It seems strange to strongly recommend a game entirely on the strength of everything but its gameplay. Yet that’s how I felt after finishing my journey through an offshore oil rig overrun with a nightmarish Lovecraftian entity. Still Wakes the Deep is a triumph in every regard, except the act of playing it, where it’s distinctly fine.

You play as Cameron ‘Caz’ McClearly, a guy who finds himself aboard the Beira D in a bid to hide from the police after battering some fella a little too enthusiastically in a pub. Oh, and he’s ‘good with the leccy’ as we’re often reminded throughout. Although the only thing we ever see him do is move a few fuses around, so we’ll have to take his word for that.

His actual credibility as an electrician aside, Caz is a great protagonist for one simple reason: He’s so darn likeable. Assault and battery charges notwithstanding, of course, he just seems like ‘a good lad,’ something his colleagues regularly profess whenever he agrees to drag himself through perilous situations to flick a few important switches. He never does so willingly, which only makes him all the more relatable. Caz is appropriately terrified of the cosmic entity infecting the rig, yet an inherent sense of duty always wins him around.

It makes you assume he must have a good reason for decking that bloke in the pub. Surely some brainless thug wouldn’t be this nice? His colleagues are all equally affable individuals too, in part thanks to the many lovely Scottish accents on display. Beyond that, though, they clearly care about one another’s well-being. Shown through playful banter, this should come off as eye-rollingly awful. Except it’s delivered with such obvious underlying affection in the face of life-threatening danger that it becomes endearing. You care when someone is snatched up into the many tentacles of the cosmic being entirely because they do. It’s some of the best acting I’ve heard in a while. 

A bunch of wee bastarts

This whole community sentiment is one part of the magnificent puzzle making the Beira D feel like a living, breathing oil rig. Everyone knows each other, uniting in their dislike of the rig’s overseer, Rennick. That’s relatable to the many British workplaces with an overbearing boss. Throw in the immense sense of place developer The Chinese Room has achieved here, and it brings it together wonderfully.

The Beira D feels like a real place. Everything from the staff’s quarters to the kitchen to the recreation room is brimming with arguably needless detail that adds so much. You can learn about Caz’s colleagues by checking out their desks or imagining the darts matches when you stumble upon the handwritten tournament bracket. Without these smaller flourishes, everything would seem clinical. 

The physical design of the thing itself is great too. I’ve not personally been on an oil rig before, though I certainly feel like I have now. Every department connects logically. It never feels like you’ve skipped through a section merely for story convenience. To get to the pontoons and ballast systems, you have to pass through all the connected areas first. And while that sounds like a slog, it never is since the atmosphere and pacing are stellar. 

Still Wakes the Deep clips along wonderfully. Clocking in at around four hours, it maintains a sense of desperation without any needless fluff. It’s a believable length too, given how the poor Beira D begins to split apart before the credits eventually roll. Within that time, you see enough monstrosities to ruin a Scottish man’s sleep for all eternity. And boy, are they disturbing. 

Still Wakes the Deep’s Beira D is stunningly realised

Even compared to the distinctly 70s bland, tired British decor, the cosmic forces are deeply upsetting. They snatch up the workers, contorting them into fleshy mutated blobs while travelling around by web-slinging their disgusting tendrils at every surface. Their hideous appearance is made worse thanks to the slurping sound effect that accompanies their actions. It’s skin-crawlingly brilliant. 

As you might imagine, since this is The Chinese Room, taking these creatures on in combat isn’t going to work. Instead, you have to sneak past them. This is where Still Wakes the Deep falters in some respects. Although, compared to other ‘sprint and dive into a locker’ horror games, it manages far more with a lot less. Whenever you encounter a colleague-turned-horrific nightmare, you’ll have to sneak from conveniently placed hiding spot to conveniently placed hiding spot in fairly small areas.

There, it’s a straightforward case of waiting until you can move or picking up an object you can lob across the room. I don’t know if H.P. Lovecraft considered that tossing a thermos flask at a gangway would defeat Cthulhu, but he certainly missed a trick if not. The stealth is never difficult, which might be a turnoff for some. However, I prefer it to the constant locker diving that comes with a larger area where an enemy is constantly stalking you. Give me a brief blast of sneakiness before getting on with an objective rather than pausing what I’m doing because a screaming mass of flesh has spotted me. 

Outside of that, gameplay is essentially wandering about, doing some light platforming, performing a couple of quick time events, and engaging in some brief, though effective, chase sequences. It’s completely unremarkable, sometimes leaning into frustration during sections where water is filling the room and you can’t find the ladder. It gets the job done, though. 

Water under the derelict rig

That’s all I needed. The uninspired gameplay didn’t bother me. If anything, the stealth sections’ brevity was a plus compared to its genre companions. While it might not defy convention mechanically, the vocal performances, spectacular sense of place, and top-tier atmosphere are worth checking out.

Score: 8/10
Time Taken: 4 hours
Played On: PS5

• For more paranormal strangeness, check out my Thaumaturge review