Among the games announced yesterday for the PlayStation 4 and PlayStation Vita is an interesting little title called Alone With You. Releasing in 2015 on both platforms, the game is developed by Benjamin Rivers, whose horror game Home received critical praise.
Alone With You is a love story about an interstellar explorer trapped on a doomed colony. At this year's GDC Rivers talked with Polygon about the game, which was at that time very early in development. "I really wanted to make a romance-focused game — like a dating sim idea," Rivers said. "But dating sims are all kind of the same deal. They're all genre-specific, they're often culturally specific, and they don't vary a whole lot."
Rivers had said he would play with existing romance game mechanics and tropes, but held back further detail, merely saying Alone With You would have a "Hitchcockian twist."
Rivers went to the US PlayStation blog yesterday to share the game for the first time with the community there. In the post he revealed that players would be working to resurrect key members of the colony's scientific staff, and that over the course of the game they would develop deep personal relationships with them.
"Recreating your former colleagues might not be as straightforward as you imagine," he wrote. "They may be interested in more than just technical details. No matter who you are, you'll be able to take a crack at love — and your choices will affect how the story ultimately plays out."
The main character of the game, Rivers says, is purposefully genderless which allows the player to truly place themselves into the role without barriers to their sexual orientation.
