The Xbox Games Showcase impressed with a flurry of new games, trailers and exclusives, but nothing shook me quite like Still Wakes the Deep. Developed by The Chinese Room, the scant slice of in-game footage and gloomy cinematics shown on stage ticked all of my boxes, and amid the current wave of survival horror intrigue, this game has already shot to the very top of my most wanted list.
The Chinese Room, of course, is the team behind walking simulator pioneer Dear Esther, and the similarly thoughtful, mysterious and unsettling Everybody's Gone to the Rapture. In 2013, the studio tried its hand in the horror genre with Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs – a follow up to Frictional Games' 2010 indie hit Amnesia: The Dark Descent – and I've wanted something as dark and twisted since. It's too early to say that Still Wakes the Deep is exactly what I've been waiting for, but throughout the whole 62-second trailer that ran during the Xbox Games Showcase 2023, I muttered repeatedly under my breath: "Please be horror, please be horror, please be horror."
