен, что тут важен настрой. Мы с друзьями, являясь фанатами вселенной, отыграли раз пятнадцать! На четыре игрока, эта игра просто расцвела! Здорово!

House rule combo works with 2+ players, from other suggestions and twist. first encounter run, second encounter run and drop all items you were carrying including scrap, third encounter dragged to nest with alien and you lose 3 turns. Other members of team have those 3 turns to save you from nest, if they do not get to nest by move 3 then you are released with chest burster and die after 3 more moves. We also use the moral tracker and call it a panic tracker. If you reach full panic it initiates self destruct as the crew is a danger to themselves and others.

Ah, thank you Cody for the review!!! I almost bought this game just because of the IP... and that I can't afford the one I really want (Another Glorious Day in the Corps). I didn't realize there was no player elimination. Disappointing, to be sure. I do see some house rules below from other commenters to change that, so I still might get this one eventually. Love the minis. Anywho, thanks again!

Brilliant review Cody, thanks, and especially for articulating the same problem I have with the title: there is a huge ludo-narrative disconnect between the xenomorph getting onto the same space as the player, and then the player merely running away - this element, just by itself, was sadly enough to turn me off this one. Thanks for the phenomenal reviews and channel, as always.

I have a few different Alien games and I really enjoyed this one as a light "beer and pretzels" game. My family aren't gamers, but they enjoyed this game as well.

I watched your review and I'm putting on my _"Ninja Game Fixer Hat"_ Write out the names of the characters with a unique number from 1 to 5 (or put a number on the bottom of the figure base). Make some numbered chits for the morale spaces, (15 chits numbered 2 to 14 (looks like there's 20 spaces on the track?), leaving the first 4 spaces with no chance to be numbered, (spaces from 20 down to 16 are safe from attack and there's no chit from the final space, "1", since the alien killed y'all), put em in a bag and before game starts draw one for as many player pawns are to be used in the game, and put each numbered chit on the corresponding space on the morale track-these are spots the alien attacks a character. Each time the alien tracker standee lands on a chit, you roll a D6 and the the number rolled shows which character is killed off. If you roll a 6 or the number of a dead character? The character being attacked escapes with their life. Admittedly this would be better for a 2 (playing 2 characters each) or 3 player game, (in a 3 player game, if the person with 1 character to control has theirs eat it, they simply take control of a pawn from a player who has 2). Yeah, there could well be some player elimination but too bad: The alien don't care... and this at least forestalls death from coming too soon in the game. I've never played the game and just found out about it an hour ago but I'd be interested to see if anyone finds this works.

The encounter cards being drawn after every turn is fucking ridiculous. The game lasted only 25 minutes for me and one other player since our morale was run dry with no way to replenish it.

What i do is divide the moral points among the crew. If a crew member runs out of moral points because of a alien encounter then that crew member dies. I always play with all crew members no matter how many players i have.

Components look kind of neat, the box looks very intriguing, but this doesn't feel like an actual Alien game and Nemesis (which isn't the IP) still seems to be the best Alien IP like game (possibly other than the Legendwry deck builder)

Perhaps if each player had it's own separate "morale" ticker?

Personally me and all my buds are huge fans of this game. I understand why they didn't have characters die because then someone has to sit out but the tension is still there with the group health. We have won just as many times as it has gotten us, sometimes on the literal last turn/encounter.

You absolutely nailed it in this review; my thoughts exactly… It’s a real shame, because I absolutely LOVE the “Alien” franchise & have always wanted a thematic game, where the creature stalks & hides among the dark & claustrophobic corridors of the ship, while the various crew members are compelled to split up & traverse the ship in pursuit of various essential goals, with all of the inherent risks, fear & tension that this would entail….. When I saw that this game had been released, I eagerly watched a play though of it on RU-vid & - while it had some commendable features in its favour - the overall “atmosphere” of the game (no jokes about the artificial atmosphere in a spacecraft, please… 😉) was conspicuously lacking, for precisely the reasons you point out… In their understandable decision to avoid the sometimes divisive mechanism of Player Elimination, they eliminated EXACTLY what created the visceral fear & tension of the Movie itself - which any truly serious “Alien” themed game worth its salt, simply HAS to incorporate - if it’s to remain remotely faithful to the seminal Movie upon which it is based. In its present form, I fully agree that it’s more akin to “Horrified” - which is also a fun game based on “Horror” Novels & Movie franchises, but similarly “Horror Light” in terms of any REAL sense of “Horror” or “Danger” (unless one is a very impressionable kid, of course 😊). That said, the two suggested OPTIONAL Rule variant mechanisms mentioned below in the comments section, whereby you can be killed - not only by the Alien, but also by Ash - immediately strike me as an EXCELLENT enhancement to the game, that really would introduce a great deal of much needed tension & suspense - for those who want it - & since the game is not overly long anyway, being eliminated as a crew member wouldn’t be so onerous & you could still have a lot of fun & involvement in the game, rooting for the remaining (& possibly slowly diminishing…) members of your crew & witnessing their close run escape… 😰 or total annihilation… ☠️☠️☠️

I haven't played the game yet, but I agree that the moral tracker was a big "huh?!" for me. You can look up a game form the 80's called "Intruder" by Task Force Games, "Alien: Fate of the Nostromo" reminds me of it. In "Intruder" your crew members can get eliminated and removed from the game by the Alien/Aliens. You can add some house rules from the "Intruder" game to make "Alien: Fate of the Nostromo" more scary and dangerous. There are print and play versions of "Intruder"

Good honest call on the fear factor. The film is a ‘shocker’ narrative and I would expect some fear tension through the character elimination just like the original narrative. I’ll probably test drive before I buy. Big thanks and insightful.

I bought this at Target today for $21. The rules will be guidelines for me, I'll tweak or change to taste. There will be death & carnage! :)

My first thought exactly: an Alien game where you can't be killed by the alien, just run around like disturbed ants? What a letdown.

It's pretty ironic to be honest. Nemesis the boardgame is an "Alien" game all but in name. Now Ravensburger releases an actual Alien game which is basically Alien the boardgame Light Edition. Not only in gameplay, but also in model count (why isn't Ash presented in plastic) and the quality of the cardboard. It seems very thin and flimsy. Granted the game costs about 1,5 times less as Nemesis but still. The thing that bugs me as well is the color of the playboard. The first alien movie was green and black themed and Aliens (second part) was blue and black themed. Being on the topic of the design. Why didn't they go with the '70 Mother design look from the movie. Missed opportunity of you ask me. The character design of the artwork is very beautiful. Glad they didn' 't just copy and past stills from the movie. I'm still picking it up. As you pointed out this is a great "scary" game for family play with an younger audience.

I'm considering buying the game (mainly because its cheap) but put off by the weak game play. I think I might change the rules doing away with the morale countdown and players have to roll a D6 to get higher than the scare number on the Alien encounter card. If they fail the roll the Alien kills them

Nice review. That flaw you mentioned is a catch-22 isn't it. If you have player elimination you have people sitting out for a long time which is not good. When we play Legendary Encounters we usually start again when someone dies. It's not very thematic to do this but at least you dont have someone sitting out for 45 mins. So player elimination is a flawed approach too.

A game based on the Alien IP and doesn't include player elimination doesn't make sense to me as well. I also really like Aliens from upper deck. Thanks for the review.

If you’re a meeple on the board, nobody can hear you scream!

But why could the alien in the movie not see the doppelganger change form ? ...... .. ... ... Because he could 'see no morph'.

The thing about humor, it requires courage to take the risk and put irony out into the ethos. I respect your sense of humor. It goes without saying that I also respect your game reviews, so I won't say it.

I don't think that the lack of player elimination diminishes the game at all. The point of the game is to see if players can complete the objectives and the final mission successfully. If players start getting eliminated to the point that there are so few players left that it would be virtually impossible to complete the objectives or the final mission, I think that would diminish the game. People like to make the comparison between this game and Horrified. In Horrified, the Heroes can be killed but then are just reborn at the Hospital, so in essence they never really die. Yet I've never seen lack of player elimination as a negative for Horrified. Why would it not be a negative for Horrified, but a negative for Alien?

Maybe house rules work

How does this game compare to Nemesis?

This looks fun. I guess I'll find out if it's ACTUALLY fun.

No thank you.

Is it one of those shitty Target exclusive games from Ravensburger they only sell in the US? They pulled a stunt like this with Jurrasic Park - a German boardgame company made an US excusive licenced board game.

This looks like a cool game, I love everything Alien, but have to admit you need to fear factor. This game seems woke to me. Not a fan of the run away mechanism, it just seems out of place and goofy. In the movie, you meet the Alien chances are good its going to end bad for the humans, as it should in the game. Not sure I will get this unless there is a death feature that fits in elegantly.

Doesn’t feel right…

It rubbish game then....

This looks like a rip off of nemesis in terms of gameplay