OK, GAF. Why don't we already have a 10-page thread about this? I know it's a PC-game by a rather unknown russian dev, but still...
They're seasoned devs as far as creepy/atmospheric games are concerned, as fellow gaffer Clevinger points out:
Update: Eurogaffers can get the english version from play.com for 23.50€:
Be careful with Anti-Aliasing when you succumb to the game. The engine really doesn't handle that feature gracefully, as some graphics cards will lead to serious bugs.
Update 2: You can now download a torrent from their website, with the complete OST, interviews, artwork, and videos. Niiiiice.
The setting of The Void seems to be a world just beyond the border between life and death - unluckily for the player, on the side of death. His goal is to claw his way back to the world of the living... using color. Once the last drop of color has left his soul, he dies for real. If he manages to find and then fill several hearts with color and additionally finds his true love, he may be able to ascend to the world of the living... maybe.
The whole game concept revolves around colors, and this includes interacting with the eleven sisters trapped inside this dead world, as well as in combat against their brothers. The player is able to inject color into dead things and living beings alike, with a glyph/gesture mechanic to produce different effects. Keep in mind that color is the players' lifeblood, so every tree you resurrect takes away from your life - but its fruits and offspring may replenish some.
The art is unique. Monsters and settings are pretty fucked up, if you don't mind me saying so. There is full frontal nudity, both male and female (the soul seems to be male). The soundtrack appears to be very atmospheric. There are 13 endings. The german version seems to feature very competent voice actors, but they haven't included the russian original voiceovers, which makes this a bit painful Russian is a wonderful language. Furthermore, there have been extensive cuts and tweaks: The original Intro is 45 minutes long(!!!), for example. Only two player choices (one click each) made it "too boring", and so it got modified: They made it playable.
The game came out in Germany on the end of May. Only one or two gaming publications even tested it (it got good reviews, there are some bugs and the learning curve seems to be a bit harsh, but ignoring that the game seems to be quite fun). English-speaking players need to either wait for a localized release, or import the russian original and find the patch that adds english subtitles... although the subtitle timing seems to be all over the place (this goes for the german version too).
Btw: Look at the age restriction on the cover. Titties for twelve-year-olds. Awesome. With a cover like that I don't expect this to demolish the charts, though...
The following links lead you to NSFW material. There are naked ladies beyond this point. You have been warned.
Official Website:
http://tension-game.com/index_en.php
Now serving an awesome torrent with yummy extras (OST, artwork, etc)!
Videos:
German audio&german subs, gameplay snippets:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_nnl5JS0cI
Russian audio&english subs, intro:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m402AQQ8Dfw
German Launch Trailer (some german texts, nothing serious):
http://www.demonews.de/videos/details.php?id=9448&related=1
Screens:
Screen/art gallery of PCGames.de. They gave the game a review score of 75%.
Demo:
(In German, of course. Disable AA in the config, or there is a high risk the game will not show some very important labels!)
Disclaimer:
This is not intended as an official thread, however please feel free to add infos and screens/videos as you see fit, and I'll do my best to keep the OP updated.
Microreview of the demo: I've played through some of the demo and promptly ran out of color, as was to be expected really; getting used to the gesture/glyph system took some time, to be honest. Wasted a huge amount of color in the beginning. Make sure you listen to the voice clues and adjust your glyph gesture accordingly. Nonetheless, I had tons of fun, and will make another attempt if time permits. I can only recommend this game.
The game is surprisingly solid. Sure, there are some issues like the odd orphaned russian voice acting sample... the german voice actors did a bang-up job though, and that's rare praise coming from me. I still would have liked an option to get the russian voiceacting, I'm a sucker for subtitled and undubbed stuff. Considering the amount of voice acting in the game that may very well be infeasible.
I also like that the demo is pretty huge; you'll be busy for quite some time. Definitely keep an eye out for this.
They're seasoned devs as far as creepy/atmospheric games are concerned, as fellow gaffer Clevinger points out:
Clevinger said:Their previous game Pathologic, despite the crap translation and difficulty, is also very good.
Rock Paper Shotgun had a good writeup about it here:
http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2008/04/10/butchering-pathologic-part-1-the-body/
http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2008/04/11/butchering-pathologic-part-2-the-mind/
http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2008/04/12/butchering-pathologic-part-3-the-soul/
And there's a really great SomethingAwful Let's Play going on here:
http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3033830
Update: Eurogaffers can get the english version from play.com for 23.50€:
That's quite the offer.Joseph Merrick said:quite cheap from play, http://www.play.com/Games/PC/4-/11488036/The-Void/Product.html
Be careful with Anti-Aliasing when you succumb to the game. The engine really doesn't handle that feature gracefully, as some graphics cards will lead to serious bugs.
Clevinger said:There are quests (and perhaps outside of quests) where you're looking for colour "mines" that are invisible with the 4000 (and perhaps 5000) series of ATI cards. Disable anti-alliasing to fix it.
Update 2: You can now download a torrent from their website, with the complete OST, interviews, artwork, and videos. Niiiiice.
The setting of The Void seems to be a world just beyond the border between life and death - unluckily for the player, on the side of death. His goal is to claw his way back to the world of the living... using color. Once the last drop of color has left his soul, he dies for real. If he manages to find and then fill several hearts with color and additionally finds his true love, he may be able to ascend to the world of the living... maybe.
The whole game concept revolves around colors, and this includes interacting with the eleven sisters trapped inside this dead world, as well as in combat against their brothers. The player is able to inject color into dead things and living beings alike, with a glyph/gesture mechanic to produce different effects. Keep in mind that color is the players' lifeblood, so every tree you resurrect takes away from your life - but its fruits and offspring may replenish some.
The art is unique. Monsters and settings are pretty fucked up, if you don't mind me saying so. There is full frontal nudity, both male and female (the soul seems to be male). The soundtrack appears to be very atmospheric. There are 13 endings. The german version seems to feature very competent voice actors, but they haven't included the russian original voiceovers, which makes this a bit painful Russian is a wonderful language. Furthermore, there have been extensive cuts and tweaks: The original Intro is 45 minutes long(!!!), for example. Only two player choices (one click each) made it "too boring", and so it got modified: They made it playable.
The game came out in Germany on the end of May. Only one or two gaming publications even tested it (it got good reviews, there are some bugs and the learning curve seems to be a bit harsh, but ignoring that the game seems to be quite fun). English-speaking players need to either wait for a localized release, or import the russian original and find the patch that adds english subtitles... although the subtitle timing seems to be all over the place (this goes for the german version too).
Btw: Look at the age restriction on the cover. Titties for twelve-year-olds. Awesome. With a cover like that I don't expect this to demolish the charts, though...
The following links lead you to NSFW material. There are naked ladies beyond this point. You have been warned.
Official Website:
http://tension-game.com/index_en.php
Now serving an awesome torrent with yummy extras (OST, artwork, etc)!
Videos:
German audio&german subs, gameplay snippets:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_nnl5JS0cI
Russian audio&english subs, intro:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m402AQQ8Dfw
German Launch Trailer (some german texts, nothing serious):
http://www.demonews.de/videos/details.php?id=9448&related=1
Screens:
Screen/art gallery of PCGames.de. They gave the game a review score of 75%.
Demo:
(In German, of course. Disable AA in the config, or there is a high risk the game will not show some very important labels!)
Disclaimer:
This is not intended as an official thread, however please feel free to add infos and screens/videos as you see fit, and I'll do my best to keep the OP updated.
Microreview of the demo: I've played through some of the demo and promptly ran out of color, as was to be expected really; getting used to the gesture/glyph system took some time, to be honest. Wasted a huge amount of color in the beginning. Make sure you listen to the voice clues and adjust your glyph gesture accordingly. Nonetheless, I had tons of fun, and will make another attempt if time permits. I can only recommend this game.
The game is surprisingly solid. Sure, there are some issues like the odd orphaned russian voice acting sample... the german voice actors did a bang-up job though, and that's rare praise coming from me. I still would have liked an option to get the russian voiceacting, I'm a sucker for subtitled and undubbed stuff. Considering the amount of voice acting in the game that may very well be infeasible.
I also like that the demo is pretty huge; you'll be busy for quite some time. Definitely keep an eye out for this.