If you’ve found yourself pondering the time-travel terrors teased in Bloober Team’s Cronos: The New Dawn reveal trailer last October, you might be intrigued to hear the Silent Hill 2 Remake studio has now shared further details in a new developer diary. That’s alongside the reveal of I Hate This Place – an open-world survival horror game it’s publishing later this year.
Cronos: The New Dawn, as we learned last year, follows the adventures of the enigmatic Traveler as they journey between a monster-infested post-apocalyptic future – created after a cataclysmic event known as the Change – and 1980s Poland. Now, though, Bloober has talked a little more about its upcoming sci-fi horror, – which is said to draw inspiration from the likes of John Carpenter’s The Thing, mind-pummelling German TV series Dark, 12 Monkeys, Dead Space, and even a touch of Dark Souls in terms of its challenge.
As for Cronos’ enigmatic lead, the Traveler is just one of a group – described as ‘divers in time’ – sent to explore the ruins of human civilisation in search of time rifts allowing them to extract people from the past who didn’t survive the apocalypse. In Cronos’ alternative timeline, the world ended in the ’80s – thanks to the aforementioned Change – and the resulting wasteland is populated by monstrous creatures known as The Orphans.
These are the remnants of humanity, and can take different forms, each with distinctive abilities. What connects each variant, however, is the fact they’re all still made of human tissue, introducing an element of body horror reminiscent of The Thing. Additionally (as per Bloober’s not entirely serious closing Q&A), players can expect walls of flesh, face-punching melee combat, “kinda” flamethrowers, dismemberment of sorts, and aliens (“maybe”). And ladders.
It’s promising stuff (especially for ladder fans, apparently), but sadly we’ve still no clearer idea of when Cronos: The New Dawn will arrive – beyond its previously announced “2025” launch window on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC, that is. What we do know, though, is that it isn’t the only game on Bloober’s 2025 release slate. The studio has also unveiled I Hate This Place, an isometric open-world survival horror currently due to arrive in “Q4” this year.
I Hate This Place is the work of developer Rock Square Thunder (Bloober is handling publishing duties under its new Broken Mirror Games label) and it’s inspired by Kyle Starks and Artyom Topilin’s comic book series of the same name. Players take on the role of Elena, who finds herself in a deadly fight for survival in a “harsh and unforgiving wilderness” after unwittingly awakening a malevolent force. It promises crafting, formidable foes, tense gunfights, and melee combat “that rewards ingenuity over brute force” – alongside a day and night cycle said to impact gameplay dynamics. Oh, and “avoid the Horned Man at all costs”.
“Drenched in bold, vivid colours and retro ’80s comic book aesthetics,” adds Bloober, “each location is lovingly crafted to tell its own disturbing story through stylish visuals that blur the line between reality and nightmare in a world where everything wants you dead.”
I Hate This Place launches via Steam and the Epic Games Store in “Q4” this year.
