Ask Anything About SOMA

[Macgyverthehero]

Okay, I'll be serious this time. My question:

How linear is the exploration in SOMA? Will the exploration be the same as it was in Amnesia: The Dark Descent? Or will it go for a more metroidvania style approach. I wanted to ask that because I noticed the game has a form of tram system, and I wanted to know if that means the game won't be like the usual format where you go through levels, hub area, and repeat.

[emaper]

Questions:
1) Is it more enjoyable with a standard mice-and-keyboard setup, or with a joystick?
2) Is it possible to play SOMA well even with a MacBook Air with a HD3000 and 380MB VideoRAM? Is there any performance difference between the Win version and the OS X version?
3) You said that VR isn't delivered "at launch"; but is there any chance to have it implemented in the game later, (maybe with a significant update)?
4) Is there a book, which we can read before SOMA's launch, that could "prepare" us and put us in the same (or a similar) atmosphere of the game?
Thanks in advance.

[Solidskila]

Please tell me that SOMA's ending is not one of those endings let to interpretation! ( Ex. Everybody's gone to the rapture)

[Traggey]

Everybody's gone to the rapture isn't very much open ended is it? I mean, the title of the game itself is kind of a spoiler as to what happened isn't it?

[Thomas]

About Steam Workshop/Mods
1. Will mods hosted exclusively on the Workshop be accessible to GOG users (if the modder doesn't specifically provide a non-Steam version)?

2. If Valve reintroduces its paid mod scheme, will FG endorse paid mods for SOMA?

3. Now that the Workshop is being used to host mods, are there any new legal standards or guidelines that modders will have to be conscious of that they might not have had to worry about so much before?

4. It was mentioned that there are now dedicated mod folders whose contents will take precedence over their equivalents in the base game. Does this mean that we could have multiple mods installed which are all independent from each other and without "contaminating" the base game? Will modders still occasionally need to modify the base files, or is this now circumvented entirely?

1) There are no trivial ways I know (non-trivial being for example to have other people send you the data), it will be up to the modder where to share it. Mods still works the same as they did before, so can just compress a folder and pass that along.
2) We'll look into that when the time comes. It is thorny issue.
3) Not that I know of.
4) Modders should never have to mess with the basic game content, the only thing that needs to remain the same is the exe. So will be able have lots of total conversations installed at the same time.

[Thomas]

Okay, I'll be serious this time. My question:

How linear is the exploration in SOMA? Will the exploration be the same as it was in Amnesia: The Dark Descent? Or will it go for a more metroidvania style approach. I wanted to ask that because I noticed the game has a form of tram system, and I wanted to know if that means the game won't be like the usual format where you go through levels, hub area, and repeat.

The game is divided into levels. Some are fairly small and linear and others are huge and sprawling, the size of hub + connected levels in our previous games. The structure is very similar to our previous game, the main difference being you cannot go back n forth between levels. But that is made up for by making certain levels much, much bigger than we have previously had.

[Thomas]

Question:
1) Is it more enjoyable with a standard mice-and-keyboard setup, or with a joystick?
2) Is it possible to play SOMA well even with a MacBook Air with a HD3000 and 380MB VideoRAM? Is there any performance difference between the Win version and the OS X version?
3) You said that VR isn't delivered "at launch"; but is there any chance to have it implemented in the game later, (maybe with a significant update)?
4) Is there a book, which we can read before SOMA's launch, that could "prepare" us and put us in the same (or a similar) atmosphere of the game?
Thanks in advance.

1) That is 100% personal preference. The only unique feature with gamepad is rumble which can be quite nice.
2) Yes, it is possible, but you are at the lower end of the systems we support. So settings need to be on lowest and there might be some slight changes graphically. Should be playable though. Mac/Linux is same as Windows apart from missing editors.
3) See previous answer.
4) A few examples: The Mind's I, The Ego Tunnel, Blindsight, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, Super Intelligence.

[Thomas]

Please tell me that SOMA's ending is not one of those endings let to interpretation! ( Ex. Everybody's gone to the rapture)

I think it is best game ending that we have had tbh. Very hard to say if you will think it is up for interpretation or not, as it depends on what answers you were looking for. I feel it is pretty conclusive, but it also relies on the player having a grasp of the subjects brought up during the game.

[MrSteve]

How different was your approach to programming enemy A.I. ?

I understand that each creature reacts to the player differently. That must have been both interesting and quite an indepth task to achieve?

[Thomas]

How different was your approach to programming enemy A.I. ?

Biggest change is that all AI is inscript, and because of how our tech work I could change behavior as the game was running. THat helped A LOT in making sure they behaved as intended. Other than that basics are similar to Amnesia, just some more lowlevel tech thingies that are different + a lot more code and work