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.
