Official Poll Regarding SOMA's Monsters

[Radiance]

Design is great but encounters are annoying. I would like to control it somehow.
Also, there wasn't any ranged attacks of monsters. This could be some idea to explore.
Disco ball head could teleport to you so it has kind of a ranged attack.

[VaeVictis]

I mostly found myself waiting for them to leave the area, especially if I knew what I had to do to progress. That isn't to say that they didn't cause me to jump every now and again, but after the initial encounter it was mostly just another obstacle to get around.

[Damascus Rose]

I found them all to be progressively more terrifying, the crying lady the most so because I didn't understand what it was or what it would do. It looked and sounded creepy as shit, left my skin crawling. The proxies were decent, but the part with Akers was the most terrifying and a highlight for me.

The diving suit guy though, he initially scared the crap outta me but then he just wouldn't fuck off and kept chasing and killing me everywhere I went. I kept going to the rooms and just wanted to read the terminal and the notes but he wouldn't let me. I initially didn't realize that I could use the light to stop him (and when I shone the light on him I thought it was a bug that he stopped because I was standing behind stuff), and when I did the spell was broken and he wasn't scary at all. Also even after I realized he didn't like the light he kicked my ass and killed me again. The design and sounds of this character are great, but mainly his behaviour isn't optimal in my opinion. It would've been great if he didn't constantly patrol outside the room I was in, I kept waiting for him to lose interest and walk somewhere else for a bit but he didn't. I think if this guy had a bit more build up I would understand about the whole flashlight thing, and make me way more scared when he showed up.

I think the main thing to fix would be the patrol patterns, it happened before with the proxy in the server room where he chased me out then kept patrolling the same area without leaving me a chance to move. It would make sense for him to lose interest and go back to whatever he was doing after a while. I also watched a few others stream the game and they got frustrated with this as well.

[PathOS]

Patrol patterns are likely very tricky to program. On the one hand if you program them to patrol at a distance you could potentially end up with a situation where the enemy is not a threat at all and you can easily lose it where it goes off to the other end of the level. And on the other hand if you program them to be too "clingy" then they can get to become a nuisance. Obviously the Alien in Isolation was criticized for being both in certain situations. It seems that Akers may also have been a bit too "Clingy".

I didn't mind Disco-Ball-Head's tracking of you, as I just accepted that it was teleporting to different areas of the Ship as you continued to progress through it.

The Screaming Woman was great because you couldn't figure out what was going on with her and all her movements

[Damascus Rose]

I found akers perfect, I felt like he was a threat at all times but I also felt I could do something about it by hiding and listening carefully. he kicked my ass a few times but that's mostly because I forgot about the whole blindness thing. I felt absolutely terrified because of his sounds and especially how he looked. He had great build up that really added to the fear and I love that he locked you in a 'lucid dream' like he wrote on his wall in structure gel. Then you realize all those panting bodies you see are having wau dreams as well- it's just very well executed and rooted in the story, and themes. He was the pinnacle of the horror in the game for me and probably the most scared/threatened I've felt from a game.

The screamer was the creepiest skin crawliest thing, for reasons we all understand. Perfect except that maybe she can get a bit frustrating blocking your path and what not. She creeped me out the most but she wasn't a large threat so that's why I rate akers higher.

[Mina Darsh]

I now vote for Yoshida as scariest monster, it just glitched the Hell out on my when it was running towards me... Stretched polies and all... One thing scarier than any monster is one that glitches out... ._.'

[Sevtai]

A lot of people are commenting about Akers and the glass, which is interesting, cause it sounds like a great moment.

I missed it because I went straight to the security office, and just unlocked the to door to Brandon's room =p

As such, and unrelated to the monsters, I really appreciate that there are so many different methods.

[PathOS]

Yeah I too didn't do the window thing as I had unlocked it from the security office as well. Akers still followed me into the room but I managed to wait him out by not moving and making any noise and he went away again.

[Brakespear]

I've been a fan of these games since Penumbra (even wrote about them in PC Zone, back in the day), and I've thoroughly enjoyed the ongoing evolution of the franchise... and so far, I've been impressed with Soma (even if the story was kinda spoiled by the film "Cargo" and by the book "The Footprints of God").

The thing I've enjoyed the most about Soma's monsters is that they have been used sparingly. Most of the time, the most terrifying thing about them is the implication of them - the distant howl, the anticipation. The one you can't look at, for example? Great concept. Been done before, sure, but it worked really well to ensure that I never actually got a clear view of them (rather like the crazy guy in Sunshine)... so they remained "unknown".

But that one people are calling Akers? I haven't even been able to establish that it *is* Akers, because he's getting in the way of my exploration. He is very, very annoying. Scary, sure. But mostly annoying.

Just now, I tried to seek refuge in Brandon's room, since the door was still locked, but my stupid virtual body spectacularly failed to jump through the window, and Akers got me.

I limped towards the nearest heal station... and Akers, having reset, appeared in the doorway behind me mere seconds later, and came wandering straight towards me, and I was trapped right after using the health-sphincter.

There's really no point giving the player a couple of lives if the respawn and target acquisition speed of the monster negates that second life. Furthermore, Soma's strengths are predominantly its atmosphere and story. With that annoying zombie following me everywhere, I'm unable to enjoy the atmosphere, and prevented from delving into the story - my explorations become random lunges along a maze of corridors every time I do something that magically triggers a chase.

Make Akers go away after a while, or move the story content in that area. There should be no audio logs in an unsafe area, unless you pause the game to deliver them or allow the player to archive them.

[Brakespear]

Actually, I'll change my conclusions where the Akers scenario is concerned, having played a bit more... but I'll leave my original complaint there because it was my "first impression".

The problem with Akers, that I think others experience too, just stems from the implementation.

Until this point in the game, all monster encounters are neatly divided by chapter; repeated encounters of the same monster/type of monster are expected within that chapter and environment. The Helper robot at the beginning? You know he's hunting you, so when he (or another helper) arrives later, it makes sense.

Same with the "don't look at them" guys. You know there's more than one. You know you're still in their territory; there are lots and lots of scripted appearances and audio cues to let you know that you're not free of them yet.

With the introduction of both of these monster types, there are clear rules; with the Helper, you kinda guess (since it's your first monster) that conventional stealth rules apply, and the enemy will respond to light and sound. With the second monster, Catherine actually *tells* you the rules - warning you not to look at it.

With the Proxies, the game actually implies there is only one, initially; when you descend the stairs to the first proxy's area, Catherine mentions finding a warning about "the proxy" responding to sound. THE proxy. At least that's how I heard it.

Given the collapsed state of the stairs, and the fact that you have to climb to escape that area, it's also implied that THE proxy is left behind in the depths, and there are no subsequent audio or visual cues to imply that it escaped.

So when you finally arrive at the Akers area, you view it as a new chapter, with new rules. And as you explore, you wait for something to make those rules clear. But instead, for the first time, you're forced to learn from your mistakes; for many people (myself included) the broken window to Brandon's office is the first thing you encounter. You smash it, because the game has taught you that cracked windows can be smashed, and that smashable windows lead to game progression. Akers shows up, looking decidedly different to the previous Proxy, and you cower in terror; hiding, because you don't realise he can't see you.

The problem with this is the problem with all horror games; because the player hasn't figured it out yet, they'll probably die. And you can only kill them once; once the player has died, their fear of death diminishes. Without that fear of death, failure creates frustration.

Once the player actually knows the rules of this scenario (that Akers jumps back into the ducts after a while, and that the player must be quiet), it works very well. Personally, I've never felt so tense opening a desk drawer and hearing a pen roll around inside. So I think all it really needed was for the player to find an audio log or some sort of cue to let them know that they're dealing with *another* proxy.