The Invincible trailer pulls you into an arid sci-fi dream, which feels at once familiar and new. Set on an unforgiving planet called Regis III, players will take the role of Dr. Yasna as an amnesiac astrobiologist who is separated from the rest of her crashed research vessel crewmates. Your job is to find the rest of your fallen comrades, as you navigate the ‘cunning, murky, and cunning’ planet.
There is an almost dreamlike gloss to the visuals here, with grand landscapes, a chirping bird, a single jeep, and a solitary scientist striding out into the distance. There is a handheld red radio of some kind, with white lights, which reminds me of the portable tracker introduced in Alien, only without all the deadly surprises. The team cites Firewatch as a point of reference for the team, as well as Returnal, Prey, and Amnesia: Rebirth.
The game doesn’t formally have a name yet, but the website features a countdown to the supposed “worldwide premiere.” Certainly, the team has captured a certain kind of cinematic edge that I love in games such as Above, Below and Far Cry 4. Where games like Far Cry often indulge in grand vistas, there is a real sense of claustrophobia here as we find Dr. Yasna in almost complete solitude.
There is a fear for her crew, but also a curiosity to explore the mysteries of Regis III. As she says in voiceover, “Not everything everywhere is for us.” But, even as we glimpse those burning skies filled with shards and shards of floating, dejected space junk, an excitement bubbles at the back of my throat – the same excitement I felt watching astronauts emerging from the module for the first time, or strapped into that cumbersome headset for that grisly spacewalk.
Starward Industries will develop and publish the game.