Okomotive’s FAR: Changing Tides, its follow-up to the atmospheric FAR: Lone Sails, releases on March 1st. Along with pre-orders going live, a new trailer has been released which showcases the perils of navigating the world both above and below water.
In a PlayStation Blog post, creative lead and founder of Okomotive Don Schmocker spoke about the new challenges that players would face. “We’ve expanded on the setting seen in Lone Sails but instead of sun-scorched, dusty plains, players will face stormy waters and submerged cities. We hope that this new environment combined with new puzzles and ship mechanics will bring an exciting experience to fans of the series and new players alike.”
However, much like its predecessor, the story is something that players will have to discover for themselves. This is done by exploring flooded buildings, gathering sunken items, analyzing images and so on. “This environmental storytelling presents a very different type of game design, but we feel it helps to build a close bond between the world and the players, as they choose how much of the story to seek and engage with.
“With Lone Sails, we found ourselves defining and building elements of the story throughout development, which became increasingly difficult. For Changing Tides we wrote the majority of the story and world-building during pre-production, this gave us better direction and allowed us to plan and design the environments together with the story.”
Of course, as noted in the trailer, one’s vehicle can now submerge underwater along with sailing across it. At the end of the day however, the relationship between protagonist Toe and the ship is what matters. “The relationship is a symbiotic one, the ship won’t sail without Toe to control the sails or oars, and Toe can’t overcome certain obstacles without the ship,” says Schmocker.
FAR: Changing Tides will be coming to Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, PS4, PS5, Nintendo Switch and PC. Stay tuned for more details and gameplay in the coming weeks.