Game Director at Obsidian Entertainment Josh Sawyer recently revealed on Twitter that he once worked on an Aliens RPG. The tweet which has since gathered significant attention from fans, followers, and industry insiders provides insight on a rather interesting project which unfortunately never saw the light of day.The tweet comes in the context of an ongoing discussion on Twitter about close calls and near misses in the games industry. Sawyer at this point is widely seen as a legendary figure, having worked on games including Icewind Dale, Fallout: New Vegas, Pillars of Eternity, and most recently Pentiment. According to Sawyer, Sega once approached Obsidian about the possibility of creating an RPG based on the iconic science fiction series Aliens.RELATED: Josh Sawyer On Making A Detective Game Where You Never Solve The Case“I got to work on an Aliens RPG for Sega from 2006 to 2009,” Sawyer explained. “Obsidian didn't have directors at that time, just leads who were all considered peers. It resulted in a lot of dysfunction when the leads didn't agree on how to do something.”

The tweet immediately sparked interest among fans of both Aliens and Obsidian, with many wondering what the game would have been like had it been completed. “Progress on the game was very slow, especially when it came to creating workable game levels,” the designer pointed out. “We had another game in development with Sega at the time, Alpha Protocol, and Sega (understandably, in my opinion) shelved Aliens in favor of Alpha Protocol.”

Sawyer didn’t elaborate much on the project, leaving fans to speculate about what could have been. The designer did on the other hand share a couple of screenshots showing a few of the title screens. When it comes to why the project was shelved, Sawyer described how “there were a lot of cool ideas in the works, but you don't ship ideas! The biggest lesson I learned from the experience is that if you don't have playable levels, you don't have much of a game.”

Aliens in fact has a long history in the world of games, with titles ranging from the classic Aliens vs. Predator to the survival game Alien: Isolation, but an RPG would have been a welcome addition to the series, offering players a chance to explore this unique universe in a new and immersive way. Some of the gameplay concepts however turned up in Aliens: Fireteam Elite. “The overall setup was similar,” Sawyer noted. “Small team, third person, with an emphasis on deployables and support actions. The similarities ended there, but it was nice to see the idea could actually be fun in practice.”

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