Fear is Near: Pulp Horror Indie The Fabulous Fear Machine Unveils Launch Date of October 4, 2023

Stylish new gameplay trailer features eerie storytelling and real-time strategy in the upcoming narrative-driven game from the creators of Do Not Feed the Monkey

Madrid, Spain. [August 29, 2023]—Fear draws near, as AMC Games and Fictiorama revealed today that their upcoming pulp horror strategy game, The Fabulous Fear Machine, will launch October 4, 2023 on Steam, GOG.com, and the Epic Games Store. A chilling new gameplay trailer foretells the unsettling stories and tactical gameplay players can expect from the title. The game’s updated demo is also available now during Steam’s official Strategy Fest for those who want to get a head start on the spooky season. 

Watch the Release Date Announcement trailer: https://youtu.be/4OX1sWXgrOM 

The Fabulous Fear Machine is a single-player, narrative-focused game that welcomes the player as a newly minted “Master of the Machine,” an abettor to a dark power that can grant their deepest desires… for a price. Through the clever deployment of Legends—scary stories, grim folktales, and urban myths depicted as playing cards—players must spread fear across the globe with the help of creepy servants called Agents. 

The new trailer is narrated by the first campaign’s protagonist, Jen Hammond, a scientist and industrialist turned evil mastermind. Jen guides players through the game’s basic mechanics, explaining how she expands her influence from the landfall of a “fear seed” to the far corners of the map. As Jen’s domain grows, so does the pressure to perform against Rival powers and randomly-occurring social events that may force a change of plans. It ends with glimpses of the other Masters in the game, who operate in newly-revealed regions of the Americas featuring advanced mechanics to contend with, like psychic locks and “Utopias” (basically, anti-Legends).

Horror fans may recall seeing The Fabulous Fear Machine at the IGN Awesome Indies showcase and Future Games Show during Gamescom 2022; since then, the demo has added localization in 4 languages, a streamlined tutorial, and more classic comic-style art. The Strategy Fest demo for The Fabulous Fear Machine is available now on Steam. For more information, join the conversation on Twitter or hop into the game’s official Discord.

Fictiorama Studios is a Madrid-based indie game studio founded by 3 brothers (Mario, Alberto, and Luis Oliván) united in their devotion to narrative-driven games. Their 2018 release Do Not Feed the Monkeys is a “digital voyeur simulator” that won multiple awards for innovation and narrative excellence, as well as garnering a triple nomination at the Independent Game Festival. In addition, two of the Oliván brothers are members of the alternative rock band Kovalski, which performed the soundtrack for Fictiorama’s first game Dead Synchronicity.

AMC Games is the video game publishing arm of AMC Networks, providing developers with a home for their passion projects that guarantee players a unique gaming experience. Launched in 2020 with the IGF-nominated flight passenger simulator Airplane Mode, which meticulously recreates the experience of real-time commercial flight, AMC Games has produced titles including the meditative metal-detecting game The Magnificent Trufflepigs, the upcoming pulp-horror strategy game Fabulous Fear Machine, and the upcoming “video editing puzzle” game It’s a Wrap!, which has already won the Critic’s Choice Award at Indie Game Fest, Excellence in Design from BitSummit, and Most Fun at Indie X.