Dreamfall dev announces first-person survival horror Draugen
Explore Norway's mysterious west coast.
Red Thread Games, developer of Dreamfall, has announced a first-person survival horror game called Draugen, which has won a $144,000 grant from the Norwegian Film Institute.
Draugen, in development for PC, Mac, Linux and next-gen consoles, is set in Norway's west coast, famous for its deep fjords and mountains. Oslo-based studio Red Thread described Draugen as a "dark and disturbing journey into the pitch black heart of Norwegian national romanticism, as seen through the eyes of an American nature photographer, botanist and entomologist".
The story is inspired by Scandinavian literature, legends and fairytales, Norse mythology and the Icelandic sagas. Draugen is a Norwegian word meaning "the Draug", an undead creature from Norse mythology. "The original Norse meaning of the word is ghost," Red Thread explained, "but unlike traditional ghosts the Draug has a corporeal body and physical abilities. Draug reside in their watery graves, guarding the treasures and secrets that were buried with them. And they will protect those secrets at any cost..."
Draugen is set in the early 1920s, in a remote fishing community where everyone has mysteriously vanished. The player explores the settlement, gathering clues and memories as you try to uncover the truth behind a terrible tragedy.
"From time to time, a woman in black can be spotted in the distance," Red Thread teases. "Who is she, and what is her connection to this place? Who is the little girl singing broken lullabies as the sky begins to darken? And when night falls, and those last few, precious drops of kerosene in the lamp feed a fragile, flickering flame, what hides out there in the darkness and in the cold, black sea?
"Discover the clues. Uncover the memories. Decipher the past. Survive the night."
Red Thread is currently working on Dreamfall Chapters: The Longest Journey, the sequel to Dreamfall: The Longest Journey that was successfully crowd-funded earlier this year. Dreamfall Chapters is due out in November 2014.