Official Poll Regarding SOMA's Monsters

[GhylTarvoke]

I'm a wuss. "Very scary, but also a bit annoying."

Construct: One of the two sympathetic monsters. Interesting sounds and movement. Not particularly scary, except when the searchlight shines in your face.

Swimmer: The other sympathetic monster. Not particularly scary, but says some disturbing things.

Flesher: Very scary, with its whale-like sounds, teleportation, and explicit don't-look-at mechanic. Unexpectedly seeing it on the ocean floor is panic-inducing. The CURIE section is far too long, though (long enough to get sick of it).

Proxy: Scary. Paradoxically, its blindness makes it more scary; I'm not sure why. The server room is bad (not knowing where it is, and hearing it long before you see it), and the nest is worse (the tensest part of the entire game).

Akers: Very scary and unnatural-looking. A formidable opponent. Again, its blindness somehow makes it more scary.

Robot Girl: Scary, mainly because it took me a while to figure out. Not having an enemy react to you is very unsettling. The one-hit kill in the last encounter is a bit cheap.

Leviathan: Looks super-cool and serves the plot, but isn't that scary. Its first appearance is the best: seeing it loom in the distance, barely visible, is a great moment.

Fangtooth: Not that scary, but made me panic.

Anglerfish: My favorite part of the entire game.

Yoshida: The scariest enemy, even though it fits cleanly into the "zombie" category. The music, the way it walks, the way it stands still, its near-omniscience, and the doors that open painfully slowly are all contributing factors.

I would've liked to see other monsters (e.g. the one from the teaser), but there were already more than I expected.

[Bridge]

I was very scared throughout the whole game although certain enemies were of course scarier than others. To me the scariest enemy was actually the "jiangshi" because I never really understood it very well. I spent probably 40 minutes crouched in a corner in the Curie trying to calculate its patrol and when I finally decided to go for it I basically ended up walking right into it and had to run. I died, but running is how I got past it anyway because I never felt safe sneaking past it. The rest of the encounters were not necessarily less scary but I felt more confident in how I was able to interact with the environment and the enemies from that point on (I think the fact that the Curie level is all underwater definitely adds to the creepiness).

The only encounters that I would call "a bit annoying" were the ones in Theta starting with Akers in the upstairs area. This whole section until you get out of Theta was way too stressful - it literally wore out my nerves. I think this is probably the scariest section in the game and it felt the most dangerous even though it is probably in fact the least dangerous section in the game. It just went on and on for too long and I wanted it to stop. It's not that my immersion was broken, I just didn't have the energy for it. The fact that the enemies are blind really wasn't much more than mild consolation, and my brain in some way refused to believe it. I kept away from light sources and didn't dare turn the flashlight on even once.

Loved all of the encounters from that point on - they all felt fresh and individual.

[jamman39]

The encounter in the large maze like area in Theta iwas not only the highlight of the game but possibly one of the 2-3 best monster encounters I've ever had.

The chase sequence in the Curie def got my heart rate up. I had a perfect experience here as I remembered exactly where to go and was able to sprint through w/o getting caught. Because of this, I don't know if it can be annoying, butost encounters like this tend to be annoying after you fail even once.

All of the rest of the encounters were pretty unremarkable except:

Yoshida in the diving suit in Tau. He was pretty creepy but he did his job a little too well and made exploration impossible. A good encounter turned bad.

All that said, I have to add: I hope you don't take the mixed to negative reaction about monsters too seriously. What SOMA did well, and better than any game I've ever played, is environmental storytelling. Please, please, don't ever stop focusing on this. Every puzzle and story beat felt diagetic and natural and I can't say that about any other horror game I've ever played

[PathOS]

Yeah, the environmental storytelling of this game is pretty much unmatched and phenomenal. All the lore and details that you can find exploring each room and reading each console just added to the chilling setting and in some cases helped strengthen the enemy encounters for which there was lore to read upon like Akers.

It's definitely difficult to imagine how to make enemy encounters different than they were without introducing what I feel would be undesirable elements. Someone mentioned hiding in lockers or under furniture and I really don't like that kind of gameplay. I think it wore out its welcome in Outlast/Alien and after a while you get desensitized to it having any sort of effectiveness aside from just pure tension without actually being scary.

A similar issue happened to me with Akers actually. I locked myself in Strohmeier's Security Office and just waited in there while Akers patrolled outside. After a while of watching him go back and forth I began to lose some fear of him and I realized he was just a programmable object on a designated patrolling path. That's how tricky these things can be.

I do agree that Yoshida in Tau was both scary and kind of annoying, because I wanted to explore a bit more of the Lore in TAU but that's hard to do with him stalking you. But that said, the tricky thing is if you make it so he cannot stalk you everywhere, then he will lose some of his fear potential. And if you were to, say, put all the Lore in locked rooms that he cannot reach you in, then you'd come to expect those places to be "Safe" areas and suddenly a predictable pattern begins to form.

Horror is such a tricky genre to do, it's no wonder the larger developers stay away from it unfortunately.

[Moist]

Disco ball head guy had the best mechanics of the monsters.
Proxies had the best design.
The crying lady was scary but should have been used more I think. Her part was really brief in omicron.
Wau diving suit was just frustrating and seemed to be too heavily scripted. If you made his AI a little more random and designed him scarier It would have made Tau much scarier.
Overall i voted. Very scary and a little annoying.

[Fortigurn]

Very scary, and interesting to encounter, but also a bit annoying. Some of my heartstopping moments were here, here, here, here, and here (the dreaded trek to Tau). I have to say my experience with monsters in SOMA was better than even my experience with monsters in A:TDD and A:AMFP.

[Moist]

OH and you guys should have used that angler fish a little more in the abyss. I saw its shadow when i csme out of the cave and noticed it wasnt as blue as the other lights. Then i stayed clear, but from what i heard ppl who ran into it got really scared.

[EnDash]

my main problem was that the humanoid monsters could be overcome if you crouched and looked away and waited. the most annoying part was mostly the waiting. and when i would stand and do something the monster would hear and run toward me way too quickly.

the best monster in my opinion was the giant worm near the end. even though it was kinda easy it didn't feel frustrating. maybe because there wasn't anything to explore or puzzles to solve while it chased you.

[Mina Darsh]

Haven't read all the replies, there are so many, so going to respond perhaps with what has already been said.

Anyhow, the monsters were a refreshing change from Amnesia The Dark Descent. The thing that took the scary and uncertain part away in TDD was that the monsters rarely ever stayed and had music ques playing which kind of betrayed if they were around and when they despawned. So really, it was just hide, wait, and continue.

SOMA though, they stayed, and they also did way more the monsters. Dear lord did it make the game tougher and scarier, but not in an annoying way. It's actually a brilliant combination I think that you make a game that is so scary that one might not play it any more because they got too scared of it, but yet the story is so compelling it just pushes you to go on because you crave to know more. This is by the way why I never finished Outlast because something about the story just didn't grab my attention and it was still, for me, very scary. So yeah, I quit that one.

So a good story is so extremely vital for a game that is so tense.

Anyway, the monsters, first they appeared fairly tame, they just patrol, they react to objects thrown though it was hard to use that tactic without them somehow still noticing you. Then came Discoball... The teleporting ability gave a huge: "Oh crap!" Moment, that got me excited and freaked out at the same time.

The next surprise was the Angler Fish which was indeed mean, but I didn't feel cheated on, it's what Angler Fish do more or less. You search for lights, Angler Fish knows this, uses its light to lure you and nom! Luckily it didn't kill me and only happened once.

Then came the Robo Girl... I was so confused at first, wondering why it was only yelling and causing some sort of shockwave when an object was thrown but not investigating. I even managed to throw an object against her but still no movement! This sudden change in what one is used to with encounters brought such a level of uncertainty that it created a huge amount of psygological fear, it was insane... (And that girl was messed up... Also the irregular breathing, huffing and what not, she was scary by just standing there!)

The last interesting part was the Infected Deep Sea Diver, now he didn't do anything out of the ordinary, but it was the area he was in and the way he came in... You're just entering a facility and suddenly you hear alarms blaring and an automated voice mentioning the airlock is used. Since you're pretty much the last sane being left you already think: "Oh crap, that can't be good..." And this heavy tentacle face Deep Sea Diver comes out and you're in some pretty tight corners, make one wrong decision and you can't sneak around it anymore since there is simply no alternative route, that part was difficult!

So yeah, that is my two cents on this, I really think the encounters were a lot scarier, awesome job!

[GhylTarvoke]

@Hionimi: Excellent analysis. I'll just echo everything you said.

In TDD, once I realized that monsters eventually despawned, my fear almost vanished. SOMA skirts that pitfall.

Good point regarding the relationship between tension and storytelling.

With the robot girl, I kept thinking, "What the heck?" Very unexpected.

It's weird how Yoshida is so scary, even though he's a very conventional monster. You're right that the environment is largely responsible.