HELENA : Cloud District is a megastructure photography game laser targeted at my interests, and it’s out next week
HELENA : Cloud District is a first-person exploration and photography game set in a vast, decaying megastructure overgrown with unusual plants. Players explore its dangerous, layered spaces and take photographs to uncover the structure’s history, making the camera and the need to choose what to document central to the experience.
The game is non-linear, with players free to find their own routes using movement abilities such as sliding, hovering and gliding. They can carry only three photographs at a time and must return them to a computer at the centre of the structure. HELENA : Cloud District is due out on 29 October, the same day as Hypnos.
In short
- Explore an abandoned megastructure.
- Take photos to reveal its history.
- The game launches on 29 October.
Explained simply
First-person exploration games put the player in the character’s viewpoint, while photography games make taking and choosing images part of play. In HELENA : Cloud District, players explore a huge, deteriorating structure where unusual plants have taken hold, and use photographs to piece together its history.
The structure has multiple levels and routes, and players can slide, hover and glide through it. They can keep only three photographs at once before returning to a computer at its centre, so exploring and deciding what to record are linked.