Summary
For the last twelve months, we’ve had our heads down working hard on Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture and it’s really exciting to be able to share some more information with you as well as a new trailer.
If you already know The Chinese Room, you’ll know that we make story-driven games. Creating a rich, deep world with strong drama and exceptional production values is key to what we’re all about. Rapture is set in a remote valley in June 1984 and is a story about people and how they live with each other. But it’s also about the end of the world.
Rapture is inspired by the fiction of John Wyndham, J. G. Ballard, John Christopher and other authors who deal with ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances. There’s a very particular English feel that we wanted to capture in the game, a combination of the epic and the intimate. Rapture also came from our obsession with post-apocalyptic gaming, and the simple idea that whilst we normally play as the hero, in reality, most of us would be the piles of ash and bone littering the game world. That’s an interesting place to start telling a story.
Our approach is to create a game that you can utterly immerse yourself in. Yaughton Valley, where Rapture takes place, is a living, breathing world. The world of Rapture is not just a backdrop; it’s a character in its own right. It’s great working with PS4 as its processing power makes a game like this possible for a team our size.
The game is all about discovery. It’s open-world so you have the freedom to explore wherever you like, visiting areas in an order you define, and the story is written to allow this whilst making sure every player has a strong dramatic experience. It’s a type of storytelling that is completely unique to games. The choices you make as a player have a direct impact on how you understand the story – the more you explore and interact, the deeper you are drawn into Rapture’s world.
Storyline
Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture tells the story of the inhabitants of a remote English valley who are caught up in world-shattering events beyond their control or understanding. Made by The Chinese Room -- the studio responsible for the hauntingly beautiful Dear Esther -- this tale of how people respond in the face of grave adversity is a non-linear, open-world experience that pushes innovative interactive storytelling to the next level. This story begins with the end of the world.
Everybody's Gone to the Rapture Activation Instructions
Everybody's Gone to the Rapture Reviews & Ratings
This game is an experience one cannot expect from a video game. Masterpiece. Philosophy of life dressed up in a costume of messianic parousia.This game is an experience one cannot expect from a video game. Masterpiece. Philosophy of life dressed up in a costume of messianic parousia. Words can not express, what has been done here. "Simulation of walking"? Yea. But your empathy and brain cells must run harder than both your CPU and GPU. World design is wonderful, graphics are great and music by Jessica Curry leaves man speechless.
This is not a game.Visually speaking, EGTR is incredible. Rocking two 1080Tis in SLI, I struggled to maintain a decent framerate in UHD. TheThis is not a game.Visually speaking, EGTR is incredible. Rocking two 1080Tis in SLI, I struggled to maintain a decent framerate in UHD. The textures are spot on, the game look crisp and the level of detail is incredible as well. The audio is nice, as is the voice acting.While the story itself is interesting, the game sometimes becomes boring as you can't move but at a very slow speed. The fact that you can't jump, forcing you to make incredibly long detours when facing a 10cm-high fence, is also gamebreaking imho.
Continuing my story game theme as of late I jumped on this one as it looked interesting but after finishing it I could have lived withoutContinuing my story game theme as of late I jumped on this one as it looked interesting but after finishing it I could have lived without playing it. It's a pretty great art piece but a piss poor game, technically it's a shocker, I had to play with the 30fps cap enabled on medium settings just to maintain a somewhat stable frame rate, 60fps was out of the question even on low settings. It is a very nice looking game, on the same level as The Vanishing of Ethan Carter which blew me away but with considerably worse performance (60fps solid in TVoEC). The video settings menu was almost completely empty with only the basics available. The audio was really great though, both the music and voice work, absolutely no complaints here. Gameplay wise, well there wasn't any, at all, you literally walk around (VERY slowly) and press X occasionally, a lot of games are falsely labelled as walking sims but this really was just that. This would have been a much better game with proper optimisation and a proper run button (there's a sad excuse for one where you hold R2 and you slowly build up speed but it's not always available and you barely move any faster).
A true visual novel that draws you in and leaves you wanting more. Fantastic voice acting and musical score really just provide icing on the cake here. Very worthwhile!
The stunning graphics and the exceptional music, as well as voice overs, are not enough for a game that lacks appropriate optimization and a satisfactory interpretation of the events we tail after, packed in no longer than 5 hours. A very promising narrative experience that proves inadequate in many key areas.
| Release Date | August 11, 2015 |
| Publisher | The Chinese Room, Sony Computer Entertainment |
| Content Rated | M (Mature) |
| Game Modes | Single player |
| Player Perspectives | First person |
| Genres | Adventure |
| Themes | Science fiction, Drama |
| Platforms | PC (Microsoft Windows), PlayStation 4 |
