So you've probably seen the trailer for I Am Alive.  If not it's here. 

Sure it's not going to look that amazing graphically and sure it's another survival game...but the more I think about this....this could be an amazing game.  I mean sure we've all played the survival horror game where you've got to worry about zombies around ever corner and all that good stuff.  But this time things are different.  An earthquake in Chicago throws the few survivors left into a free for all.  Leaving everyone for themselves or to possibly form alliances in order to survive.  Now I don't know how the gameplay will work but lets just imagine the possibilities for a second.

You're in the middle of Chicago and an earthquake strikes.  Leaving many dead, a lot more people trapped, and others who while injured are suddenly faced with the realization that survival must be first on the mind.  As you saw in the trailer a simple bottle of water became something worth fighting over.  Which makes me think what other implications could this have.  First lets start with the moments just after the earthquake is over.  Chicago is destroyed and you begin to hear cries of help from people all around trapped. 

Everything could be given to you from the start and everything you do affects everyone.  You could help some people out from under fallen debris or care only for yourself.  If you help people you can form an alliance like the three guys we saw in the trailer.  Potentially this could make surviving easier as they may be willing to help you out.  But helping the wrong people could pose bad as they may forget about your health and take all the water and food scraps for themselves.

At the same time you have hundreds of others doing everything they can to survive.  Potentially you could run into other alliances or other people who chose to go it alone.  And most certainly you'd run into people who may try to steal something from you if it helps them to survive.  If things are set up correctly there may not even be a set storyline.  It starts with the earthquake and ends with either your death or your survival. 

 Now of course you'd think that with something like this happening that people would be sent to help survivors...and this could be the case but I think there may be something that is later explained that causes people to be unable to get into the city.  However if troops are sent to help this could up the ante for survivors.  Ideally things would become hostile very fast.  Even if it only takes one day for troops to arrive someone would be unhappy and some may even turn against their "rescuers". 

 In the end it's all up to you and mostly you to survive.  Sure you'll be able to help others and try to form alliances but you'll have to be careful about who you choose.  Can you trust them or will they deceive you?

So lets say the game goes through periods of days.  At the end of each day you have a choice.  Do you find a place to sleep knowing that at anytime in the night the little food you have could be stolen or do you continue to roam around trying to find as much scraps of food as possible but taking the penalty of losing energy (which could consequently cause controlling your character in the game harder).  With sleeping you'll have to find a hideout.  Some place that you can stay that no one will find you.  A place where you can keep valuables key in keeping you alive.  In fact, if you've formed alliances, you'll have to decide to reveal your hideout to them, taking your trust into consideration.  Each day things will get worse as well.  The amount of food is depleting fast, you have to be careful about just how far you travel since you can't eat too much and your energy will not stay high. 

Now think about this.  Remember when 9/11 happened.  People knew they wouldn't make it out of the tower in time so they jumped out the window.  Could it be possible that some will be driven to insanity in the game and make that "jump"?  No longer are we playing a survival game with zombies to worry about.  We're stuck in Chicago with people just like us that have been driven to the edge and scared that when they go to sleep they won't wake up.  Or fear that they won't find the food they need.  And what happens if they can't find food?  Suddenly that sleeping man across the street doesn't look so bad.  As the days pass people get more and more violent.  Different types of people come out.  The people that go alone, the ones that team up, the crazy people who will kill if it means food for another day and others who don't want to go another day and "jump". 

And what of the "rescuers" that are sent to essentially save the day?  That all depends.  If you want saved you may want to be there when the crazy people decide to kill the meaty soldiers sent to help them. 

So lets get to how this would all end.  There would be hundreds maybe thousands of storylines...except it would all end two ways.

Survival:  No matter how it is you manage to survive it would probably end something like this.  Weeks have passed and now you are one of the few....with many news reporting that none are found to have survived the cleanup continues with no one expecting to find anyone walking.  Yet there you come....out from a building limping your way towards some guards.  You're taken away in a helicopter and a camera angle shows us the entire city....for the first time we see what the entire city looks like from over head.  I'd imagine this to be like seeing the nuke go off in COD4.  And that's the last we see of it.

Death:  Obviously if you died you'd be able to restart from a save point but who's to say we have to have a Game Over screen.  Perhaps if you die we see a scene like when the clean up team comes in and finds your body.  This way we get to see just how the city turned out after you died.

I'm not saying this is how its going to be, heck this probably reads more like a list of things I want in it.  I'm just going to leave it at this could be how this game plays out.  In this article the developer says they want to make this very realistic...and I think this could be one way for them to do so.  This isn't how it has to be either...if you've got another idea do tell I'd like to hear and if not what do you think of this one I've posted?  Hopefully we learn more about I Am Alive soon.  But until then I'll leave all of the above to a big "I hope it's like this".

Again what do you think?  Will it be like this?  Do you think that some of this stuff is even possible in the next gen?  Or do you have a few ideas yourself about what this game will be like?