Tuesday 22 September 2015

SOMA Has Been Released!

The day has finally come. What started out as a vague idea back in 2010 has finally become an actual game. It's been quite the journey to get here, and we're all really proud of what we've achieved. SOMA is now available on Windows, Mac, Linux and PS4!



Our most important goal for SOMA was to create a game that delivered a different kind of fear. In Amnesia the horror came from a more primal feeling, from things like being hunted by monsters. This time we wanted to evoke something deeper. We wanted the sense of dread and terror come from thinking about disturbing subjects dealing with consciousness and what makes us human. Achieving this turned out to be really hard, and it's what made the game take so long to finish.

So it's been incredible to get reviews like these:


“In the 10 or so hours it took me to finish SOMA I was hooked for the entire experience, from shocking beginning to one of the best game endings I’ve seen since Portal. SOMA will destroy you emotionally, and that’s a very good thing indeed. - GameWatcher

SOMA succeeds at crafting something much more meaningful in a genre that’s deserving of more than just simple jump scares. - GameSpot

I’ve never played a game that’s affected me as much as SOMA, and to be honest I’m not sure I want to ever again, although I’m very glad I did. It has the DNA of movies like Alien, 2001, Sunlight, and Event Horizon, with a splash of the original Dead Space and Bioshock, but brings plenty of new ideas to the table. It makes you think about what it means to be alive, and indeed how you classify life, and is a brilliant example of just how far video games have evolved.” - TheSixthAxis

“The best horror sticks with you long after the credits roll, an uneasy feeling that lingers uncomfortably in the moments before you fall asleep. I’ve been thinking about what happened in SOMA for days now, especially the game’s closing minutes, and can’t let it go. Just thinking about it makes me sick to my stomach. If that’s not a sign of success, I’m not sure what is.”  - Kotaku


Now we're eager to hear what all of you think of the game! Our aim is to evoke a long-lasting sense of dread, and to leave you with disturbing questions that keep coming back to haunt you. If we've succeeded, please tell us all about it!

Finally, we'd like to say thanks to everybody who has supported us over the years! We hope we can continue to fuel your nightmares long into the future!


19 comments:

  1. Congratulations to you all! Very impressive to see all those great reviews, and eager to see wait awaits myself.

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  2. Can't wait to try it out! Good work everyone, I really didn't expect something like this to happen when I first tried the demo version of the first Penumbra..

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  3. Just started yesterday, I'm so pumped :D Do you guys have any other projects coming along now that SOMA's released?

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  4. Is there any chance for DRM-free Humble release? I know there is one on GOG, but Kinda got used to Humble DRM-free + Steam releases for indie games. I still can't decide where to buy because of this.

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    1. We'll probably put a non-steam version of the exe on steam

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  5. I just finished the game. You guys outdid yourselves. What an amazing ride. My heart is still pounding over the action, the horror, the drama. That ending. I am so moved. The brilliant music, scenery, sounds everything is just is perfect I wanna scream and laugh and cry. I feel like i'm having an anheurism. Oh wait that's probably it. I should go to the hospital now. :D Keep up the great work and I can't wait for your new masterpiece.

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  6. I'll avoid seeing gameplay somehow until I get a PS4 to play the game, but I want to congratulate you guys for taking so long and finally releasing another masterpiece. Now enjoy this moment, you deserve it!

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  8. Thanks for sharing..The game trailer was excellent and i love it,Great work and Congrats to all...

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  9. Outstanding game, so far I'm enjoying every last bit of it :)

    Steam downloaded two updates since the release, were those patches or is it just Steam acting weird? (because I can't find any info/changelog about them)

    Also I found a small level bug in the Theta Labs level section, you can see the "outside world" when trying to look into a vent opening (by jumping).
    The vent opening is located on the right side of the map, in the corridor running along the Omega Management room (using the ingame map as reference).

    Last but not least it seems to me that the biggest bottleneck in performance of the game seems to be the hard drive? (lots of loading, game is stuttering quite a bit during these periods)
    It would be great if that could be resolved or improved at some point :) (maybe offload the disk access to a separate thread if you are not doing so already?)

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  10. I just beat the game last night. Everything about the game was amazing. What a combination it was, the way that you guys strike fear into the player while making the player question what it is to exist.

    I loved the puzzles in SOMA a lot. The lack of manuals to understand the puzzle, and the focus on having the player troubleshoot the situations using terminals, emergency equipment and such was a really good experience

    It was wonderful that you guys kept the mechanics for making the player have to interact with the environment even at critical times like the elevator.

    There was a part on that particular level where some glass of a room was cracked, but could not be broken with a heavy object. I found this slightly annoying. If there was a reason the window could not break (i.e, the window is reinforced with metal wire), then it would be a little better.

    The graphics were well done, though I could not play on high with my old GTS 450.

    As mentioned above there were some hiccups at some points in loading, but I forgive that because it wasn't during a critical time.

    It is great seeing Frictional Games improve with every game they develop. I purchased all of the penumbra series and played on Linux for a while. After that, I saw trailers for Amnesia and played that. While I liked the story a lot more for Penumbra, a lot of other improvements really made Amnesia a wonderful experience. Now with SOMA, I couldn't even imagine the many improvements that took place.

    Cannot wait for another Frictional Games title.

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  11. Guys I know that it might be hard for independent company to put time and money into localization. There is a country in the middle of Europe called Poland and we appreciate polish subtitles in the game.

    Of course it is Sony fault that they have Polish in the product description in PSS while GOG and Steam are clear that there is no such localization.

    The question that I saw on multiple gaming forums in Poland was: is there any plan for the nearest future to add Polish localization via patch?

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  12. Playing it felt like an ice cold hand was grabbing at the back of my spine, quietly scratching those parts of my mind, that i don't want to look at. The terror of facing the truth haunted me long after i have quit and switched off the computer. Everyone has those kind of fears, and people try to cope by escaping into a some kind of an illusory world, it is a very human thing to do.
    But you know, when the lights are out, and you are left alone in the dark, the truth will come out creeping from those small cracks that are always left between illusion and reality.

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  13. Great job in the flow of the game and on it not being a simulation. I saw your guy's demo stuff, though, and I would have loved it if you could have retained more of the Giger elements, had an "Alexander" style showdown with a sentient and perhaps alien induced WAU, who had been monitoring your interactions and basing its behavior off what is increasingly its largest obstacle, you the player. I loved the shadow in the dark descent, and it's too bad that the mechanical growths couldn't act as the antithesis to one's existential questioning...Just festering development as seen in the demo. That wouldn't have to contradict a sentient WAU, just as needing to breath doesn't mean we can't question life. Aside from that, maybe cut scenes for the interaction with the monster, and a specific hindrance they impose that requires environmental supplies...Like the robot requiring more structure gel. All monday-morning quarter-backing aside, it was wonderful.

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  14. Hey Thomas,will scripting tutorials for HPL3(SOMA) be available soon?
    Cheers :)

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  15. *Spoiler Warning* I've been following the development of this game for a long time. I read a lot of the game design theories on this blog and I think you guys are probably the closest out there to figuring out this interactive narrative business. Anyway, congratulations. I had high expectations, but after playing Ethan Carter last year I was a bit apprehensive. Because that game also shared a lot of the same game design philosophies but in the end, the only thing that really matters is story. And I thought that game was lacking in that department. But here is where SOMA really shines. In a lot of games of this sort I feel lost most of the time. Reading and listening to audio logs, not fully grasping what's going on, and having to ask people online to explain the ending. (A Machine for Pigs comes to Mind). SOMA had a bit of that in the first third, but little by little all the pieces started to fit and I was right there with Simon slowly unraveling the big picture.
    It's incredible how important good dialogue and acting is. There's a simple moment in the game that I loved, right after the switching bodies part when they get to the elevator. Catherine tells us to turn on the thing and strap in. The tone in her voice says so much about what just transpired. She feels both hurt by Simon's reaction, but also a lot of guilt I imagine. Great stuff. Loved the part where you have to get the password from that one digital guy. Loved seeing my robot face in the mirror for the first time. Loved the body switch. Loved talking to the last human on the planet and of course, loved the ending. I'm not sure how I feel about the monsters though. The game would be a bit strange if it was just walking around with no danger, I'm not sure what they could be replaced with. But overall, what sticks with me is story, so I doubt I'll ever forget SOMA.

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  16. I lve the game trailer, thanks for sharing, I'm so excited to buy and play this amazing game

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