Frostpunk creators dive into mind-bending sci-fi with The Alters, a deep-space game of survival

pcgamer.com:

Frostpunk developer 11 Bit Studios unveiled its next game at the PC Gaming Show today, a «classic sci-fi» tale of survival among the stars called The Alters.

The Alters follows the adventures of Jan Dolski, who volunteers for a high-risk mission to find and extract a rare element called Rapidium that enables the creation of alternative versions of organic matter. But the mission goes wrong: The ship crashes, and Jan is the sole survivor. Alone and trapped on a hostile alien world, he's forced to use Rapidium to create alternative versions of himself—the Alters—to survive and ultimately find his way home.

The Alters are not clones: Each one is Jan at heart, but effectively a version of him that made different choices over the course of his life. Those choices led to different outcomes: Each Alter has a unique set of skills and traits, but also different attitudes, beliefs, and personalities. They're manufactured individuals, a dichotomy that's at the heart of the game.

«We as people, we are shaping ourselves every single day with every single decision that we are making,» game director Tomasz Kisilewicz said during the show.

«This process, the whole process of becoming who we are, it can be quite painful at times. But in our game, Jan, the main character, he has this unique possibility of not only shaping himself, but also reshaping himself, numerous times, with every single Alter that he is creating.»

Like previous 11 Bit Games, The Alters is built around the studio's «meaningful entertainment philosophy, so it's a game we hope will make you think even after you stop playing.» It will feature elements of horror games, thrillers and mysteries, and a «thick layer of surreality,» Kisilewicz said. «I mean, how surreal would