The first teaser trailer for Living Dark, the upcoming procedural action adventure game from DayZ creator Dean Hall’s new studio, debuted this week. While the new clip does an excellent job of establishing a tone, it doesn’t actually give us much information on what to expect from Living Dark when heads to an unspecified number of platforms.
Thanks to the game’s website, we know Living Dark will take place in a “near-future city” called Vox that is “straining under tensions it can barely control.” The game will follow a procedurally-generated, neo-noir narrative that bends and warps as you explore Vox and forge relationships with the locals. Rocketwerkz says players will “gain allies and make lasting enemies.” Each will have a tangible impact on the districts and neighborhoods spread across the city, all of which have their own unique social and cultural identities. It’ll be up to you to decide which people and/or factions deserve loyalty and which can be used to further your own goals.
The Living Dark teaser confirms a handful of facts about the world we’ll be exploring. We know robots can pose a serious threat to humans, though it’s unclear whose behalf the automated ground troops are acting on. But we’re not looking at a far-future story here. The people who seem to be manufacturing drugs, or whatever “Weather” is in Living Dark, all wear clothes that wouldn’t be out of place in 2017. A man in the foreground wears a large gold chain and another crew member consults a laptop while mixing powdery substances. And then an explosion provides a new door for the invading forces, a combination of human and robot soldiers who seem to be wearing military fatigues.
To say we’re intrigued would be an understatement. Living Dark sounds different than most of what we’re seeing on the market these days. We’d caution against letting your imagination run away from you when imagining the possibilities, if only because there are definitely going to be limitations on an evolving open-world environment from a 15-person studio. But we’ll definitely be keeping an eye on development of Living Dark in the new year.
Be sure to check back with Player.One and follow Scott on Twitter for more Living Dark news in 2018 and however long Rocketwerkz supports its next game after launch.
