Still Wakes The Deep review: Oil be damned

Perhaps Still Wakes The Deep works as an allegorical warning that we knew even 50 years ago that the hunt for oil to burn was never going to end well. This chilling horror set in 1975 drops us on to the ailing Beira D oil rig in the North Atlantic shortly before its drill disturbs something unspeakable fathoms below in the murk.

The sudden halt terrorises the men aboard more first because of the reaction of their sadistic boss upset at missing his corporate targets. But then the slow realisation dawns that out here, hundreds of kilometres from anywhere in a heaving ocean, they are not alone.

Brighton-based developer The Chinese Room made its name with critically acclaimed spooky narrative adventures such as Dear Esther (2012) and Everybody’s Gone To The Rapture (2015). But it has experience in pure scares too and Still Wakes The Deep leans heavily into body horror as you play a worker named Caz McLeary trying to escape the nightmare unfolding on the Beira D.

To justify the sense of terror, The Chinese Room must first establish its characters and setting. Caz wanders a fabulously grim facsimile of a 1970s rig, marvelling at the preponderance of beige, surfeit of bad food and depressing quarters. All that’s missing is a few nude pin-up calendars on the walls to evoke a dismal era.

It’s the well-acted workers who pierce the melancholy with their gallows humour, extremely salty language and northern accents – mostly Scottish with an Irish one or two for good measure. Their friendly banter – “Away with ye, ya clatty gobshite” – soon gives way to panicked four-letter tirades but somehow always retains the affectionate c-word beloved of Scots.

There’s even a trophy for playing the entire game in the Scots Gaelic language – entitled Bheir an cuan a chuid fhéin amach (meaning, the sea will claim its own)

Caz has his own emotional demons to claim – he fled to the rig to dodge a jail sentence, traumatising his wife and children. But these troubles pale beside the abominations he faces as he clambers around the rig seeking safety and rescue.

The Chinese Room builds a potent sense of place – the hulking steel structure groaning in the weather, the warren-like corridors and the thunderous ocean a few hundred metres below. Into this maelstrom comes the lifeform stalking the workers. To say much more would rob the player of surprise but let’s just say Caz will know his enemies.

If you’ve experienced any of The Chinese Room’s games before, you’ll remember that narrative and vibes trump gameplay every time. Caz spends most of his time exploring gloomy interiors, navigating flimsily suspended exterior walkways and cursing his bad luck. Just occasionally he has switches to throw, levers to pull and valves to turn.

Even less frequently, he plays a white-knuckled game of hide and seek with hostile creatures. But he’s completely helpless with no weapons or method of defence other than patience to slip past the omnipotent enemy.

Perhaps The Chinese Room takes its contrivances a little too far in pursuit of an authored story. Caz can’t even hop over a low crate and his path remains resolutely linear, with conveniently locked doors gating his route.

Still Wakes The Deep reminds me of John Carpenter’s equally implausible The Thing, an enjoyable schlock-horror set in the Antarctic. But if you can suspend your disbelief about this rigged rollercoaster, you’ll find layers of depth beneath the surface.