There’s no lack of fresh takes on the roguelike genre at the moment. Joining the likes of Spelunky, FTL and Rogue Legacy is Subaeria, a puzzle platformer developed by Montreal studio Ilogika. Due mid-2015, the Orwell-inspired puzzle-platformer requires players to toy with AI in order to escape each of its levels unharmed. According to Ilogika, you’ll need to “control, trap, destroy and even make enemies fight each other”, which is a different way of saying that you can’t murder anything with your bare hands.
Along the way you’ll unlock new abilities and characters which carry over to future game sessions even if you die. Apart from these RPG elements, Subaeria is fairly typical of the roguelike genre: there are no saves, and each of the game’s labyrinths are procedurally generated.
Exploring the world of Subaeria appears to be one of the game's strongest aspects. The studio lists a variety of inspiration including Orwell, Huxley, Melville and, weirdly, Google executive Eric Schmidt. Subaeria "lets you explore a unique science fictional setting through multiple characters who are both the perpetrators and the victims of their world’s injustice.
"As you discover the world of Subaeria, you’ll peel back the layers of a society that is democratic in principle, but secretly controlled by shadowy multinationals and mysterious algorithms powering the status quo. A social and political fable for our times, the world of Subaeria will feel fresh and original, yet disturbingly familiar."
Subaeria is scheduled to release mid-2015.
