“I should go check on the Frictional website,” I assumed to myself after I awoke this morning. I’ll name it a premonition, although I clearly wasn’t the primary to have it. If you hadn’t heard, Frictional Games, builders of Soma and Amnesia: The Dark Descent, just lately up to date their web site nextfrictionalgame.com with a spooky pulsating little image. It morphed as soon as already, and has morphed once more, starting a merry chase of YouTube movies and hints presumably associated to Frictional’s subsequent game.
Three weeks in the past, I speculated that the little white image on Frictional’s web site seemed a bit like a neuron. Only a number of days later, you lot seen that it had became one thing new. An embryo, perhaps? Now it’s—properly I’m undecided what actually—however it’s modified once more and extra importantly there’s a brand new button on the web page subsequent to Frictional’s social media hyperlinks.
Over on Resetera, person “Foxnull,” shares that whereas clicking the Egyptian-looking eye image doesn’t appear to do something, hovering over it exhibits textual content that’s the correct size for a YouTube video code. Using the textual content “suWaF-aIdV4” as a part of a YouTube URL results in this odd video of rocks. But ah, not simply rocks, somebody is attempting to video some type of odd image drawn on them.
Next, Foxnull inspected the HTML for the web page, discovering one other YouTube code hidden within the web page header. With the meta title “artefact,” the subsequent string of textual content results in one other video. This one is audio-only. Headphone customers beware, it’s a creepy monster scream.
Resetera aren’t the one ones following the free threads Frictional have left for us to search out. The Frictional Games Discord now has a channel “general_unannounced” devoted to, properly, no matter this unannounced game is. Folks are speculating what the textual content from every YouTube video description may imply and digging for extra clues.
The leads thus far appear to be as follows: within the video of rocks, titled “Box 52, Tape 16,” the outline references “Shetpe, KSSR,” a small village in Kazakhstan. The audio monitor, titled “Box 7 Reel 2, Partial Success,” has the phrases “Triple Crown,” in its description. Speculation appears to be that the textual content references the Egyptian “Triple Atef Crown,” which might pair properly with the Egyptian type eye image from the web site and the village Shetpe. Kazakhstan isn’t precisely subsequent door to Egypt, however it’s within the neighborhood no less than. Shoutout to “partial success” as properly. Science gone improper is all the time spooky.
I’d initially suspected that the neuron image that first appeared on Frictional’s web site might level to a different Soma game, given how a lot Frictional’s underwater horror game centered on the thoughts and consciousness. The scream within the second video actually sounds just like the scream of the WAU creatures from Soma to me, however that’s only a guess. If you wish to preserve a detailed eye on clues as they’re uncovered, Frictional’s Discord looks as if the place to be.
