Alien War

I stumbled across this video on YouTube recently, which brought back memories of a trip to London and a visit to Alien War in the Trocadero Centre in Leicester Square.

My memories of Alien War are a little hazy, which isn’t surprising given it was thirty years ago.

The conceit is straightforward enough – you take the role of VIPs being guided around a Weyland-Yutani facility by a colonial marine. It starts quietly enough, as you see eggs and things. But things go wrong when the alien critters escape.

I remember…

I was working on site, and was wearing a bright yellow high-viz coat. (I think it must have been winter, hence needing the coat.) High-viz was a novelty back then; there’s no way I’d wear something like that today.

I can clearly remember an alien appearing in a dark corridor beside us. It felt like it was pitch black, but I suspect we had all been blinded, and the alien appeared while our eyes were adjusting. It was very impressive – and surprisingly scary.

I don’t remember much about the lift sequence. The video talks about one of the VIPs being taken by an alien, but I don’t remember that – I think I was squashed in the far corner, away from where the victim was taken.

At one point, we all sat in a drop ship, all lined up in seats facing a central aisle. My brother and I were first in, and were against the wall, furthest from the door. Then an alien attacks through the roof (the queen, if I remember right), right above us! My brother was first through the door…

And other than it being really good, that’s about all I remember. It’s a shame it was damaged in a flood and closed. 

Anyway, here’s the AVP page on Alien War.