Still Wakes the Deep is one of those games that grabs your attention long before you even pick up the controller. The premise alone is enough to spark discomfort in many people: we're trapped on an oil rig in the middle of the North Sea, isolated from everything and everyone, when something inexplicable starts to happen. For someone like me, with a certain degree of thalassophobia, simply looking at the endless ocean surrounding the Beira D is enough to feel an immediate shiver.
There's something deeply unsettling about the idea of being cornered in a place like this. There's nowhere to run. No help nearby. Just metal, storms, freezing water, and an empty horizon that seems to stretch on forever. It's a perfect setting for a horror game, and the truth is The Chinese Room knew exactly how to make the most of that sense of isolation.
Curiously, despite the frightening premise, Still Wakes the Deep wasn't a game that provoked much fear in me during most of the experience. There are disturbing creatures, uncomfortable environments, and several moments of tension, but I never felt that constant terror or anxiety some titles in the genre manage to provoke. Instead, I quickly realized the team's main focus wasn't to scare the player around every corner, but to tell a story.
And that's precisely where the game finds its greatest strength.
The narrative is, without a doubt, the element that sustains the entire experience. We play as Caz McLeary, an electrician working on the Beira D platform who, from one moment to the next, sees his routine turn into a real nightmare. As the situation deteriorates, we're dragged into a story that blends survival, human drama, and supernatural mystery.
The most interesting part is that the game never loses sight of the human side of events. Far more than monsters or unknown threats, what truly matters are the people trapped inside that structure and their desperate attempts to survive. The dialogue feels genuine, the performances are extremely convincing, and there's a rare authenticity in how the characters react to the chaos around them.
The voice acting deserves a special mention. The heavy Scottish accent of much of the cast helps reinforce the game's identity and contributes significantly to the immersion. There are moments of despair, anger, sadness, and hope that work precisely because the performances manage to convey those emotions credibly.
Visually, Still Wakes the Deep is impressive. The recreation of the oil rig is extremely detailed and conveys a constant feeling of claustrophobia. Narrow corridors, rusted structures, industrial machinery, and confined spaces create an oppressive environment that works perfectly for the narrative.
But above all, it's the atmosphere that impresses. The raging ocean, the sound of wind battering the structure, the constant rain, and the platform's subtle swaying help create a remarkable illusion of reality. There were several moments when I genuinely felt present in that place, trying to find a way out while everything around me was falling apart.
The art direction also deserves praise for how it combines realistic elements with the narrative's more supernatural aspects. Without going into spoilers, there are some truly memorable images that stay etched in your memory long after the final credits.
The gameplay follows a fairly simple formula, clearly inspired by so-called "walking simulators." Exploration is the main focus, accompanied by some chase sequences, stealth moments, and small environmental challenges.
Anyone looking for complex systems, combat, or deep mechanics will probably be disappointed. Still Wakes the Deep bets almost exclusively on narrative and atmosphere to hold the player's interest. Fortunately, when a story works as well as this one, that simplicity ends up not being a problem.
Even so, some of the chase and stealth sections could have been more refined. There are moments when enemy behavior feels inconsistent, and certain sequences depend more on trial and error than on actual player skill.
Unfortunately, technical issues ended up significantly affecting my experience. Throughout the adventure I encountered several bugs — some minor, others far more frustrating. The worst case happened near the end of the game, when I hit an error that simply prevented me from progressing the story.
It was particularly frustrating because I was already fully invested in the narrative and very close to the final credits. The only available solution would have been restarting the entire campaign from the beginning — something I honestly wasn't willing to do at that point. I ended up turning to videos to watch the last fifteen or twenty minutes of the story, a decision I never like to make, but one that was practically unavoidable.
It's a shame, because these problems end up tainting an experience that would otherwise have left a much more positive impression. When a game so focused on narrative fails precisely at its ability to carry the player through to the end of its story, that impact on the final verdict is impossible to ignore.
Even so, despite those setbacks, Still Wakes the Deep remains an experience worth having. The narrative is engaging, the characters are believable, the atmosphere is extraordinarily immersive, and the recreation of the oil rig is one of the most impressive I've seen in recent years.
It may not be the scariest horror game on the market, nor the one that will keep players constantly on edge. But it's an excellent story of survival, isolation, and humanity in the face of the unknown.
In the end, Still Wakes the Deep loses a few points for its technical problems, but it manages to stay afloat thanks to the quality of its writing, the strength of its atmosphere, and the way it makes us feel trapped in that nightmare at sea. And when a game can transport us into its world like that, it's already doing a lot of things right.
out of 10
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Game Still Wakes the Deep Released 2024 Available on PC · PlayStation 5 · Xbox Series X|S Reviewed on Xbox Series X|S |  Cover: IGDB |
| PL | Pedro Lopes Writer · Portugal |
A games writer from Portugal running on a highly irresponsible amount of coffee — his blood type is officially "espresso". He has been a content creator at Lisbon Games Week, a jury member at Over & Out ’25 and an attendee of DevGAMM Lisbon 2025 (mostly for the free coffee). He has a Pac-Man tattoo on his finger, which contractually obliges him to chase ghosts forever.