Alien: Isolation performs extremely well across a wide swath of GPUs, which many times means the graphics are subpar, but that is not the case here. This game is a showroom of DX11 efficiency; Watch Dogs eat your heart out. We haven't seen the likes of this much attention to detail using DX11 on the PC in a very long time. We hope to see more titles focus on this. Less console-itis please.

While we mostly have positive things to say about Alien: Isolation, there are a few negatives. The one "downside" to games that perform this well is that it doesn't push the need for a faster GPU. That said it is great to see more mainstream GPU owners getting to sample high end graphics quality gameplay. While the image quality is quite good, there are a couple of things we'd like to see added. More dynamic shadows please; the shadows in the game seem somewhat pre-baked. More dynamic shadows in Alien: Isolation would go a long ways to making the game even more dramatic and compelling. It would be great for at least high end GPU owners to turn on better levels of detail to even further push the game's immersion factor.

We very much need more AA options in Alien: Isolation. The performance is there for a SMAA "4TX" option. We know SMAA 4X exists, Crysis 3 has it and that's an aging title. Finally, we would like to see a high resolution texture pack for PC gamers, or an option to run uncompressed textures. The performance is there, the technology is there, with BC7 compression we would love to see a high resolution DLC texture pack for this game. Add these few things, and visually the game will be much more engrossing.

All of this should explain to you why we are not going to be adding Alien: Isolation to our gaming suite. $200 video cards are plenty powerful enough to play this game at 1440p. At 1080p resolution you can even game with $150 video cards and still play at maximum settings. There is no need to spend $350+ on a video card for Alien: Isolation, unless you are a 4K gamer. At 4K a high-end card will do just fine, but for the majority of people a $200-250 video card is sufficient. We think that Alien: Isolation is a template that other game designers should take notice of. We love the use of open technologies based on DirectCompute and the absence of proprietary technologies that make Alien: Isolation truly a great title. Team Green and game devs please take notice of this, as this is what pushes the gaming industry forward as a whole. And that is simply good for all of us.