By Quintin Smith on November 2nd, 2010 at 2:20 pm.
This April, Jim sluggishly wobbled into action when German publishers The Game Company announced they’d be publishing a Polish 3rd person survival horror shooter called Afterfall: Insanity. This morning, we got a press release from German publishers Just A Game will be publishing Afterfall: Insanity in 2011. Why? Oh. Turns out The Game Company declared insolvency earlier this year. They will be missed.
The new press release has more details on Afterfall’s “sinister post-apocalyptic setting” and “very sophisticated story”. RPS readers! I hereby invite you to be the judge of that.
Berlin , November 01st, 2010 – The Berlin publisher Just A Game secured the global sales rights in Afterfall: Insanity. The survival-horror-shooter from Nicolas Games uses the Unreal-3 engine and will be released for Windows PC, Xbox360 and PS3 in 2011. With its sinister post-apocalyptic setting and a very sophisticated story with various surprising twists and turns unusual for that genre, Afterfall: Insanity will cause an adrenaline rush in fans and newcomers to the genre alike.
It is 2032 – 20 years after the end of World War III. To survive the nuclear holocaust, humankind fled from the contaminated surface to find safety in bunkers, mines and huge cities below ground. As mysterious psychologist Adam, the player will be part of a team of medical scientists in charge of monitoring the fugitives’ mental stability. Humankind may have survived certain death aboveground, but their safe haven threatens to turn into a cursed prison.
In this 3rd-person-shooter, the player will fight mutants and hostile war victims in the dreary ruins of once beautiful cities and in the refuges below former European metropolises to discover a horrible truth. However, if he does not face his greatest weaknesses and deepest fears, the player will not survive the claustrophobic depths of the underground from which there is no escape and where the darkness hides more secrets than just the madness of its inhabitants.
Being in charge of a team, eh? Darkness hiding more secrets than just the madness of its inhabitants, eh? I think– NO! I’ve just noticed that the the one thing Jim commented on, the developers’ excellent name- “Nicolas Intoxicate” – is now “Nicolas Games”. Seems like a bad omen to me. Although in the course of researching that, I found out that the studio was created by fans of Stalker and the original Fallout games, which is surely a good thing. Also, Inc Gamers notes that the earliest screenshots of Afterfall: Insanity date right back to 2006, when it was an isometric, tactical game. Hmm.
Hypothesising is difficult. Guess we should just wait for some footage.
Interesting… kinda. Another post-apocalypse, but at least you’re doing something more interesting. I’ve been waiting for a game in which you play a scientist trying to do scientist things despite the environment. I just hope that the shooty-bits don’t completely overwhelm the science-bits.
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I was looking forward to this game when it was supposed to be a Fallout-inspired turn-based isometric RPG.
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I look forward to a very sophisticated story with various surprising twists and turns unusual for that genre.
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Is post-apocalyptica the new WW2 / modern war setting?
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Mabye. But you can vary much much more with ‘post apocolyptica’. Everyone has a different view on how places are going to look after major natural disaster, a nuclear disaster, or a man made natural disaster (everyone also has a different view on how the world is actually going to end). Then you have the location and the timeframe, how much technology survived, if it is actually just a local disaster or a worldwide one (Stalker vs Metro), etc.
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Was isometric? *sigh*
3rd person? *sigh*
One can only hope for the best … but, being the pessimist that I am, I don’t think it’ll even come close to Stakler never mind Fallout. The story sounds like your run of the mill video game tale, which isn’t a good thing.
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Who writes this shit? The story is about as original as a cover of Unchained Melody.
P-u-l-e-a-s-e!
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Is that the… Free Man?
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Is it possible to make a good game story without the use of monsters and space marines?
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Sure it is! Of course, you have to replace them with wizards and orcs. Apparently there is a law or something.
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Sure! But you have to use wizards and orcs. Apparently there is a law or something.
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Hah, futuristic Hussars!
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You thinking AOEII as well? Gangster…
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Hey, who left their Metro 2033 plot lying around here?
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I think it was found on a train next to Bobby Kotiks WW2 plot.
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Interesting that it was in creation before even previews of metro 2033 then.
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So WW3 is supposed to last a year? At the most? Highly suspect.
Looks like a re-dressed Doom3 clone to me. I’m not usually one to so quickly dismiss something apparently hoping to tell a good story but… meh.
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In the event that WWIII was a full-scale engagement between major powers, it would probably be largley “over” within a week or so, although there might be some skirmishing to follow it up.
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I’m more astonished by the idea that there will be “huge cities below ground” for people to flee to in 2012. They’d better get started on those!
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“I’m more astonished by the idea that there will be “huge cities below ground” for people to flee to in 2012. They’d better get started on those!”
Have you played in a SMP minecraft server?, if anything, I *fear* the ability of humanity to build amazingly fast. Also, is really cheap that wen the only precondition to add another room to your house is “seems a good idea”.
We just need diamond pickaxes.
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Just to be clear: Nicolas Games is developing a game formerly published by The Game Company but with a new publisher, Just A Game. Sounds superfluously gamey.
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Bloody hostile war victims, always such a nuisance.
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Winter 2011 I guess?
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It is 2032 – 20 years after the end of World War III
So that’s what’s supposed to hit us in 2012?!
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On Dec 12th 2012 the Mayan calender ends. I think there may be some prphetic vision depeiting the end of the world associated with it. Some sort of doom anyway…
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Alternate history, like many other games?
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Do the “screenshots” in the article look a lot like mock ups to anyone else?
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uhm, looking at the last sceenshot seems like the player will control a dual welding machinegun Mr.Fantastic!
That’s awesome and original to say the least :)
(You say those are actually two men and not your very long arms? A man can dream…)
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Comment of the week!
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Oh my, it’s impossible to un-see it now.
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That would be original.
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Aww, why did I scroll back…
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1st screenshot – invokes the old pulp-sci-fi/original star wars feel.
2nd screenshot – I really hope the big thing on the left is just poking his head in and saying “Oh, who’s the new guy” while said new guy is startled. And foreground character is just looking over his shoulder saying “Hey Bob”.
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— “Being in charge of a team, eh? Darkness hiding more secrets than just the madness of its inhabitants, eh? I think– NO!”
No? Whats wrong with that phrase? Trying to be negative only to be negative seems a little bit childish. But what do I know…
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As mysterious psychologist Adam, the player will be part of a team of medical scientists in charge of monitoring the fugitives’ mental stability.
This bit sounded promising. But it turns out to be a shooter. Boo.
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Using 2012 as the date for their apocalypse doesn’t seem particularly original to me. But… you never know. They might get right what many in the mainstream aren’t.
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Nice flush of negativity we got here again. You guys know anything about the history of these devs? They started as an indie dev trying to create massively complex isometric 3D rpg much like fallouts (but insanely more complex – you know, the standard Eastern Europe complex :P), but eventually realized it’s not going to happen without a publisher.
And so in their quest for a publisher and hope for some standard of living while working 100% in game dev, they (Intoxicate games, or what it was called?) became part of Nicolas games, and apparently they intend to create a series of games in the Afterfall universe. Whether or not we’ll ever see the original RPG plan highly depends on the success of this game and perhaps others that will be. Now it seems they’ve had to jump publishers time after time, making me personally even more sympathetic to their cause.
Anyway, it seems there’s a noble dream behind this all. Of course this doesn’t tell us anything about how Insanity will turn out. But regardless, a bit of support and a tad less negativity (maybe even open objectivity?) would be in order for anyone with even a little respect to indie devs and smaller studios.
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To be fair, when you start your PR blurb with saying it has ‘a very sophisticated story’, and then not really give any real indication of such a sophisticated story existing, you’re kind of asking for it.
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Forgot to say – until we actually get to see the game in action, the gaming audience tends to skew towards the more negative, what with the enormous amount of mediocre to horrible games we’ve had to endure.
The road to mediocre games is paved with noble dreams.
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It might have a sophisticated story – it’s far too early to tell. I am glad a game would want to advertise it’s story, that’s a good thing. It doesn’t even have a synopsis here, it has a brief overview of the ‘sinister’ setting, which sounds good to me: A psychologist begins to notice that humans, now forced to live underground by a world war, are apparently going mad. You could have a great plot with that as the central premise of the story.
I mean, you could quite easily have a terrible plot as well, and it could be really over familiar, with wastelands and mutants. Ruined European (Polish?) cities sounds unusual for a start, as does the psychology aspect – A Penumbra type game set in hive-like habitats under Krakow – where there are already massive mines – could be great without being cliche, and could explain how people got underground so quickly.
3rd person is actually really conducive to a good story as well, especially with an interesting main character. Hopefully not a faceless space marine like in Dead Space. It’s rare that games feature a lead character that you actually care about and that is integral to the plot.
Survival horror is a dying genre but it’s still my favourite genre by far. I would also put money on new, good examples of it only coming, if they come at all, from Eastern Europe (or Japan or Scandinavia) so I am intrigued by this game. And I managed not to mention Silent Hill 2.
Although Mr Fantastic vs mutants in the last screen cap looks a bit worrying. But maybe they think you have to flash your monsters around for publicity – even Amnesia did that.
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I love the post-apoc setting
- can´t really comment on the story/plot before having played it tho.
hvaing to whack a few mutant skulls isn´t that bad, coz i love Doom clones aswell :)
nice character design- the scientists actually look like scientists instead of Supermodel-went-to-the-wrong-house
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+1 tag.
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Requiem avenging angel armour! Sweet!
I’m positive.
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The stiltedness of the language couldn’t possibly be related to translation/second language issues could it?
Nah. They’re just stupid. Let’s mock them and their assuredly craptastic game — the latter sight unseen.
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