SOMA is one of those games I didn't even bother thinking about before it came out because I knew it was a horror game. I just can't play those. The only game I have beaten "normally" is F.E.A.R., mostly because the scary parts where infrequent and the shooting was awesome. I hid under a staircase in Doom 3 back in the day, never played it again. Got a few hours into Dead Space before noping out of that. Did beat Dead Space 2 though, but I barely had any sound on. Was still hard as hell.

But the more I heard about SOMA after release made me want it. I love that kind of story, and I often play games for the story. Started watching a playthrough on Youtube, but decided that I wanted to experience it for myself. Find everything, read everything. So I got it. And I played a bit. And it is just so fucking hard to play for someone that just can't deal with first-person horror. The "I am helpless" makes it all so much worse. I got just past finding Catherine, but even the first monster freaked me out. And he/it/they mostly stayed out of my way. Not even sure if that one attacks.

As far as I have gotten on the GOTY podcasts for 2015 the crew have repeatedly said that the game would have been better without monsters. The good parts about the game is the atmosphere, the story and the locations. And I agree. Those parts are awesome, and if further on in the game I have to run past awesome stuff because a crazy Gonk Droid is chasing me, then that is a shame.

Which is why I pulled the trigger and installed the "Wuss Mode Mod". With that mod on the monsters no longer attack or run after you, save for some instances it seems where the chase is a part of the story. Which, as the creator mentions, kinda makes it even better. Having the monsters patrol the corridors, mumbling and screaming, or following you around being angry at you changes the atmosphere into something kinda worse in the "this is fucked up" way. I have only played a bit of it, and have either managed to stay away from a monster or I have just not encountered a new one yet, but the game still freaks me out. I know I cannot be attacked now, or die because of something attacking me as the monsters give off no damage with the mod on, but I still feel the dread. The fact that some of the chases will happen due to story stuff makes it, in a weird way, more tense. I have no idea what monster will chase me. Which means I will still crouch-walk everywhere, stay out of sight of whatever is walking around. But knowing I cannot die at least takes some of the paralyzing dread I feel in games like this away. I can now play it, experience it, beat it, while still being pretty scared. Which is awesome. So if you are like me, one who wants to experience the game for themselves but just cannot sit down and play it because of the scares; try the mod.

I don't agree at all that it would have been better without the monster.

But hey, that mod existed for Amnesia The Dark Descent as well, so if it makes someone play the game that otherwise wouldn't, more power to you.

I loathe horror games because I can get so immersed in games when I play them, and I hate the feeling of absolute powerlessness. It took me several months to get into BioShock back in the day, and only after playing for a while did I realize that I had enough agency to kill things that tried to get me and the initial fear evaporated.

Still, I think I'm going to play SOMA the intended way. Something about my personality insists that I try things out the way most people are going to experience that thing. The game has been talked up so much in the GOTY debates and lists that I have to check this thing out.

Doubt I will ever play Amnesia, though.

Thanks for mentioning the mod, at any rate. Who knows? If I find myself too on edge I may have to go back and try it with the mod.

@atwa: And that is a very valid stance to have. The game was made with monsters you have to hide from after all.

I just played some more, and had a monster chase happen. I did my best to stay out of its way at first, not looking at it as that fucked things up (which probably makes it clear which monster it was since this is still somewhat early in the game).

It was less scary, but not by that much. I mean, the screen is going crazy, the sound design is really great and you just can't look at the thing without everything going bonkers. I knew I could not be harmed, but it was still unnerving as hell. Then the chase happened. I was just as frantic, just as panicked as I would have been if it could have harmed me. Then it did catch me, because I took a wrong turn. Flashes of images, followed by "You Died". So the mod does not make the game easier in that aspect of it. The chases are still awesomely scary, and the atmosphere is, to me, largely intact.

EDIT:
@viking_funeral: I had intended to play it normally first, but I realized that I would never beat it that way.
One of the things that makes these games so scary is the fact that you have nothing to beat the monsters with, but also that hiding isn't always as easy. I managed to beat both Bioshock and Bioshock 2 pretty well, but only after getting powers and abilities that made me either much better at killing or hiding. I played most of those games crouched, as I do with all stealth and scary games, and in Bioshock I often stood still since that literally made me invisible.

If the game had hiding mechanics like in Thief for instance, I would probably manage to play this without any alterations. Knowing that you are nigh invisible somewhere makes it all more tolerable. But you just can't know if you hide well or not, and here that is a moot point anyway as the one monster could just seemingly appear out of thin air.

But it is a great game so far, and still pretty terrifying. Was going to play more with this mod last night, got into a broken down ship underwater. Slid open one of the doors, something shook, there was some banging, the screen glitched out a bit. At that very moment one of my ceiling lights flickered. I shut the game off pretty fast.

SOMA isn't really scary, kind of creepy sure but that's about it.

@jonny_anonymous: What is scary or not is entirely subjective though. For you it can be a walk in the park, while for me it is something I can barely get through.

These arguments are always completely pointless, as what is scary is 100% subjective.

Every horror game that comes out these days, you see a bunch of people yelling "ITS NOT SCARY!!" and its just so incredibly silly.

Huh I thought I was the biggest scaredy cat when it comes to games but maybe not? Like, scary anything is enough to fuck me up for a long time. I still get freaked out in the shower sometimes and don't want to close my eyes when I rinse my hair because I think when I open them I'm going to see X, Y or Z from whatever movie I accidentally watched 15 years ago. Sometimes I'm like 90% sure there's going to be a wendigo when I step out, thanks Until Dawn.

But I was still able to slog through Soma without any significant issues. I mean I totally would freak out and refuse to look at the screen whenever something grabbed me, but maybe it's because all the stuff about consciousness and mortality and existence freaked me out more, the actually scary stuff didn't bother me as much?

Anyways, hopefully more people become aware of this mod because everyone should get a chance to experience this game. Glad it worked out for you OP.

git gud

The GOTY podcasts convinced me to check this game out and I think I'm going to use the mod. Not even for a "being scared" reason I just don't see the appeal of that gameplay at all. I could get through it but do I want to get through it? I'm asking but really I know already.

I want to see the story a lot now. Without that I wasn't interested because I knew the gameplay was going to be something I would not enjoy.

huh, maybe i'll try this out. i struggle to play through scary games as well, but this mod sounds fascinating. thanks for bringing it to my attention.

I bought this game because of GOTY discussions too. I thought if the story is REALLY THAT GOOD, I owe it to myself to check it out. And I'm actually kind of disappointed. I think the story is totally ok, but I really don't think it's as good as they make it out to be. I think maybe if the game wasn't as fresh in their minds as it was, it might not have won. But yeah, the story isn't bad but definitely not (in my opinion) the best in class. I don't mind the monster stuff that much, but the game doesn't run well, tends to be really tedious, and some of the story delivery methods could have been handled better. That, on top of the fact that I think the main character needs a different voice actor; all of those things for me detract from a story which I might enjoy a lot more had those problems not been as noticeable.

I downloaded it as well because of GOTY talks and am annoyed by how spooky monsters are getting in the way. I'ma download this so game is faster.

The ending of this game is what propels it from a good game to a great game, if you ask me. What a perfect ending

@atwa: @jaqen_hghar: Not really, SOMA isn't trying to be scary. It's not like Alien Isolation or Amnesia, it's just trying to tell a story with a creepy atmosphere.

Hunh, I don't typically dig scary games either, but that mod sounds like an interesting way to play it.

@atwa said:

I agree. There was one monster part that went on for far too long, but other than that, the monster scenes were all really well done I thought. The sense of relief at getting by a monster and moving on with the story makes it all worthwhile, I guess I'd say it gives the game a much greater sense of progress.

Is there a reason why the monsters exist or is it a smokescreen to hide the whole robot narrative?

@shindig: I think it's a story reason to show how fucked up WAU got in it's attempts to "save humanity",

Oh wow I had no idea a mod like that existed - I'd have probably played Soma instead of watching a let's play haha. The hiding stuff was more of an annoyance than fear for me. I just didn't want to deal with it and was way more interested in the story.

@atwa said:

As someone who really, really enjoyed both the Penumbra series and Amnesia: The Dark Descent, I disagree.

The monster encounters in this game mostly felt obligatory, like Frictional felt forced to put them in because they make "those" games. They just felt forced and did nothing but detract from the awesome atmosphere for me as I hid crouched in a corner for 5 minutes waiting for a monster to just fucking LEAVE THE ROOM I'M IN PLEASE THANKS (true story, happened multiple times).

The game needed something more, or something else. Different, new ways to interact with monsters. Take some cues from the excellent Alien: Isolation and revamp the Frictional formula. Give me an inventory, and give me some tools to help me out.

Or, omit the half-assed stealth sections, and keep the monsters for the exciting sequences: The chases and the deep sea segments. The only interesting stealth section in the game is the one with the blind monster in the basement. Replace those sections with more exploration, more exposition, more puzzle-solving, etc. Basically, make it the adventure game you want it to be.

Enough of this weird hodgepodge of walking simulator and survival horror. Both this game and Machine for Pigs did it the same way--both have less mechanics than either Penumbra or Amnesia, and its kind of ridiculous. Commit to something, please.

The only issue I had with Soma where after a while of constantly getting caught by the same monsters they became just annoying, some area's when they had long squences of constant monsters just got old very quick.

I will say however, I noticed on a few occasions that some of the monsters actually despawn/spawn near you to keep them catching you off guard. When hiding and looking through windows I witnessed monsters suddely despawning only to respawn a minute later in the same spot.

I just finished with the mod on. I appreciated removing most consequence from the game so I could just run everywhere. It's still quite a slog though regardless. I'd have appreciated a crisper pace, but that's just not what this genre is I suppose. That's basically what I've come away with this from. My problems with the game are just my problems with the entire genre. "There's monsters about who will kill you if you go fast" just disagrees with me. Gotta go fast.

Anyway, good game, improved by the mod, but not enough. I thought it was kind of weird how with the mod the monsters basically became weird stalkers who'd follow me around. That was annoying honestly, they should make a mod that makes them leash. Get on it modders!

I adore all the Penumbra games and both Amnesia games.

I think they have definitely not hodgepodged between, they have gone a clear direction away from Amnesia. Its much more focused on story, which Thomas Grip said since day one. Personally, I didn't encounter any of the problems with the monster that a lot of people seem to have. Most of them are extremely short, taking somewhere between 10-15 minutes and then you never see them again. I also think without them the atmosphere would have been much worse, because you don't really see examples of what the WAU wanted to do. I thought at most one monster was a bit badly designed, the rest are so easy to avoid that the complaints are really unbelievable to me.

Or maybe you just have a different opinion? The game was just released 2 months ago, and the amount of detail they can recount definitely goes against your belief. I adore the story and think its just as good. No story was better this year.

@atwa: I will admit that I got much farther last night after I wrote that post (I just left Omicron), and my opinion of the story has definitely improved a great deal even though I didn't think the story was bad to begin with. I still believe, and it seems many others do too, that the story is bogged down by some of the games other faults, none of which seem to have improved since my last writing. But I definitely do agree that the story is very very good. Still don't know if I'm ready to say "best" yet, I'll wait until I'm finished to make that call for myself.

Also, what I meant by them having just played it was that Vinny and Austin said they finished the game the day before the Best Story podcast, so it was fresh in their minds. I was just wondering if the staff would have felt differently had they been able to play through it in January, for example, instead of when they were realistically able to play it.

I want to play this after seeing on the GOTY lists. However, I'm with you on the whole first-person horror game fear. I made it through the first Bioshock after warming up to it after the first few encounters. The splicers are really creepy and I hate things attacking me from behind. I want to play acclaimed games like Deadspace and Amnesia, but it becomes a bit much when they turn off lights and do jump scares.

Question: What's the difficulty of the game? Is it hard to run away from monsters and complete game objectives? I might be able to eventually deal with the scariness if I don't have to solve a bunch of puzzles simultaneously.

Recommendation: Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw made a series of adventure horror games that are really good and are available for free on his website. The games are in order 5 Days a Stranger, 7 Days a Skeptic (my favorite), Trilby's Notes, and 6 Days a Sacrifice. They have a great atmosphere for 2d adventure games. What I'm hoping for, which may never happen, is that they'll get remastered for consoles. That'd be great.