SOMA Gets Official Launch Date and First Gameplay Trailer
After a very interesting viral marketing campaign and the release of some curious live-action videos, Frictional Games has released the first gameplay trailer for the new survival horror game SOMA. In addition, the studio behind such genre-defining titles as Amnesia and Penumbra revealed the launch details for the game. SOMA will be available exclusively for PlayStation 4 and Windows PC on September 22.
The story is set in what appears to be an underwater facility called PATHOS-2. Communications on the facility have gone dark, and key personnel are missing or have been declared dead in the preceding weeks. The machines in the facility are starting to act strange, almost like they are human. One of the viral videos showed a robot that seemed to think it was one of the human staff members of the facility.
The game looks to be an interesting mix of Alien and The Abyss. In the video, the protagonist, who calls himself Simon, stumbles upon some sort of robot from the facility. However, this robot thinks it is another staff member Carl Semken. Moments later, the protagonist finds the dead “human” body of this character. Something seriously wrong has happened at this base, and that looks to be just part of the game’s greater mystery. There also appears to be a malevolent robotic creature stalking you throughout the demo. You only see snippets of this character, who seems reminiscent of Big Daddy from BioShock.
Frictional Games will self-publish SOMA later this year. You can check out the extended gameplay video, along with the other live-action viral videos below.