In 7.53+dfsg-1 The best thing you can do to fix this bug is remove the symbolic link ~/.config/alien-arena and create a directory with this name.
$ mkdir ~/config/alien-arena than link data1 inside. This bug present in the file /usr/games/alien-arena edit this lines: # Ready to rumble! export COR_GAME="$HOME/.config/alien-arena" >> ln -s /usr/share/games/alien-arena/data1 $COR_GAME change to: if [ ! -f $HOME/.config/alien-arena ] then mkdir $HOME/.config/alien-arena fi ln -s /usr/share/games/alien-arena/data1 $COR_GAME/data1
