Directive 8020’s rewind function makes play-your-own-survival-horror simpler for completionists

Supermassive’s well-regarded interactive survival horror collection, the Darkish Footage Anthology, is prepared for its second season. Directive 8020 might be its first entry and was accessible to play in demo kind at SGF 2025, even when it was closely weighted with cutscenes and context-setting preamble.

The demo kicked off with a gathering between Younger and Stafford, marking the anniversary of Younger’s father’s demise, who was additionally a long-time buddy of Stafford’s – the commander of the area mission that Younger can also be sure for.

The plot then leaps 4 years ahead, putting us aboard the spaceship Cassiopeia. Oh and it’s one way or the other overrun by some fungal, sentient alien goop. Worse nonetheless, but in addition a horror staple, the goop is coalescing into almost-perfect copies of the human crew. Belief no-one!

When the hydroponics bay is overrun by an alien substance, two crewmates Cernan and Stafford, should combat their ET doppelgangers. Lastly, I acquired to play (however just for a couple of minutes), transferring stealthily across the decrease deck of the hydroponics bay whereas my alien copy (now fungal and indignant) tried to hunt me down. Happily, you’re geared up with a scanner to mark the place the aliens had been final seen, and after triggering a close-by hydroponic pod to distract, I made my means up the ladder.

This was one in every of 3 ways to play this part, handily introducing a brand new mechanic for The Darkish Footage’ second run: Turning Factors. Utilizing this function, you possibly can rewind to those choice bushes, permitting you to replay sections and discover completely different choices or alter the end result. That is an fascinating change for the collection. In earlier video games, when you may rewind to replay complete sections in macro, there was no strategy to change a single micro choice.

I mentioned this with my colleague Jessica Conditt, and we’re each the sort of gamers to proceed with our horrible selections in video games like Directive 8020, the Darkish Footage Anthology, Till Daybreak and the remainder. Happily, then, Directive 8020 will embody a hard-boiled Survivor Mode – with no rewinds.

The demo shifted again to a extra narrative focus and cutscenes, briefly interrupted by the chance that one crew member (particularly, the CEO funding the entire operation) is perhaps an alien. Did I pull the set off? Nope. I’ll have to attend til the October launch to know if that was the proper choice to make.

Directive 8020 launches on 2nd October, 2025 on PlayStation 5, Xbox Collection X|S, and Steam.