SOMA is a science fiction survival horror video game being developed by Frictional Games. It is due to be released on 22 September 2015. The game will take place on the PATHOS-2, an underwater remote research facility with machinery that begins to take human characteristics and will be played from a first-person perspective.
Strange occurrences are disrupting the routines of the PATHOS-2 research facility. The radio is silent. Behavioral anomalies of the machines are increasingly dangerous. The facility is devolving into chaos. No weapons, and the only escape is practically unthinkable. SOMA is an aberrant tale of scientific inquiry and survival; an entropic exploration of synapse and circuit that wades through the delusions of human consciousness. SOMA is importantly a deadly game of hide-and-seek (since there are no weapons, gadgets, or tools to fight back, all you can do is run and hide) with a procession of strange computerized monsters. You have to make it from one end of underwater facility PATHOS-II to the other without being spotted. Along the way you learn about the base, the sinister experiments going on there, and what happened to its mysteriously absent employees. It’s a pretty basic horror game at its core, but elevated by a compelling sci-fi story and a hauntingly evocative setting. It’s a sophisticated and thoughtful game, with some grand, exciting, and frankly strange ideas. SOMA may not routinely rouse a quickened heartbeat, or cause beads of sweat to trickle down your forehead as regularly as Frictional's previous work, but it’s also all the better for it. The game is played from the first-person perspective, and you interact with the world in a brilliantly physical way. The way you pick up materials, manually slide open doors, and pull down on levers until they clunk into place, hold stuff is all just realistic in a way. Computers breathe into life with a digital clatter and the whirring of fans, and SOMA’s various puzzles usually revolve around simply interacting and manipulating these various machines, gears, and clunky hardware.
You play as Simon Jarrett in the deep, derelict subterranean research facility, though, i don't know how he ended up there. I guess it's a mystery which will gradually be revealed as one progresses in the game. The amount of high quality dialogue (in terms of both voice acting and writing), is one such delightful disclosure. Simon is certainly the talkative type, and though you may be trapped aboard a rotting undersea hulk, signs of life have not diminished entirely within these corroded metal halls just yet. Fairly early on, you meet a woman named Catherine who keeps in semi-regular contact with you throughout the game. She symbolizes a familiar voice in times of peril, but there’s also a sense of unease inherent in never quite knowing her true intentions. Nevertheless, the snappy back-and-forth between the two, and their budding relationship, forms the crux of SOMA’s storytelling.
In SOMA, when you come across comical objects, you begin to imagine all sorts of things, images begin to form in the mind,and any corpses you find can be interacted with to reveal the final few seconds of a person’s life, lending SOMA’s irregular style of audio logs a sense of weight and intrigue. Notes scrawled on bits of paper strewn across someone’s desk may offer some insight, while most computers carry a few tidbits of backstory and information, that's if you’re willing to look. Judging from the way the Facility looks, one can tell it was once full of life and bustling with activities. Coming to the part of the monsters, Its cast of robotic stalkers is varied, but their AI is rudimentary. Scary at first, rocking back and forth in the shadows and letting out all menacing growls, piercing shrieks, screeching, rasping, and ranting about ‘black blood’ in distorted voices, the screen glitches and distorts as they approach...quite scary, huh?.
When they attack, you lose a ‘life’ and will then be sent back in time to just before they spotted you, giving you a chance to correct your mistake. Try not to get caught many times else, it will be game over for you. You'd agree that we are afraid of what we can't see than what we can (in some cases?). However, as defenceless as you are, crouching and moving slowly proves to be the most effective tactic against these foes. Biomechanical growths cover the walls like an aggressive cancer, covered in barnacles and dripping with a thick, black substance. A similar affliction seems to have affected the semi-organic creatures that lurk in the shadows.
Overall, i'd say SOMA is a great game, able to combine horror and 'hide and seek' to craft an interesting, exciting game with astonishing graphics and a good storyline. It's a great horror game which appeals to you psychologically and emotionally. Why not get SCARED?
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