Survival games are a dime a dozen these days, and it’s tough to find one that does something – anything - to set itself apart from a sea of similar games. The Solus Project hopes to set itself apart by weaving a narrative in with its survival mechanics, creating an experience where you’re scavenging the environment not just for food, water, and shelter, but for clues to an unfolding mystery. The game hit Early Access recently, and we got the chance to dive in and see how it’s shaping up.
But first, let’s talk about Early Access. Yes, it’s where survival games go to live, and more often than not, it’s where they go to die. The Solus Project, as a narrative-driven game with a set beginning and end, seems like a poor fit for EA, but it’s essentially an episodic release with some additional bug fixes and tweaks along the way. Updates are coming in chunks that each provide an hour or two of content, with the final release of the game coming in roughly three months. It’s an odd release plan, and one I’m not entirely sold on, but at least the game should be available in its final form soon. This preview is based on the first phase of the Early Access period, featuring the first three levels of the game.
The Solus Project casts you as an astronaut on a mission to save humanity. Not by killing a bunch of aliens or anything, but by seeking out a new planet suitable for human life. As you approach the alien world you’ve been sent to explore, disaster strikes, killing most of your crew and sending the debris of your ship hurtling toward the surface.
The game begins as you emerge from your escape pod. The Solus Project has all the trappings of a survival game, but it’s almost more of a thematic element than the game’s true focus, which is exploration and discovery of its narrative. You’ll gather food and water and need to keep a torch lit for warmth, but supplies are abundant, and you’ll have moved on to the next area before you’re in any danger of running out.
In a further act to distinguish itself from other games built around survival in a hostile environment, the game is built as a series of discrete levels. The lead designer, Sjoerd De Jong, says that this was a very deliberate choice. He wanted to create a game with survival elements, but without the directionlessness that defines the survival genre. In the Solus Project, there’s always a clear objective, often indicated by a waypoint.
Which isn’t to say that the game’s a linear run from objective to objective. While the large goals that determine your progress through the game are arrayed in a very set order, exploration is well-rewarded, and goals are often hidden behind obstacles that you need to search out the answers to. Sometimes by exploring you’ll find resources to help you survive, or artifacts that increase your resistance to hunger or the elements. Other times you’ll find a tool that you need to make progress.
Along the way, you’ll discover notes from other crew members scattered among the wreckage of your ship, and find alien ruins that hint at ancient mysteries and secrets. The piece of the game currently available doesn’t even cover a quarter of the total length, and the direction of the story has barely even begun to take shape. Nonetheless, there are enough interesting hints to make me want to see where it goes.
The game’s divided about evenly between open outdoor areas and more constrained indoor tunnels and ruins. In the early parts of the game, the former will challenge you more with exploration, while the latter is built around puzzle solving. In both cases, the alien world is mesmerizing. The weird landscapes and strange colors of the sky are as beautiful as they are weird and frightening, and the aesthetic reminded me greatly of the classic sci-fi film Forbidden Planet. In both cases, the look of the world and the color of the light strike an incredible balance to make the environment both inviting and threatening.
I can level similar praise to the sound design. It’s weird and synth-heavy, making it hard to tell what’s coming from the ambient soundtrack and what’s coming from the environment itself - which is, again, similar to classic sci-fi films.
I’m very excited by what I’ve seen of the Solus Project so far. There’s a very solid base here, and the game’s final quality is down to how interesting the later steps of its story become and how long its survival mechanics stay interesting. In any case, I’m looking forward to seeing where it goes. You can play the Early Access version of the game now, and the final release is planned for some time in May.
