An upcoming open-world RPG called Maneater puts players in the role of a shark who can swim around the coast and terrorize humans using some rather torturous methods.
In Maneater, players play as a shark who seeks revenge on a shark hunter that attacked them as a baby. The game takes place on a fictional version of the gulf coast which features seven large regions for the shark to explore. As the shark swims around, it can eat other sea animals and can also attack humans, on land, on boats, and in the water.
According to Tripwire, the humans in the game become targets because of the ways they wreak havoc on the shark’s ecosystem. The areas will feature different levels of pollution and the shark can learn more information about places as it discovers them. In order to punish humans for the way they treat the oceans, the shark can fight back with fatal attacks or with more torturous means. The shark can remove people’s limbs and let them bleed to death. The more humans the shark kills the more they will get hunted, which makes them much more dangerous than Katy Perry’s left shark, to say the least.
The game, which the developers call a Shark-P-G, will have RPG-style upgrade mechanics. Instead of gaining levels, the shark will grow larger and begin to evolve. Tripwire has teased three different evolutionary sets that players can choose to follow: the Bone Set, the Electro Set, or the Stealth set. Each of these will evolve the shark in unique ways and change its appearance and abilities.
Along with the open-world, the game will feature other RPG staples like a day/night cycle. The type and frequency of enemies changes with the time of day. The game also features seven apex predators that serve as boss encounters for each of the seven areas. These include a large alligator, a barracuda, a sperm whale, and some others. If players spend too much time in an area eating the food, it will draw these predators out. Players can travel to any of the seven areas at any time, but might encounter creatures far beyond their evolutionary level.
The game also has an interesting narrative framing device. To justify the animal’s strange behavior, the developers have framed the game as a shark-based reality TV show with a narrator voiced by Rick and Morty’s Chris Parnell. Parnell will divulge shark facts during the game, and commentate on the player’s actions and how they differ from average shark behavior. Too bad he wasn’t around to offer facts about the elusive shark in Red Dead Redemption 2.
The game sounds like a pretty twisted take on the Ecco the Dolphin concept. The team hasn’t talked about a release date yet and has so far only announced the game for PC, but they have said that it will be out next year.
Maneater will release in 2020 on PC.
Source: IGN
