Originally released in 2019, Free League’s Alien RPG earned widespread acclaim for its innovative approach to the iconic Xenomorph franchise, even picking up a Gold ENnie for Best Game in 2020. Six years later, Free League has listened to community feedback and launched the Evolved Edition, a streamlined update to the original ruleset. Alongside the new Core Rulebook, GM screen, cinematic scenario (Rapture Protocol), and miniatures set, we now have this Boxed Starter Set. So, what’s inside, and is it worth your time? Let’s find out.

First Impressions: What’s in the Box?

The first thing that hits you about this Starter Set is how packed it is. In addition to the abridged rulebook and the introductory adventure Hope’s Last Day, you’ll find:

Here’s the official box contents list:

• Rules booklet with abridged Evolved Edition rules
• Updated edition of the fan-favorite Hope’s Last Day cinematic adventure, expanded into three acts
• A huge double-sided map (format 35 x 22 inches) with one side depicting chartered space in the year 2183 and the other featuring the Hadley’s Hope terraforming colony, known from ALIENS
• Five pre-generated characters to choose from
• Playing cards for gear, combat initiative, personal agendas, and panic responses
• Cardboard tokens for characters and creatures
• Rules reference sheets
• A useful supply dial for keeping track of crucial resources such as air, ammunition, or time
• Ten engraved base dice and ten stress dice, designed specifically for the ALIEN The Roleplaying Game
• A high-quality plastic miniature of a Xenomorph

Bang for your buck? Absolutely.

What’s New in the Evolved Edition?

The Evolved Edition introduces minor rule tweaks and major layout improvements, making the system more accessible without losing its depth. The original game was already excellent—this version feels tighter, cleaner, and much more appealing to RPG newcomers.

Game Modes: Cinematic vs. Campaign

There are two ways to play:

Cinematic Mode: Short, high-stakes stories in the style of classic Alien films. Designed to run over 2–3 sessions with pre-made characters, each with unique motivations and arcs.

Campaign Mode: A longer, traditional RPG experience with player-created characters.

Personally, Cinematic Mode shines brightest. The Alien universe thrives on tension and risk, and in Cinematic play, survival is never guaranteed. That’s the magic.

Core Mechanics: Simple but Brilliant

The abridged 25-page rulebook in this box covers everything you need to get started:

Each player has four attributes: Strength, Agility, Wits, Empathy (rated 1–5). They also have skills, talents, health, resolve, and personal agendas

Whenever a skill check is required, the player rolls the appropriate number of base dice based on the level of the skill being used and its associated attribute. Roll a success on any of these custom dice and you succeed the check.  Makes sense, right? Roll multiple successes and you really succeed, with the adventure text and/or GM determining what else happens. Pretty cool, but still – so far, so straightforward. However, this system’s real selling point is the glorious risk and reward mechanic of the stress dice.

Stress: The Heart of the Game

Stress is a big deal in space, especially when a terrifying xenomorph with concentrated acid blood is hunting you. If you fail any roll (or need/want more successes to achieve the desired outcome), you can choose to “push” your roll. This gives you the opportunity to re-roll any unsuccessful dice, but with the addition of a stress dice to the pool and an increase of 1 to your stress level.  These new stress dice function exactly like the base dice, except for the fact that one of their faces has a facehugger on it which, if rolled, triggers a “stress response”.  This can add penalties to specific skill checks (e.g., -2 to Strength rolls) or cause you to fail the roll immediately.

That’s not all though – because as your stress level increases, you become more susceptible to “panic responses”, which are rolled for when something terrifying happens, like discovering a horrifically mutilated NPC, or coming face to face with a Xeno for the first time. And, given the world we’re playing in, these “panic rolls” can happen quite frequently. Failure on these rolls can lead to anything from becoming frozen in place with fear to going into a frenzy and attacking whoever is closest to you. Fun, right?  So, stress becomes a bit of a balancing act which is, at its heart, the core of this game. More dice in your pool when rolling is always a good thing, and being a little bit stressed is usually beneficial, but get too stressed and you can become a liability to yourself and others.

Personal Agendas: Roleplay with Teeth

I mentioned personal agendas above, and these are a really great addition to the Cinematic game mode. These allow you to earn “Story Points” by effectively playing in character and making decisions and taking actions to further your own agenda.

Each of the pre-made characters has three agenda cards, one for each act of the story, which include key tasks for them to carry out (including things like “go find some guns”, “go find a specific NPC”, or “don’t let on to everyone else that you know exactly what’s happening here”) as well as a general mindset and backstory, frequently including secrets to be kept, which provides a great sense of direction for the players to help shape their RP decisions.

Game Flow: Stealth, Social, Combat

The gameplay is broadly broken into three different stages – stealth mode, social mode, and combat mode. These are all fairly self-explanatory, and the mechanics for stealth are very well implemented, ramping up the tension with frantic searches, desperate attempts to hide yourself amidst clutter, and the ominous “beep, beep, beep” of motion trackers.

Combat is solid, if perhaps a little clunky in places, but certainly flows a lot more smoothly than it did during the original 2019 rules. As you might expect, Xeno combat is high stakes and incredibly challenging depending on what sort of equipment or weaponry you have, which definitely helps to keep the stakes suitably high throughout.

The Game Mother

The DM role here is played by a “Game Mother” (or “Game MU/TH/UR”, I guess?), and features some fairly traditional responsibilities – play the role of everyone and everything the players encounter in the world, describe events, roll dice, etc. Interestingly, the vibe Free League are expecting from the GM side of things seems to be to keep dice rolling, particularly skill checks, to a minimum, which certainly makes this game a lot more appealing to RPG newcomers who could potentially become overwhelmed by the plethora of stats, modifiers, etc. Keeping these rolls for more significant situation makes them feel like they mean more, which adds to the overall tension.

The “Hope’s Last Day” Cinematic adventure included in this starter box is straightforward enough to GM, and – in a great decision by the folks at Free League – fits smoothly into the big screen universe, taking the players to the familiar setting of LV-426 and letting them witness firsthand the downfall of Hadley’s Hope, the mining colony which served as the backdrop for the Aliens movie. The premade characters are all interesting to play, and the difficulty level is pitched well enough that the players should hopefully be able to complete the overall mission and escape, but not so easy that everyone will survive without a scratch.

Final Thoughts

The Alien RPG Evolved Edition Starter Set is a fantastic entry point into one of the most atmospheric RPGs out there. It nails the tone of the franchise, offers great value, and delivers a tense, cinematic experience. If you’re a fan of Alien or love tense, story-driven RPGs, this Starter Set is a must-have. Just don’t get too attached to your character – you probably won’t make it out alive!

---

The writer of this piece was: Craig Neilson-Adams (aka Ceej)
Article Archive: Ceej Says
You can follow Ceej on Twitter

---