Avant garde stealth game Tangiers looks like a surreal noir nightmare
Inspired by Burroughs, Ballard, and Dadaist art.
Tangiers looks unlike anything I've seen. A surreal stealth game by two-person Bristol-based indie outfit Andalusian Games, Tangiers is set in an abstract landscape that resembles a mix of Silent Hill's grey palette and featureless monstrosities with Dark City's morphing noirish urban sprawl and a hint of Zeno Clash's delirious wilderness thrown in for good measure.
Looking at the developer's Facebook page, it cited its inspirations as: Thief, Man Ray, Throbbing Gristle, Cabaret Voltaire, William Burroughs, J.G. Ballard, and the eastern European Dada movement. This all shows in Tangier's trippy, industrialist aesthetic.
Mechanically, Tangiers sounds similar to Dishonored with an emphasis on staying out of sight, setting traps, climbing rooftops, and stabbing foes in the back. Intriguingly, you'll be able to "collect discarded conversations" while eavesdropping on enemies, then use their words as diversions by "hurling" them down the road. It sounds like this means you'll actually be able to grab subtitles, then use them as physical objects, a possibility further hinted at when the developer wrote "The unstable reality of Tangiers has the thoughts of its inhabitants materialise into the world."
Like Dishonored. the game will change depending on your actions, but Andalusian suggests this might be an actual physical change. "Play disruptively and the world fractures, deforms... a unique structure in response to your gameplay choices," the developer cryptically stated.
Little is known about Tangier's narrative, but you will be uncovering the secrets of a lost civilization across a vast, open-ended landscape.
It's hard to get a firm grip on what exactly Tangiers will feel like to play, but its striking art style and bold ideas have certainly left me hungry to find out more.
Tangiers is expected to come out in mid 2014.
