Today Sony revealed a new trailer for their upcoming first-person action-adventure title Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture. The game is being developed by The Chinese Room, a UK-based studio best known for creating the Half-Life 2 mod Dear Esther. Their current project is a spiritual successor to that mod and will be available exclusively for the PS4. Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture is a story that takes place during the apocalypse and centers around six characters. The game is set in the English village of Shropshire where our protagonists are left wondering alone while everybody else seemingly disappeared. Jessica Curry, composer and co-director revealed some more details about the game today, which can be read below.
“Rapture is inspired by the fiction of John Wyndham, J. G. Ballard, John Christopher and other authors who deal with ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances. There’s a very particular English feel that we wanted to capture in the game, a combination of the epic and the intimate. Rapture also came from our obsession with post-apocalyptic gaming, and the simple idea that whilst we normally play as the hero, in reality, most of us would be the piles of ash and bone littering the game world. That’s an interesting place to start telling a story. Our approach is to create a game that you can utterly immerse yourself in. Yaughton Valley, where Rapture takes place, is a living, breathing world.”
“The world of Rapture is not just a backdrop; it’s a character in its own right. It’s great working with PS4 as its processing power makes a game like this possible for a team our size. The game is all about discovery. It’s open-world so you have the freedom to explore wherever you like, visiting areas in an order you define, and the story is written to allow this whilst making sure every player has a strong dramatic experience. It’s a type of storytelling that is completely unique to games. The choices you make as a player have a direct impact on how you understand the story – the more you explore and interact, the deeper you are drawn into Rapture’s world. ”
Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture was first announced back in August, but not much else was revealed since then. This newly released info is a welcomed sight indeed and helps us gain a better understanding about the upcoming game. If it’s anything like Dear Ester, (and it looks like it is) not everybody will be able to enjoy it. These are experimental titles that attempt to reinvent the way in which stories are told in video games. Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture will be released sometime during 2015. We’ll keep you posted as soon as we learn something new so stay tuned for more news and updates.