• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

SOMA gameplay trailer.

M

Messofanego

Banned
Scarecrow said:
Kinda feel like, after Outlast and Alien, I've played this type of game already. I guess I'd be in it for the story? Also, what was the name of that other upcoming hide and seek game set in a space station?
Click to expand...

Routine
ibgGCnlcI7coFb.gif

iQH319QABmcg4.gif
 
M

More_Badass

Member
Creepiest part was the beginning with the machine begging you not unplug it. That was weird and unsettling. The rest was very immersive and atmospheric, but didnt seem that scary
 
C

Chronoja

Member
Looks great imo. I really hope they cash in on the existential horror because that's what's really going to push it above just being another Amnesia, and it seems like they will.
 
D

Despera

Banned
Looks pretty good.

Graphically the game doesn't seem that demanding. A good thing if it has VR support, which it most definitely should.
 
I

I H8 Memes

Member
So whats the story behind this game? People are being killed and having their consciousness stolen and transferred to robots that are taking over the facility?
 
S

Seven4sses

Member
Easy_D said:
You ought to! Play Penumbra Black Plague as well. Both fantastic horror titles. Unless you don't game on PC I suppose :p



I loved A Machine for Pigs as well. The story was fantastic, voice acting great (The Machine is menacing as hell) and it looked great too. Frictional also were the ones who told them to get rid of the inventory system. They're doing the same for Soma. That makes our little fanclub 3 members :D.
I think Machine for Pigs holds up better for multiple playthroughs than Dark Descent does as well.

Also
dat final ascent up the stairs with the music and the Machine's monologue was spine chilling
Click to expand...

The music during
the pigs ravaging the city as you ran
made me feel things no human being should ever feel. Everything was more macabre from the setting to the notes, including the one where it states that
the dining room was one big trap door to the grinder
.

Also,
reanimated manbearpig in a labirynth of tesla coils
was the scariest thing in that game. More horrifying to me than the last half of The Dark Descent.
 
K

komplanen

Member
Everything about this looked and sounded amazing! I just hope there's more horror to the game than the hide-and-seek stuff or that I am not full of it anymore when the game ships.
 
B

br0ken_shad0w

Member
komplanen said:
Everything about this looked and sounded amazing! I just hope there's more horror to the game than the hide-and-seek stuff or that I am not full of it anymore when the game ships.
Click to expand...

Trailer didn't wow me especially, but I'm not doubting Frictional Games yet. You don't make blog posts critiquing the horror genre and not follow through. For those who are concerned that it's going to be similar to Alien: Isolation, read this.

Pilgrimzero said:
Calling it now: Dude is a robot that looks human with false memories. Like in Bladerunner.

Just a guess though.
Click to expand...

It's so telegraphed it's insulting, which hopefully means there's much more than that.
 
N

nel e nel

Member
Pilgrimzero said:
Calling it now: Dude is a robot that looks human with false memories. Like in Bladerunner.

Just a guess though.
Click to expand...

I was going to say a human consciousness in a robot body that is perceiving itself as a human (which is why we see human hands). Same idea though.


br0ken_shad0w said:
It's so telegraphed it's insulting, which hopefully means there's much more than that.
Click to expand...

Well, we kind of already knew this, they blatantly show it in their teaser trailers that they've been releasing for the past year:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eytOzwyfiCA
 
V

Visualante2

Member
A g-g-g-ghost in the shell

Very gripping. Looks like they've produced something with the some weight as Alien Isolation but on a fraction of the budget.
 
A

Anung

Un Rama
I love the kind of stop motion way the enemy robots seem to move in. I find that kind of movement so unnatural and scary as hell.
 
M

Messofanego

Banned
br0ken_shad0w said:
Trailer didn't wow me especially, but I'm not doubting Frictional Games yet. You don't make blog posts critiquing the horror genre and not follow through. For those who are concerned that it's going to be similar to Alien: Isolation, read this.
Click to expand...

Well, just because they can give good critiques, doesn't mean they'll automatically rise above it all when making the game. There might be compromises. Tom Bissell's writing on Gears of War Judgement and Battlefield Hardline doesn't exactly line up with his well-known critiques. Adrian Chmielarz wrote blog posts critiquing the adventure genre being essentially bad games and yet made a fairly disappointing first person adventure game with Vanishing of Ethan Carter (to me at least, some loved it). Captain obvious and slightly pretentious narration with not so great voice acting on protagonist's part, forgettable puzzles, shallow characters, and kind of a disappointing story (
was expecting more than just a kid's imagination being the reason why there are these disparate supernatural bits
), saved by great atmosphere, fairly open structure, and visuals. The Talos Principle for me, did a better job integrating the story with the world while not making me want to shut the narration up :p

I really hope all that critique makes for a less predictable game. That worse than death mechanic sounds interesting, cause lots of death can make a horrror game more a chore sometimes.
 
K

komplanen

Member
So was the idea there that the "human/robot" that player talks to is that dead body (or one somewhere else)? I mean the dead body had cables penetrate his body so I'd guess his "soul" was absorbed into the facility and manifested as a collection of robot parts.
 
A

Abdiel

Member
With folks referencing space, I think the implications from the imagery/trailers they've released, it's more likely to be some kind of underground/underwater laboratory, nothing space related. Just with that very mechanical/noonegivesashitaboutasethics-vibe.

I don't play horror games, but for those that do, I hope this one is good.
 
E

Easy_D

never left the stone age
Abdiel said:
With folks referencing space, I think the implications from the imagery/trailers they've released, it's more likely to be some kind of underground/underwater laboratory, nothing space related. Just with that very mechanical/noonegivesashitaboutasethics-vibe.

I don't play horror games, but for those that do, I hope this one is good.
Click to expand...

There's gameplay footage of the player in a diving suit exploring the seafloor. Can't find that though. But there's always this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DU-qEaG98Lc
 
V

Verger

Banned
This looks like another game to play with Headphones in the dark, like Alien Isolation.

The Frictional team certainly has a lot to live up to. Even though Machine for Pigs was maligned, most knew that was TheChineseRoom's game, so they'll be looking to them to recreate another Dark Descent.

Though I'm glad they're going for something more cerebral. I too am tired of the "run and hide from monster!" design of horror games now, especially since Alien Isolation pretty much was the pinnacle of that and I don't know where you can take it from there without retreading old stuff.

Still, I did like Machine for Pigs for its better story and narrative. And Frictional said that's what they're trying to go for with this game too I believe, so that alone excites me. They certainly have nailed down the atmospherics from what I can see/hear.
 
E

eFKac

Member
If there was a hand instead of a cursor it would have been a perfect Morpheus horror. I wonder if it has Move support? Seems like it would be really intuitive with it.
 
J

JP

Member
Has potential although I'm not quiet sure what to make of it yet. Probably not a "thing" for anybody else I'm finding that first person games that give your character invisible arms when you flick a switch, move an object, open a door, etc is becoming increasingly disruptive for me. It didn't used to bother me much but it really destroys the immersion for me now. :(
 
M

MattyG

Banned
YESSS. This looks awesome. I've been pumped for this ever since that first gameplay trailer, glad it's coming this year.

ratcliffja said:
Machine For Pigs was excellent, but that's the Chinese Room rather than Frictional. I'm excited for this and Everybody's Gone to the Rapture, as both are very solid developers.
Click to expand...
Can I play Machine For Pigs without playing The Dark Descent? I have them both, but Machine For Pigs looks and sounds (from the gameplay I've seen and the spoilers I've accidentally read) more interesting to me.

I'll probably actually never end up playing either becuase I'm a big baby when it comes to horror games.
 
V

Verger

Banned
MattyG said:
Can I play Machine For Pigs without playing The Dark Descent? I have them both, but Machine For Pigs looks and sounds (from the gameplay I've seen and the spoilers I've accidentally read) more interesting to me.

I'll probably actually never end up playing either becuase I'm a big baby when it comes to horror games.
Click to expand...
Yes, the two games aren't really connected aside from some callouts to the "Orbs" from the first game which are the source of what is going on. Anyway, Machine for Pig's is less "scary" than Dark Descent and you're less likely to get stuck at a point where you're trapped by a monster.


Anyway, love the theme of SOMA being (or at least on the surface) about taking human brains and putting them into robots. The sounds and screams of the robots seem waaaay too real... :*(
 
V

Verger

Banned
The themes definitely are more reminiscent of Machine for Pigs since in there
Humans were being turned into those manpigs, and you felt sorry for them
, and it looks like that's going to happen here, but with robots.

Although in this game it's clear they're going to go even deeper in regards to the themes since here the robots will emulate man and memories. Where as the monsters in previous games could not do those things.

Dark Descent was more about being hunted by spectral force and its minions.
 
Zomba13

Zomba13

Member
nel e nel said:
Am I the only one that noticed the 'glitches' on the screen. Almost as if the protagonist wasn't looking through eyes, but through lenses/screens?
Click to expand...

People have been turned into machines/conciousness uploaded to machines and they see themselves as still human. Plot twist is that we've also been turned into a machine but think we're the only real human left.
 
C

ChosenPredator

Banned
all the horror games have a bit of the same mechanic to them just with prettier graphics, i wonder if this does anything different from hiding, throwing things to make noise and such.
 
V

Verger

Banned
ChosenPredator said:
all the horror games have a bit of the same mechanic to them just with prettier graphics, i wonder if this does anything different from hiding, throwing things to make noise and such.
Click to expand...
The devs indicated that this is what they were trying to avoid. They didn't want it to be another "run and hide" game like The Dark Descent.

That's actually a bit infuriating in a way in terms of expectations. There is a vocal group who wants another Dark Descent game (which basically was a run-and-hide game) and they didn't like Machine for Pigs which was more story/narrative based. But I too am tired of a run-and-hide game as both Outlast and Alien Isolation pretty much did that element well and it's gotten old now.

Frictional stated long ago that they wanted to take TheChineseRoom's storytelling approach for this game, but I guess people are wary because they want to have some gameplay involved. I mean, the gameplay demo definitely shows interacting with the environment in interesting ways and we'll see what else is in store.
Zomba13 said:
People have been turned into machines/conciousness uploaded to machines and they see themselves as still human. Plot twist is that we've also been turned into a machine but think we're the only real human left.
Click to expand...
That definitely seems to be the popular theory that the protagonist is a robot. And even though he has a human-looking arm, it could very well just be a severed arm attached to a robot body (which would be freaky cool).

But who knows.
 
J

jaundicejuice

Member
The beginning of the video was the most unsettling part where the machine begged the player not to unplug it and shut it down. The game, based on what they've shown, looks very atmospheric but not as unsettling as Amnesia: The Dark Descent...soooo that means I can probably actually play through it. The end kind of freaked me out but not as badly as The Dark Descent did.
 
Y

Yasae

Banned
Looked okay. Hit a lot of derelict space station cliches (even if we know that it may not be set in space) - help the damaged robot, restore power to X part of the station times infinity, switch flipping galore, mangled/fuzzy lines of communication, dead workers, etc.
 
D

DieH@rd

Banned
Poor's man Alien Isolation [which really knocked me out with its much better presentation], but I'm sure this game will also be well worth playing.
 
S

Shake Appeal

Member
Verger said:
Still, I did like Machine for Pigs for its better story and narrative.
Click to expand...
For all my issues with its shallowness and bad level design, the end "monologue" in this game is some of the finest and most affective gaming writing I've experienced.

"I have stood knee deep in mud and bone, and filled my lungs with mustard gas. I have seen two brothers fall. I have lain with holy wars and copulated with the autumnal fallout. I have dug trenches for the refugees; I have murdered dissidents where the ground never thaws, and starved the masses into faith. A child's shadow burnt into the brickwork. A house of skulls in the jungle. The innocent, the innocent, Mandus, trod and bled and gassed and starved and beaten and murdered and enslaved. This is your coming century! They will eat them Mandus, they will make pigs of you all and they will bury their snouts into your ribs and they will eat your hearts!"

That's the century I was born in, the century we're all living in the shadow of.

As a vicious metaphor for modernity, industrialization, capital, that game slayed.
 
S

Shake Appeal

Member
DieH@rd said:
Poor's man Alien Isolation [which really knocked me out with its much better presentation], but I'm sure this game will also be well worth playing.
Click to expand...
Alien Isolation had a much, much larger budget and a goliath franchise to lean on. It also likely wouldn't exist without Frictional's games.
 
V

Verger

Banned
Yeah, the more I see of the videos, the more I'm getting hyped about it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4aN52psDOXU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pCXqRdurmkM

That said, if people are just expecting another Dark Descent on a basic level, then they might be disappointed since they're clearly aiming for something more cerebral and getting into themes that make you think.


For instance, how does a machine know what it means to be "alive"? What happens when you suddenly give an inanimate object "consciousness" and how "pure" in that consciousness?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

Sony hopes to entice PC players to PS5 by releasing ‘tentpole’ games for console first
News Business 5 6 7 8 9
411
9K
Danknugz replied
Classic Disney-Style FPS MOUSE Gets a New Gameplay Trailer
Trailer
3
690
Vick replied
A 'SOMA-style' Game Is In The Works At Frictional Games
Opinion Game Dev
1
677
Blitzmangoman replied
Toys for Bob going independent
News 2 3 4
199
12K
Mibu no ookami replied
The Last of Us Online has been cancelled
News 10 11 12 13 14
678
36K
Tiago Rodrigues replied
Top Bottom