The Long Dark, a first-person open world survival sim that throws you into the cold Canadian wilderness, moves closer to having a story mode. Developer Hinterland has added a Telltale-like layer of graphical polish, too, making the environments themselves richer storytellers in their own right. Interiors and exteriors are more full-bodied. From stovetops to ice sheets, from dust motes to the Northern Lights, there's a color grading that I can only liken to Firewatch's masterful paintbrush.
They've also worked on the first-person presence, so you look extra screwed when that coyote starts chewing on your forearm. And it's got early facial animations and 3D-modeled characters which look like they're aiming for beautiful concept art and they're getting beautiful concept art out of it.
Watching this video just made The Long Dark ping hard on my radar again. While it's been on Steam Early Access since September 2014—as more of a pure survival sim—I want to get both my hands wrapped around this upcoming story mode. It's looking at a late-this-year release window, somewhere near the end of 2016.
