For his or her newest sport, Nonetheless Wakes the Deep, builders The Chinese language Room are taking a dip into the sub-genre of horror often known as aquatic horror. Normally, aquatic horror and creature options go hand in hand, however that isn’t at all times the case. Sorry readers, however all these low-budget shark assault horrors don’t depend! For my cash, there aren’t sufficient aquatic horror films, video games, or books. Whether or not it’s on a ship, a submarine, or, as within the case of Nonetheless Wakes the Deep, a drilling rig, the sense of isolation, lack of locations to run, and no assist inside calling vary provides to the horrific thrill of panic and dread that powers these tales.
Nonetheless Wakes The Deep takes all of those themes and plot units, chucks them right into a blender and goes one additional by including the catastrophe film style into the combo. Not solely are you working on your life from one thing nasty, however the collapsing surroundings round you can also be trying to do you in.
Set on an oil rig on the coast of Scotland, Nonetheless Wakes The Deep transports you again to the yr 1975. You’re far-off from the protection of land in an inhospitable and uncaring surroundings the place one mistake might value you, and the boys subsequent to you, dearly. As electrician Caz McLeary, you’ve run to the ocean from the regulation and are simply scraping by on conserving the rig’s electrical techniques working. Simply once you’re about to be despatched packing, the rig’s drill breaks into one thing unknown and catastrophe ensures. The whole lot that may go unsuitable on a rig does however the actual nightmare is simply starting.
That’s the idea for The Chinese language Room’s cinematic horror journey sport. It could be unsuitable to name Nonetheless Wakes The Deep a survival horror, although you do must survive, as the sport is extra fascinated by throwing you into the bowels of a horror film and tasking you with taking part in by way of what’s, basically, an interactive film.
Now, initially, I assumed that Nonetheless Wakes The Deep’s linear gameplay and lack of exploration was a disservice to a unbelievable setting. And the idea of interactive films nonetheless has a nasty style within the mouths of players, however as soon as I realised what The Chinese language Room was aiming for, Nonetheless Wakes The Deep blossomed into one among this yr’s greatest horror video games.
You see, the builders need you to reside a horror film with this. And a catastrophe film too. And identical to these films, there’s a ticking time bomb propelling you from one set piece to a different. You may’t simply escape. The whole lot has to interrupt right down to kind an deadlock for you. Have to get to that lifeboat? Positive however it’s important to swim by way of oil, however earlier than you are able to do that it’s important to shut the facility down or threat changing into a crispy critter.
After which there’s the horror film facet, as mates and foe begin to mutate round you, dying horrible deaths or changing into unrecognisable issues trying to tear you limb from limb. From the heights of the oil rig to its water-logged depths, it’s important to resolve the rig’s issues whereas working and hiding from what your folks have turn out to be.
Pitched as “The Factor on an oil rig”, Nonetheless Wakes The Deep influences are plainly seen. The Factor, Leviathan and an entire host of gloopy, gory 80’s physique horror films permeate the sport together with motion and catastrophe flicks corresponding to The Poseidon Journey. It’s an excellent hodgepodge that works splendidly with the sport’s character-centric narrative. There’s a good quantity of psychological drama at play right here, blended in with a vaguely Lovecraftian, cosmic horror aesthetic that retains a definitive rationalization as to the organism invading the rig wrapped in thriller. It’s a story transfer that I admire because it retains the thriller intriguing.
The sport performs out from a first-person viewpoint. You may run, leap, crawl, climb and work together with particular objects. There is no such thing as a fight within the sport with enemy encounters counting on stealth, hiding and velocity to keep away from dying. There’s additionally little or no in the way in which of exploration with the paths you must comply with clearly highlighted for you. A lot has been mentioned about signposting interactable elements of the surroundings in yellow just lately, however right here it really works because of the nature of the surroundings. Yellow railings, lockers and vent covers match completely in with the surroundings’s industrial design, changing into as a lot part of the surroundings as pink gantries or flickering work consoles.
As such, Nonetheless Wakes the Deep is a really linear affair that depends on its cinematic design and character work to maintain you engaged. The builders have used their earlier expertise to craft a tense, pulse-pounding affair steeped in dread.
Whereas the precise story beats will not be shocking, the character work is well-written and acted. The sport sports activities some unbelievable voice appearing from Scottish actors that retains character curiosity alive.
Nonetheless Wakes The Deep can also be a really lovely sport that includes some attractive, realistic-looking visuals within the surroundings design, unbelievable lighting and completely beautiful reflections. The rig and climate are characters themselves, with splashing waves and fog-filled visuals paving the way in which. The sport will not be utilizing RT reflections, however the high-quality SSR on water and oil are breathtaking to behold.
The good visuals and set design do come at a value within the extra expansive views although, as I might see some body drops within the out of doors areas, particularly later within the sport when the mixture of fog, flame and out-of-this-world lighting mix to create an eerie, alien panorama. There are solely three visible choices obtainable on the console: Movement Blur, Movie Grain and Chromatic Aberration.
Movement Blur is the very first thing I disable in any sport and switching off Chromatic Aberration helped to easy out the frame-rate in these sections a bit. Disabling the Movie Grain might have helped as nicely to disable the post-processing load however I favored the environment it lent to the sport.
Nonetheless Wakes The Deep will not be the expansive survival horror title I hoped for, however I really feel that the builders have achieved what they got down to do by dropping you right into a horror film. As such, not solely have they created a gnarly physique horror title, but additionally one among this yr’s tensest and most atmospheric horror video games.
Nonetheless Wakes The Deep Trailer
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