UNDER

Indie horror UNDER leaves you stranded on a sinking ship

Out of the frying pan and into the fire.UNDER

Globiss Interactive recently released a demo for their up and coming psychological horror, UNDER, which follows the misfortune of a traumatized World War 1 veteran who, after escaping the hell of the trenches, finds himself trapped in an eerie turn-of-the-century ocean liner. And, things aren’t getting better any time soon by the looks of it. In fact, the vessel is taking on water and it’s bloated, dark halls are stalked by malicious entities.

So, there’s a lot to be afraid of: The ship is sinking, seemingly haunted and you’re trapped unable to get above deck. This is about as claustrophobic an atmosphere as you can get, with the narrow, waterlogged hallways giving the ship the feeling of a tomb.

The difficult part here is how they chose to handle the mental health aspect of the game. Shell shock was a serious post-traumatic disorder that affected thousands of soldiers who fought in World War 1 and 2, and certainly shouldn’t be sensationalised for storytelling purposes. Let’s hope they handle the subject matter with care.

The game totes itself as a classic horror experience, which invokes a sense of games like Silent Hill and Resident Evil. It is played through a first-person perspective though, so rest assured the control scheme won’t be classically inspired – thank god. Those hallways look far too narrow for tank controls.

All in all, it looks to be an engrossing and fear-inducing experience that also promises to have an engaging narrative behind the events unfolding. The atmosphere is already very present, even in this early build of the game.

You can download the demo for UNDER on its itch.io page. The game is set to release on PC as soon as the developers can feasibly do so. Can’t argue with that.