A year after launch, the cooperative shooter set in the Alien universe, Aliens: Fireteam Elite, is getting its first boss battle. Starting Aug. 30, as part of the game’s paid Pathogen expansion, players will be able to take on a mutated Xenomorph Queen.
If you’re incredulously asking, “This Aliens game didn’t have the Xenomorph Queen, the ultimate boss of the movie Aliens, as a playable boss battle?” the answer is “sort of.” Players can encounter a Xenomorph Queen in the game’s campaign, but the mission is to escape from it, not to kill it.
That will change next week, when Aliens: Fireteam Elite’s Pathogen expansion goes live on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X. That expansion will bring more than just a killable queen to Fireteam Elite, it will also bring a new strain of Xenomorph mutations, which have been infected with the “black goo” introduced to the Alien fiction in Ridley Scott’s prequel, Prometheus. The Xenomorph Queen players will face down will likewise be all goo-ed up, and differ in appearance from the familiar queen Ripley famously faced in Aliens. You can see a sneak peek at of the Pathogen-mutated queen and her hive in the trailer above.
The Pathogen expansion will bring with it three new missions, new weapons and attachments, and a bunch of new cosmetics, emotes, and other customization options. The expansion costs $14.99 as a stand-alone add-on. 20th Century Games has two other purchase options: an Ultimate Edition Upgrade for existing owners of Aliens: Fireteam Elite, which packs in the Pathogen expansion and five Endeavor Pass DLCs for $29.99; and the Ultimate Edition, which includes the aforementioned add-ons and the base game for $59.99.
For players thinking of getting back into Aliens: Fireteam Elite, developer Cold Iron Studios made it easier to play with friends last month, thanks to a new cross-play feature that enabled multiplatform co-op across PC, PlayStation, and Xbox. Read Polygon’s review to see if the game’s right for you.
