PlayStation’s State of Play event had plenty of well-known franchises to populate their 20-minute event, but we also got a stunning trailer for a very promising debut game. As the first game from Ironwood Studios, Pacific Drive looks ridiculously good, especially to survival horror fans.
The trailer started off on the perfect foot by featuring a dark road, cracked and overgrown in the Pacific Northwest. Headlights and the rumbling of an engine introduce us to our main character as a warning plays on a loop: “Alert: You are within the bounds of the Olympic Exclusion Zone.” The beat-up station wagon appears to be the only sign of life outside of all of the plant life. It pulls up to an abandoned garage with maps and supplies inside. While the station wagon looks like an old heap on the outside, there is scientific equipment mounted next inside, and we see a device issue another warning that an anomaly is about to occur.
The game is a first-person perspective driving survival game where players are free to roam around their surroundings in search of supplies as long as no anomalies occur. However, due to radiation, freakish weather, strange shifts in gravity, and even supernatural beings, players absolutely need to get back in the car during these events. This is when the reveal trailer picks up and catches everyone’s eye.
A montage of weird, creepy, and crazy events seen through the windshield. Chunks of the earth may rise in the road or weird green gas may come out of the earth. There are weird bugs, lightning strikes too close for comfort, and eerie shadowy figures in the dark. From what we have seen in the trailer and what was revealed by the communications specialist at Ironwood Studios on PlayStation’s blog, we know that the game will be split between driving out to gather resources, driving through anomalies, and returning to the garage to maintain the only lifeline you have. The station wagon will keep you safe as long as you keep it running. Check out the trailer below.
There are plenty of survival horror games to choose from out there, but somehow Pacific Drive still looks fresh and unique. There’s a bit of an Annihilation vibe because the Olympic Exclusion Zone is a walled-off, scary place where weird things happen, but the blending of science fiction, urban legends, and West Coast road trips is one of a kind. According to the communications specialist, “Remember to keep your eyes on the road, the woods are deep – and not entirely empty.” That’s quite the selling point!
We don’t know a lot about its release other than it is estimated to be available in 2023 and that it will be on PlayStation 5. Let’s hope it’s early 2023.
