Quantic Dream unveils new "poetic underwater adventure" Under the Waves

YouTube

Watch On

During Opening Night Live, Quantic Dream revealed Under the Waves, a new "poetic underwater adventure" in development at Parallel Studio.

The reveal trailer shows a protagonist exploring moody underwater scenes populated by diverse wildlife, underwater facilities, and abandoned roads and shipwrecks. Plot details are as murky as the waters, but the project apparently supports ocean preservation via The Surfrider Foundation Europe, which is pretty cool.

While the makers of Heavy Rain and Detroit: Become Human itself aren't actually developing Under the Waves, indie studio Parallel will be using Quantic Dream's full suite of tools for motion capture, voice recording, animation, and more, so it sounds like this will be a high-quality experience on the technical side of things, at the very least.

Again, there aren't a whole ton of details about Under the Waves right now, but Quantic Dream has revealed that it follows a professional diver named Stan who starts experiencing weird stuff beneath the surface. There are themes of isolation and "the engulfing power of grief," which isn't entirely unexpected from a publisher known for games about serial killers, child death, and sentient robots facing discrimination from predatory humans. Indeed, despite being a third-party project at Quantic Dream, this all feels very David Cagey for the moment.

Parallel Studio is a relatively new team of developers whose past work includes the 2015 mobile horror puzzler White Night, the 2016 VR mystery adventure Dark Days, and most recently, the 2018 "poetic narrative puzzle game" (noticing a theme here?) Eqq0. Parallel calls Under the Waves its "most ambitious and creative" project yet, and says it'll have "a strong narrative aspect" and "cinematographic dimension."

While we wait for Under the Waves, why not check out our ranking of the best video game stories ever and make sure you haven't missed any?