The Ultimate SOMA Discussion Thread

[Googolplex]

googol it's a video game

No. It is not a "game". Because games are about FUN. This is why Dear Esther, Amnesia & Penumbra etc. are different.
Nevertheless, if it would be a game, that wouldn't be a reason.

They said everything in SOMA should make sense.

[Deep One]

googol it's a video game

No. It is not a "game". Because games are about FUN. This is why Dear Esther, Amnesia & Penumbra etc. are different.
Nevertheless, if it would be a game, that wouldn't be a reason.

They said everything in SOMA should make sense.

They're still video games.

edit: "Definition of video game in English: A game played by electronically manipulating images produced by a computer program on a monitor or other display"

sooooooo if Frictional GAMES' games aren't games, what are they?

[Damascus Rose]

Googol has a point. The game's physics should make sense or it pulls you out of the immersion.

The excuse that it's a game isn't really an argument. Obviously it does have creative control and we have to suspend disbelief for many things in a lot of forms of media, but if something as fundamentally wrong as the things googol mentioned is present then it loses credibility.

About the walking underwater thing, I remember reading Thomas saying something about that along the lines of "I'm glad you noticed that, it will all be made clear on release"

[Kein]

I really hope this streamlining and focusing on narrative doesn't lead to another AAMFP disappointment.

"Another disappointment"? That's new to me, I thought AMFP was decent and I liked it. Definitely not disappointment.

I hope my subjective opinion didn't cast shadow over yours? Sorry I didn't mean to.

[Googolplex]

"Another disappointment"? That's new to me, I thought AMFP was decent and I liked it. Definitely not disappointment.

I agree. Overall AAMFP was not better than TDD, but the story was the best I ever esteemed in a media.

[Sampyli]

"Another disappointment"? That's new to me, I thought AMFP was decent and I liked it. Definitely not disappointment.

This.

Anyway, Thomas wrote in the blog (I think) about how everything has to make sense in SOMA instead of just saying it's magic or so like in TDD, so I somehow doubt they'd leave a thing like walking in the bottom of the ocean unexplained.

[pagan]

I really hope this streamlining and focusing on narrative doesn't lead to another AAMFP disappointment.

"Another disappointment"? That's new to me, I thought AMFP was decent and I liked it. Definitely not disappointment.

I hope my subjective opinion didn't cast shadow over yours? Sorry I didn't mean to.

You have every right to have your opinion, but i'm afraid we, who were disappointed, are the majority, unfortunately. I think it's no coincidence that Frictional blogged quite a lot about ATTD sales figures, but never mentions AMFP. It was nowhere near the same success story. (and not because it wasn't 'jumpscary' enough, contrary to popular belief in this forum, but because it was a shallow game with several immersion breaking design decisions).

[Potato]

You have every right to have your opinion, but i'm afraid we, who were disappointed, are the majority, unfortunately. I think it's no coincidence that Frictional blogged quite a lot about ATTD sales figures, but never mentions AMFP. It was nowhere near the same success story. (and not because it wasn't 'jumpscary' enough, contrary to popular belief in this forum, but because it was a shallow game with several immersion breaking design decisions).

I'm guessing SOMA will suffer from a immersion breaking design decision as well in your book since there's no inventory here to sate your needs.

I still don't know why people choose the most ridiculous of reasons to complain about AMFP. I'm fine with complaining about it not being very scary, but I could honestly care less about the inventory and sanity (object interaction to a lesser extent, I still got over it though unlike some people).

[7heDubz]

Or TCR made it akin to their wishes and design process? What if they made that game and amnesia TDD hadnt come out? (similar to Dear Esther) I'm pretty sure people woulda been like ZOMG so good.

The ONLY reason people think it was "sad" and "alone" and "game braking immersion" was because what they are comparing it to, is completely different.

Same name, different game, different people, different thought process, different design, different play-styles.

[Tesseract]

I just find some things very unrealistic:

- Monsters are walking under the ocean! Do you know how difficult it is to walk under water? It's almost impossible!

- Too many objects are floating in the water. I would like it to see a hand full floating objects, but normally things either were swimming on the plane or sinking to the ground.

- Underwater computers and radio messages?

If you're so concerned about realism perhaps you should just stop playing video games and go outside.
Everytime details about a game made by Frictional come out you always nitpick on the most irrelevant things.

You haven't played the game yet so there's probably an explanation as to why the enemies can walk on the ocean floor. From what I saw the enemies look like they're modified humans.

Too many floating objects? That's exactly what happens in water, things either float or sink.

Don't know what is wrong with an underwater facility having computers that look like they're specifically designed to be waterproof.