Saturnalia
Saturnalia’s Beautiful Nightmare Comes Alive In New Gameplay Trailer
Posted August 04, 2022MILAN, Italy, August 4, 2022 - Santa Ragione has unveiled a new trailer for its upcoming title Saturnalia—a single-player horror-roguelite set in the Italian region of Sardinia, circa 1989. The previously-unseen narrated footage showcases the game’s setting, story, and gameplay elements, including an introduction to the fictional town of Gravoi and an explanation of the game’s mechanics. Click on the image below to start watching:
A PC game set to exclusively debut on the Epic Games Store—with more platforms to be announced in the future—Saturnalia is a fever dream inspired in equal parts by authentic Sardinian culture and classic Italian giallo horror films. The narrative revolves around a mysterious, centuries-old ritual that occurs every year on the night of the winter solstice, as each of the game’s four playable characters must utilize their unique abilities and confront their own painful memories in order to expose the secrets haunting the town and ultimately escape Gravoi.
An honorable mention for the Seamus McNally Grand Prize at the 2022 Independent Games Festival and a nominee for the Grand Prize at the 2021 A.MAZE and IndieCade Awards, Saturnalia was developed and published by Santa Ragione in collaboration with production co-funder Big Trouble. Some of its most notable features include:
- One-Of-A-Kind Setting: meticulously designed and based on real-life location scouting in Sardinia, the town of Gravoi is procedurally-generated for each new game, ensuring that no two players will share the same village layout. And if all four of your protagonists die? The village rearranges, adding another layer of complexity to exploration and puzzle-solving.
- Immersive Visuals: the art of Saturnalia borrows from rotoscope animation, traditional sketching, and impressionistic painting to craft a story cloaked in color and shadow, producing an eerily beautiful atmosphere that is as enthralling as it is chilling.
- Monster Maze: with no markers or compasses to situate themselves, players must instead rely on signs and local landmarks to orient themselves within Gravoi—all while a terrible creature stalks the cobblestone streets, waiting for its chance to strike. Players must utilize stealth and strategy to stay free of its clutches, ranging from using tools to unlock secret passageways to managing a dwindling supply of matches to keep the dark at bay.
- Band of Misfits: Saturnalia offers four distinct co-protagonists to select from, some of whom are available at the story’s outset while others must be unlocked. Each has his or her own unique abilities that are integral to completing the game’s many puzzles, and players will be able to switch between characters to cover more ground, survive attacks, and reveal new locations. Teamwork is a necessary component of both the gameplay and the story of Saturnalia: this group of outsiders must learn to trust each other, just as the player must learn how to best utilize their skills.
About Santa Ragione
Santa Ragione is an Italian game design studio founded by Pietro Righi Riva and Nicolò Tedeschi in 2010, creators of FOTONICA, MirrorMoon EP, Wheels of Aurelia, and Saturnalia. Santa Ragione’s games focus on achieving a visceral response from the player, whether through the desolate landscapes of MirrorMoon EP, the uncompromising, vertigo-inducing speeds of FOTONICA, or the controversial politics in Wheels of Aurelia. The studio has a unique, experimental approach to accessibility that encourages exploration and personal interpretation, to achieve depth. Santa Ragione's ambitions are to influence game design through new genres and to continue the tradition of Italian design.
About Big Trouble
Big Trouble is an indie video game developer and publisher based in Milan. The studio was founded in 2022 by Lorenzo Silva, creator of critically acclaimed board games such as Potion Explosion, Dungeon Fighter, Railroad Ink, and The King’s Dilemma, published under the international gaming label Horrible Guild. Big Trouble is a new venture in the world of video games, with more than a decade of experience in crafting physical games!
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