Official Poll Regarding SOMA's Monsters

[Googolplex]

There are different monsters, some are not scary and others (the monsters in THETA) are extremely scary. They looks like from Silent Hill - very disturbing! The encounters are mostly perfect, but I find one monster (this one in TAU) very annoying. But after I finished the game, I think it is good as it is. It's a horror game and some tense is always that what people "enjoy".

[WALP]

Not quite certain which answer to pick, I probably lie somewhere inbetween "A bit scary, but interesting to encounter" and "very scary and interesting to encounter".

If I were to describe how I felt about the monsters, I would neither say they were only a bit creepy like in aamfp, nor would I say they scared me in the way the dark decent did(appart from a couple moments).

Really if I were to describe monsters in SOMA in one word, it would be "Tormenting".
They always seemed to have a lot of presence and were hard to predict from the beginning.
Even when you finally got the hang of avoiding one enemy the game would mix things up and throw something new at you, pulling you out of that "comfort" and into forcing yourself through the unknown.
Unlike in Amnesia when it was like "Build-up->Release->Build-up->Release", SOMA would only let me breathe for just the minimal time I needed, before throwing me back into hell. Even when I got "killed" I would not be able to escape to a checkpoint like in Amnesia, I would just be knocked out and awaken with an enemy meters away from me, like "OH YOU THOUGHT IT WAS OVER? KEEP GOING MATE!". The game would just continue to torment me, more and more. When I thought I was safe at the screens Ross shows up. When I thought I could wait for enemies to patrol away you give me an enemy I have to approach. When I thought I could sneak I get a running guy who will eventually find me no matter what.

Like that the game continued to keep me on guard. When I picked up the arc I would normally have thought I was safe, but now that kind of "trust" had been completely broken for me. When I was in that open room in the last level where you have to carry the ark I was like "I knew it" being 99% certain something was going to attack me in that level, but nothing ever came.

When I was by the ending of the game I had never really been scared and freaked the fuck out, but I was not capable of being dissapointed by that, because I was just happy that the Torment was almost over.

SOMA might not have been as scary as Amnesia but SOMA never ever let me go until the end.

Then again I can understand that for others this Torment could easily turn into annoyance. Personally I have a lot of patience and spend up to an hour solving puzzles with monsters around, which could annoy other players, especially if they spend longer.

But in my case I really felt I got the perfect experience.

[Filizitas]

I would add an option for "weird and entertaining" Cause i just loved them for their randamoness and weird behavior!

Tentacle raping guy ;

[BrothaAtlas]

I also chose 'a bit scary and interesting to encounter'. I think, for me, what made them so interesting was how they fitted into the story. I kept wondering if it was someone I had heard in audio logs or read about somewhere, and I loved that feeling! The mystery worked so good with the atmosphere too.

What I found quite scary, besides the awesome sound design, were the build up moments. Like before you encounter the diving suit and is notified that someone is coming in, I remember that giving me chills. The randomness of some enemies, as someone mentioned, was also quite thrilling.

The reason why I didn't choose 'very scary' is because I found many of the monsters quite easy to outmaneuver, and if I happened to eventually get caught, it felt like I wasn't really punished for it. It also felt like the encounters in the darker areas had more of an effect, as I had neither any clue of their whereabouts, nor what they in fact looked like

[ktch]

The Tau diver was definitely the freakiest one for me and had my heart bounding and hands shaking. Akers and friends were very neat at first but started to get a little annoying towards maintenance due to repetition. Regardless, the game was an absolute blast to play through

[Nyarlathotep]

They were pretty scary, for sure. Some worked better than others, I feel like the Theta sequence nailed it but then something like the chase on the curie just got me killed a bunch of times and wasn't very exciting even on the first attempt.

They didn't always feel necessary or fitting. Like, amnesia-style sequences injected into a game that is focused on something else. I was hoping for the encounters to be a little more unique or weird, not as outwardly aggressive all the time.

Love the game overall though, and even the worst monster encounters didn't detract too much for me.

[Zurkon]

I liked most of the encounters, but the long stretch of Proxies after the DUNBAT crash dragged a little long.

[LordOfDragons]

Well since it is really easy to scare my socks off (A simple poke from behind and a "BOO" will do ), i had much fun with SOMA's monsters. The first encounters are the scariest ones of course and they made me crouch through the whole area, even if not needed too (Flesher in Lambda/Curie).

The infected robot only scared me a bit at the first encounter. I somehow think that it is funny instead of scary haha
Kinda the same with the weird mining robot in the occean levels which wants to suck out structure gel from you(Look at his lines, i think they are pretty funny). These 2 were rather funny to me, but i still enjoyed encounting them.

But then...
But then...

Akers ruined it. He and the other proxies were so intense. You make one noise and he comes for you (Even though the tentacle guy is more cruel in my opinion.).

So, i think the monsters did really well.
Especially the creatures from THETA to the end of the game. These ones were the worst ones...

[Mothhive]

Gonna be brutally honest as you're obviously wanting feedback to make your future games as good as possible, and let me just say I really enjoyed the overall experience of SOMA, but I went for "A bit scary, but mostly annoying". Potential spoilers ahead, so please don't read on if you haven't finished it.

Most of the monsters were incredibly easy to avoid and didn't feel like a threat, and when I got caught the first time by one of them, I wasn't scared, just frustrated that I had to backtrack.

The most frustrating parts were when the monsters were where I needed to go. I don't mean patrolling the area I needed to go through (which would have been fine), I mean they were just standing in one spot, blocking where I was meant to be going.

The first time it happened was on the Curie, and the monster just wasn't moving. I had to let it see me and chase me, I hid to lose it, then made my way back to the area, hoping it was trying to find me, but it was right back in it's starting position. Might have been a bug, but it seemed intentional to me and that what I was meant to do was have it chase me around in a circle so that I could run past where it was originally standing. If I was having to sneak around that area, knowing it was nearby and looking for me, it would have been much more scary, but instead it was more like "Pekaboo! Bet you can't catch me".

The second time was when I had to get battery pack for the new suit, and there was a monster standing directly in front of it and not moving (this was my second time in that area as I didn't realise anything was there the first, and the monster wasn't moving so just left to explore more). Every time I tried to approach it, the screen would go a little weird, but the monster would just stand there. I started throwing things around to grab it's attention, but it still wasn't moving. I started throwing things closer and closer to it, and still no reaction. In the end I had to throw and hit it with something for it to even react, then I had to have it run after me in a circle so I could grab the battery pack and run away. Having monsters activate only when you hit them with stuff seemed like terrible design to me, so I searched for it on Youtube and in the first playthrough I came across, the guy seemed to be just as confused as I was the first time I went there, and left after the monster didn't react to him. He later came back and just thought screw it, and ran right in-front of the monster and grabbed the battery pack. I think he was a bit shocked that it hadn't murdered him on the spot (which you'd think would be the logical conclusion of getting right in it's face) and after running out of the room, he looked back and it was still standing there for a second or two before it stopped screaming and ran after him. Then he shut a door behind him and it just gave up. A very poorly designed encounter in my opinion as the approach you need to take makes no sense.

The other monster that was annoying and not scary was the worm thing that chases you near the end. I was often hiding behind things, or in areas I would think would protect me (surprised anything did since it tunnelled through a floor to kill Ross), and it would just suddenly murder me, sending me back a little, and disorientating me so I din;t know where I was, or which direction I needed to go.


Hope that helps, and please don't take any of the criticism to heart. I really enjoyed SOMA, and while it wasn't as scary as I hoped, the story and setting were much more interesting and enjoyable than your previous games (which I also enjoyed).

[Atwa]

Very scary, but also a bit annoying
I thought most of the encounters were excellent, I only got a bit frustrated in CURIE. Because I didn't understand quite what made the monster attack me, and the area was so small. I loved being chased by him though.

All the other monsters I thought were excellent. I liked that none were dragged out, meaning that they never lasted too long. I adored that we got so many different ones and I dreaded the next one and anticipated what it would be.