“Do Not Dock”.
Scrawled onto the parapets that neighbour my intended port of call, like the inscription Dante saw engraved atop the gates of hell, is this ominous message.
I infer that it must have been left by some conscientious citizen who has long since departed from this accursed place. Whether in the metaphysical sense or because they just slipped aboard a passing boat. Either way, one thing’s for sure: they have departed.
As I prepare to berth at the makeshift jetty before me, it becomes increasingly clear that the islet to which I am drawn hasn’t played host to a living soul for quite some time. Sure, there are plenty of people scattered around. But none of them are breathing…
Taking stock of just how many corpses line the path up from the pier and towards my destination, I have to concede that the author of that foreboding missive may well have had a point. Docking here does seem like a bad plan!
Still, I have no choice but to press on, for I must reach that abandoned church which looms menacingly up ahead. As my port draws inexorably closer, I try to think of an alternative route. A diversion that will, yes, eat up valuable seconds when I have not one left to spare, but also grant me passage through the district without having to set foot on this godforsaken inlet.
It’s not just the graffiti that’s got me on edge, you see. Everything in the vicinity seems to be screaming “turn back”. Additional portents corroborate the one I first saw upon approach (with these supplementary writings warning of “Murderers” and “Lunatics”, while urging me to “Stay Away”), carrion birds orbit the church steeple, and my boat’s flywheel has begun sputtering erratically as if it is actively resisting going any further.
In spite of these ill omens and going against every self-preservation instinct in my bones, I eventually make landfall on the small island. Hitching my dinghy to the port, I then begin the short pilgrimage towards that desecrated seat of authority, which currently stands between me and a terrible destiny.
Along the way, I glimpse signs of profane influence infecting the place of worship. The floor is teeming with Slither — that damned worm-like pestilence that has all but consumed my city — while insectoid monstrosities from some blasphemous realm wait in the wings, occasionally darting from hollowed out tombs to snatch bodies or to spring an ambush.
It feels like an age before I reach the church door, but when I finally do, it comes as an indescribable relief. I’ve never been much of a religious man — having devoted much of my formative years to lying, cheating, and the pursuit of occult artefacts — but, right now, I can understand the appeal. Basking in the warm glow of the vestibule, shielded from the horrors of the outside world by beautiful stained glass, this feels like a true safe haven. It’s almost enough to make an old swindler convert!
Emphasis on the word “almost”. While the church does provide sanctuary from the Slither and the various other abominations that have infested Arkham, it’s clear that even it has not been able to fully escape perversion. Epistolary accounts scatter the aisles, telling of how the parishioners here turned away from the Lord a long time ago, in favour of a new, pernicious faith in dark things that slumber beneath the waves. They write of antediluvian beings from the abyssal depths of the ocean, of bizarre rituals committed in their name, and of some ancient trident that can bend the very elements to its will.
As I study these clues, the voice of local broadcaster, Mushroom Jack, echoes through the building. Gibbering from the comfort of his radio station, he’s relating a tale he once heard about a man who ventured into the church undercroft only to come up against a wall of flesh that was stretched tight, and a malevolent eye that seemed to instil madness in anyone who dared meet its gaze. Guess that’s where I’m heading.
I have no idea what I’ve walked into here, or how any of these puzzle pieces fit together. But it’s my job to find out what it all means and what to do about that formless thing that’s apparently taken root in the crypt. After all, she’s depending on me.
Who Doesn’t Love a Good Underdog Story?
Please forgive that feeble attempt at mimicking the prose of H.P. Lovecraft, but there’s a reason we took that tack when introducing our preview. It seemed like the most evocative way of conveying what The Sinking City 2 is going for.
Indeed, Frogwares’ long-awaited sequel might not feature any such narration from its protagonist. But, if it did, it would sound just like an authentic excerpt from Lovecraft’s oeuvre, complete with the same grim fatalism, the same loquacious phrasing, and the same curious blend of gothic and cosmic horror. Because this is a game that has a keen understanding of what’s made the controversial author’s output, and the shared universe it inhabits, endure in the zeitgeist for well over a century.
The same was true of its underrated 2019 predecessor, to be fair. If you’re wondering why it’s taken so long for the developers to return to this material that they so obviously love, well, you can blame a protracted legal battle for that, as well as the devastating impact of the war in Ukraine. All things considered, it’s kind of a miracle that we’re getting any follow-up at all, never mind one that appears to be in such promising shape. Of course, an outpouring of support from the community (via Kickstarter) has helped to grease the proverbial wheels somewhat.
Nevertheless, credit where it’s due, Frogwares has made the best of a rough situation here and used the fallow period between The Sinking City and The Sinking City 2 to their advantage. You can tell they’ve thought ambitiously about how they can make their sequel a real quantum leap and not just an iterative upgrade.
Moving from Unreal Engine 4 to Unreal Engine 5, it certainly looks like a game that’s benefited from seven years of technological advancements (especially when it comes to the enhanced lighting and water effects). But it’s crucially way more refined from a mechanical perspective, too.
With the best will in the world, the original game was a textbook case of Eurojank. For all of the creative ideas, intriguing world-building, and experimental design choices, it was hardly the smoothest of experiences when you actually sat down to try and play it. There were glitches abound, the combat was floaty as hell, and the whole experience could generously be described as “rough around the edges”.
Its successor, on the other hand, is significantly more polished. Part of that’s because the team has evidently learned lessons from their first go-around and wisely heeded audience feedback. To be blunt, though, the main reason that The Sinking City 2 feels so much tighter than its predecessor is that Frogwares has closely emulated a franchise that can seemingly do no wrong at present.
Namely, they’ve had a go at making their own AA version of Resident Evil. Hey, if you’re gonna steal, you might as well steal from the best in the business!
Enter the Survival Horror
As we learned during our hands-on preview, it doesn’t take long for you to pick up on the Resi influence here. Whereas The Sinking City was an unusual hybrid of open-world detective sim and (rather clunky) monster-shooting action, this is primarily a linear survival-horror title that has a few investigative garnishes.
You do have access to a Charlie Kelly-style conspiracy board — from which you can string together clues and draw conclusions about the case at hand — yet it’s an optional system that we barely got to utilise during our vertical slice. There are also occasional mysteries to sleuth out, but these are secondary objectives that you can choose to disregard altogether if you’re so inclined.
Superseding the detective role-playing (which has been Frogwares’ bread and butter for decades, perfected through their many Sherlock Holmes adaptations) is all that Resident Evil stuff. Specifically, modern Resident Evil.
The resemblance goes much deeper than just the over-the-shoulder perspective and the interconnected level design, and trickles down into the minutiae. For example, you’ve got: single-use keys that can unlock containers of your choosing (ala Resident Evil Requiem’s lockpicks); a crafting system that sees the same ingredients being used to produce both health items and ammunition; safe rooms that provide an analogue method of recording progress and a magical inventory box; a map that uses color-coding to indicate which rooms have been searched; and a reward-system that allocates points for the completion of challenging feats. Hell, they even lift that one scene from the Resident Evil 2 remake, wherein you have to nervously slide open refrigerated drawers in a morgue.
To reiterate, it’s not necessarily a crazy idea to copy Resident Evil’s homework, and Frogwares does a stellar job of it when you consider their working with crowdfunding resources. Still, it’s pretty incontestable that that’s what’s happening here.
New City, New Flood, New Dangers
Where The Sinking City 2 is trying to carve out an identity of its own is less on the gameplay side of things, and more so with its enthralling world-building and narrative conceit.
Framed as part of the public domain “Cthulhu Mythos” (which studios are getting a lot of mileage out of lately), it’s set in an alternate United States, where all of Lovecraft’s demented imaginings are an accepted part of everyday American life. The existence of Shoggoths is no secret here, Deep One sightings are commonplace, and Innsmouthers are a recognised — albeit prejudiced against — societal group.
If you played the original game, you’ll already be acquainted with this high-concept premise. What you won’t be quite so familiar with, however, is the submerged municipality after which the sequel is titled. You see, this ain’t the same “Sinking City” we explored before. Last time around, we navigated the waterlogged ruins of Oakmont, Massachusetts, but now the action has been relocated to the waterlogged ruins of Arkham, Massachusetts. I mean, look on the bright side, at least the eldritch horrors have yet to cross any state lines!
The backstory for this fresh setting is that, at some point in the 1920s, Arkham was hit with two simultaneous, and possibly related, calamities. First, a devastating flood of unknown origins swept through the metropolis, drowning its streets, its public spaces, and its residences, until only those who had managed to stake out higher ground could even think about staying put.
The initial emergency response made sense on paper, with authorities erecting barricades and building floodgates, yet it did little to quell the rising tides. Before long, Arkham was twisted into a kind of neo-Venice, traversable only by boat or by bridges that were cobbled together from salvaged materials.
Things went from bad to worse when deadly vermin began to emerge from the dark waters. Known as “the Slither”, this parasitic scourge (which, funnily enough, looks just like those alien slugs from the James Gunn movie of the same name) spread at an alarming rate and sought refuge in the corpses that were starting to pile up in the streets-turned-canals. It soon became apparent to the Arkhamites that these worms were capable of more than just proliferating disease as well, with them having the ability to reanimate and then puppeteer the dead as grim marionettes.
Between this Slither plague and the other unholy abominations that came with the flood, the restoration of Arkham was written off as a lost cause. An evacuation was promptly mandated, and the once-great city was left to rot. The handful of people who remained behind gradually succumbed to corruption themselves, and it’s now purely the domain of stark raving lunatics and mad occult worshipers.
And you, of course!
On that note, The Sinking City 2 isn’t just thrusting you into a brand-new setting, but also into the shoes of a brand-new protagonist. Which is somewhat inevitable, given that the previous game’s lead, Charles Reed, was left to an uncertain fate that hinged entirely upon your choices
In Reed’s stead, you’ll now be controlling raffish adventurer Calvin Rafferty. He’s basically a Nathan Drake type; only, rather than hunting for cities of gold or legendary pirate booty, he’s more interested in blasphemous artifacts like the Necronomicon and the idols of Cthulhu.
A pre-flood flashback tells us everything we need to know about Calvin. We’re introduced to him as he swaggers into a restaurant, brazenly swipes two flutes of champagne from a waiter’s tray, and then plops himself down at a table across from a young lady who’s been waiting patiently for him to swan along. Boasting to (who we soon learn is his long-term girlfriend and partner in crime), Faye, Calvin crows about how he managed to avoid getting in any trouble whilst acquiring his latest occult prize. That is just before a bunch of armed men burst into the room to prove him wrong on that count.
Anyway, as you can tell, he is a classic rogue who doesn’t take anything seriously and is motivated primarily by a thirst for thrills, fortune, and glory. Yet the stakes are raised when we subsequently flash forward to the events of the main story and find him in much gloomier circumstances.
Here, we join a very different (and more focused) Calvin, who is now on a quest to save his beloved from the forces of darkness. You see, at some point, he and Faye recklessly performed a botched ritual together that left her in a coma, and him utterly distraught. Now, he’s searching for a way to revive her by any means necessary.
Dark Academia Courtesy of Miskatonic University
With this narrative context established, we’re dropped into our first proper gameplay sequence. Relatively early in the campaign, it has us combing the Miskatonic University library (an important place in the Lovecraftian canon) in search of a forbidden tome that will outline the steps Calvin must follow to bring Faye back to the land of the living.
We hope that we’ll be able to find the relevant piece of literature, but the odds are frankly stacked against us. After all, the place is in complete disarray; with flooding having ruined many of the volumes and the shelves having been toppled over by God only knows what. Expecting that the sanctity of the Dewey Decimal system has been preserved here seems like it might be asking a bit too much. Still, we must persevere for her sake and so begin sloshing our way through the ankle-deep waters that have seeped into every nook and cranny of the building.
It’s here that we get our first taste of that Resident Evil flavouring that’s been so liberally sprinkled throughout The Sinking City 2. Because this library annex is, for all intents and purposes, a miniaturised Raccoon City Police Department, complete with locked doors, interconnected shortcuts, and areas that are gated off by lite puzzles.
For an idea of the kind of thing you can expect, there’s one part where we have to reorganise bookcases using a series of cranks, so that we can create an uninterrupted path through the upper level of the building. Not only does this open up new rooms that have yet to be explored, but it also gives us a convenient way to loop around to the central staircase.
Said shortcut then comes in quite handy when we later need to backtrack down to the ground floor, having acquired a chemical agent that can be used to dissolve the lock on a crate we passed by earlier. It’s all very tightly structured like that.
While not as intricate as one of the larger-scale environments you might find in Resi, the library is still a nifty bit of level design. Negotiating these kinds of areas is always satisfying for fans of the survival horror genre, as you get to figure out how neatly everything fits together and pick the space clean of its valuable contents (the endorphin rush of watching the map turn that pleasing blue hue when you’re done never diminishes).
Speaking of the library’s contents, we do eventually find that arcane book we’ve been on the hunt for. Alas, it turns out that its pages are filled with indecipherable glyphs that we have no way of interpreting.
Yet, just when it seems like we’ve hit a dead end, we bump into a scholar who offers welcome assistance. He’s a bit of an eccentric, mind you, having gouged out his own fucking eyes and inserted Slither worms into the empty sockets. We’d roundly condemn his actions, by the way, were it not for the fact that these new oculars are what enable him to read the eldritch text in our possession. And we desperately need to know what it says.
Before he performs any such translation services, though, he wants us to bring him something first and dispatches us to the Devil’s Reef Hotel, where the “guest of honor” apparently awaits collection. Whatever the hell that means!
Look, we’ve got to do what the guy asks. He’s the only one who can give us the answers we seek.
The Lovecraftian Game is Afoot
That’s pretty much where you came in, as we then proceed to head over to that weird church with the sea god zealots and the wall of flesh stretched thin in its basement. To clarify, we’re not just here to see the sights. Rather, it’s a necessary pit-stop on our journey, because a sluice is blocking passage to the Devil’s Reef Hotel, and the parishioners of this church are the ones who used to control it. You know, back when they were alive.
Unfortunately, raising the gate isn’t going to be as easy as just hitting a big red button. The operating mechanism has been chained up with a combination lock, and we’ve got to work out the code if we want to get out of Dodge.
Which brings us to The Sinking City 2’s detective gameplay. The original title was quite involved when it came to these mechanics, with cases that unfolded across a sprawling open world. Among other things, you needed to question NPCs, reconstruct the events of crime scenes in chronological order, and visit the city hall to cross-reference archival data.
By comparison, investigations in the linear sequel are significantly pared back or, dare we say it, dumbed down. Relevant clues are localised to the immediate vicinity of the puzzle (in this case, the church and its grounds) and most of them appear to take the form of written notes. You can lump findings together in a mind palace to better organise your thoughts. Yet, other than that, it’s a surprisingly straightforward approach for a developer who built their entire brand on Sherlock Holmes mysteries.
Cracking the gate conundrum doesn’t take much lateral thinking, anyway. Although it is admittedly possible that the riddles will get more sophisticated as the game goes on. You never know, maybe the developers just wanted to show us a quick and easy one for the purposes of our demo slice.
Reassuringly, there is a more complex puzzle that you can choose to solve in the church if you want to 100% everything. We won’t spoil the specifics, but it involves a starfish key, a stone trident, a rotating monolith, a codex of symbols, and a ceremonial dagger.
To reiterate, you don’t have to tackle this extra challenge. However, doing so will unlock additional context that’s well worth seeing. In fact, based on our limited experience so far, we’d recommend engaging with The Sinking City 2’s optional brainteasers whenever you can. They grant access to cool secret areas like this, can uncover fascinating lore, will bring you face-to-face with new horrors (remember that eyeball in the crypt?), and might even yield tangible gameplay rewards.
Fill ‘Em With Lead and Upgraded Combat
Another incentive for solving all of the puzzles is that — again, like in some modern Resident Evil titles — you might happen upon an attachment for your favourite weapon. When we opened that aforementioned crate in the library, for example, we were rewarded with a compensator that could be affixed to our handgun to reduce its recoil and improve its accuracy.
Yet apart from a few Slither-possessed corpses and a handful of spindly insectoids (picture a cross between Xenomorph facehuggers and the demodogs from “Stranger Things”), there wasn’t actually a whole lot for us to shoot at in the first chunk of our preview. To get a better sense of the combat, we had to skip ahead to a more action-packed chapter.
Taking place much further along in the story, and further along into the ritual to save Faye, this portion trapped us in a deserted hospital where all manner of strange procedures were being performed on the patients. It’s a bigger environment than either the library or the church, roughly comparable in size to Brookhaven from Silent Hill 2. There’s a tantalising number of locked doors and a gnarly puzzle that requires us to use surgically removed faces in order to bypass anachronistic biometric technology.
We only get to skim the surface of that stuff, however, as our exploration is cut short after about 30 minutes. That’s okay, though, because this part of the demo is really just an excuse to test out The Sinking City 2’s new and (vastly) improved combat.
As we said before, the original game was bursting with charm and creativity, but it didn’t nail everything that it set out to achieve. Enemy encounters, in particular, were awkward, stilted, unresponsive, and frustrating. They were something you tolerated, so that you get to the next stretch of detective work (like eating your vegetables prior to dessert).
The upgrade that has occurred in the sequel is undeniable, and combat is now a legitimately enjoyable proposition. Creatures no longer soak up damage without visibly registering the impact of a shot, and will react appropriately depending on where you’ve hit them. Meanwhile, each weapon has a weighty kick to it, whether it’s the forceful blast of the shotgun or the jerky rat-a-tat-tat-tat of a Tommy gun.
It all just feels way more gratifying. At one point, there’s a scripted set-piece wherein waves of Slither-zombies start swarming in through the doors and smashing down windows, before eventually tackling us over a ledge amidst showers of falling debris, and it’s a thousand times more cinematic than anything we got in the original game.
It’s not just a question of presentation, though. There’s a far greater emphasis on battle tactics as well. On that note, Calvin plays very similarly to Leon Kennedy (that’s rookie RE2 Leon, not the roundhouse-kicking super-agent of RE4 and Requiem), which means you’ve got to think strategically about where you position yourself in the room and what the most economical way of bringing down a given threat is. Maybe you’ll take opportunistic potshots at a distance to whittle down the enemy hordes, or perhaps you’ll try to lure them all into a corridor to blast them all away with a well-judged shotgun blast.
You’ll need to adapt for each opponent too, as they all have their own idiosyncratic movement styles, different behavioural patterns, and unique attacks. Those little facehugger things, for instance, will skuttle underneath furniture and into hidden crevices to make you waste precious bullets, while spitter-type mutants will bombard you from afar with projectile acid. Even the garden-variety zombies have a little twist here, courtesy of their pulsating weak spots that shift around from limb to limb whenever you try to get a bead on them.
In short, the combat is a dramatic improvement over what came before. Our only reservation, at this moment in time, is that this slickness might have come at a cost of Frogwares’ signature detective mechanics, which seemed a tad underutilised in our brief time with the game.
Granted, there’s only so much you can glean from a 90-minute demo, but we just hope that there will be more meaty puzzles and investigations to balance out the gunfights. After all, that’s what gave the first one its personality.
Nevertheless, this remains an encouraging first impression of The Sinking City 2, and we can’t wait to wade into the murky waterways of Arkham when it releases in the Summer. After everything these developers have been through, we’re rooting for them to pull it off.
The Sinking City 2 is currently in development for release later this summer on the PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC via Steam and the Epic Games Store.