At EGX this weekend, XDev and Supermassive Games showed off a ten-minute playthrough of their upcoming cinematic horror title Until Dawn.
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The game is written by horror icons Larry Fessenden and Graham Reznick and follows eight separate friends as they try to survive one awful night at a cabin while being hunted by a crazed serial killer. The game has been in production for some time now and was originally announced for the PS3, but is now a PS4 exclusive.
Players will play as each of the eight different kids, each of whom has their own motivations, backgrounds and relationships. You the player retain all knowledge, but none of the cast will know the entirety of what's happening. This creates a horror-film aesthetic with the added layer of you not only being the audience, but the director as well.
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The interactions between characters can change and ultimately affect the story in any number of ways. There are the big decisions, like choosing between living and dying, but also the small moments, like handling a tense situation with calmness instead of hostility, that can result in added insights and clues. The many ways you can approach a situation should also make for a game that can be replayed over and over again.
The game appears is less Resident Evil survival horror and more Alan Wake storytelling. All of the characters are kids fighting a seemingly unknowable terror. There won't be much in the way of fighting, but rather investigating and understanding. The EGX demo did a good at displaying this; despite being dropped in media res, the setting and characters are easy to understand and follow. The game appears deliberate, measured. An unhurried title is a rare thing these days.
You can watch the whole demo below. Until Dawn comes out next year.