Bethesda-veteran turned indie dev Nate Purkeypile shared a trailer for The Axis Unseen, his new “open world horror hunting game” where the monsters can hunt you.
The new trailer shows off a bunch of clips that Purkeypile shared since the game’s reveal, mostly focusing on the environments and visuals – which makes sense as Nate worked on Skyrim as a world artist/designer.
It’s worth noting the game seeks to capture the look and feel of the folkloric worlds as portrayed in folk heavy metal, and the game naturally has a brooding folk metal soundtrack to boot. The game itself also seems more like slow-burn hunting experience with the player moving slow, positioning in for the perfect shot.
The “horror” part of the game’s descriptor comes from the fact that the various creatures you can hunt are from folk legends – react to the player’s movement, sounds, and even smell. The game doubles down on its grounded approach to hunting by forcing players to track creatures purely with their own senses – even using tracks to detect movement.
Here’s the new trailer for The Axis Unseen:
Here’s a rundown on the game:
The Axis Unseen is an open world horror hunting game from one of the developers of Skyrim/Fallout. Hunt and track monsters from folklore in a world trapped outside of time. Upgrade your senses and find special elemental arrow types. The monsters are hunting you as well.
Features
- Hunt and track monsters from folklore – Hunt monsters from folklore. Follow their tracks and blood trails. Pay attention to the wind direction so they can’t smell you approaching.
- Primitive metal soundtrack – The Axis Unseen features original music by Clifford Meyer, previously of the legendary post-metal bands ISIS and Red Sparowes. It is a unique blend of Heavy Metal and primitive instruments. The music dynamically adjusts to what is going on in the game. Sometimes it is atmospheric, other times it is intense metal.
- Improve your senses – Upgrade your senses with the powers of the creatures. See scent particles. Feel the warmth left behind on their tracks. See colors that no human has ever seen.
- Unique arrow types – Your bow and arrow keeps you alive. Upgrade your bow or even find different arrow types such as fire, wind controlling or time distorting arrows. Experiment to see all of the different ways the arrows can interact with each other, such as wind arrows making the fire spread faster.
- Uncover the secrets of the hunters – Find out what happened to the hunters who came before you and what secrets they uncovered by inspecting their journals and drawings. Where did this world come from? How do you stop the creatures from escaping into your world?
The Axis Unseen is in development for for Windows PC (via Steam and the Epic Games Store).