The Light Keeps Us Safe

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The light might well keep you safe, but after the blue-sky sci-fi of The Signal From Tölva, Big Robot’s latest is a return to much darker territory. And we’re not just talking about the colour palette – while Sir, You Are Being Hunted offered a more playful brand of scare, this is the studio adopting the tone and tenor of serious horror. Set in a desolate, procedurally generated world patrolled by twitchy machines – instructively, the first area you visit (and the game’s original working title) is Bleak Road – it all but demands to be played with the lights down and the volume up. “We do atmospheric stuff pretty well,” creative lead Jim Rossignol says. No kidding.

For all its danger, it’s a weirdly alluring place – certainly more so than the dingy, grotty little bunker you find yourself in at the start. Encouraged to venture outside by a woman’s voice – Burnistoun’s Louise Stewart strikes a fittingly stark, sombre tone – you’ll find yourself exploring a world built around a high-contrast aesthetic that gives you landmarks you can easily pick out from a distance, with bright lights representing both danger and opportunity. A red glow in the distance might mean a building full of supplies; it will also, almost certainly, mean there are machines nearby to distract or disable before you can get inside and grab them.