If there was anything missing from the Oculus Rift-launch title ADR1FT, it was guns. (Please note: I am joking.) In ADR1FT, the player is a lone astronaut, floating in the endless abyss of space. The goal the player is tasked with is seemingly simple: survive and get home. No ifs, ands, buts, or gun-wielding about it. Yet, returning home from space and surviving along the way isn’t as simple as it seems. In fact, in ADR1FT’s complicated world, the player is always confronted with puzzles, a lack of oxygen, and other mishaps on their zero gravity journey to escape the space station wreckage.
All this considered, it’s entirely possible that the China-based developers, Studio Surgical Scalpels, behind the in-development Project Boundary glanced at ADR1FT and thought, “let’s do this, but make it a multiplayer first-person-shooter.” So they did.
ADR1FT with guns
The frenetic, floating space battles of Project Boundary were recently revealed at the PlayStation China Conference, held at ChinaJoy 2016. While only confirmed for mainland China at this particular point in time, Project Boundary represents a future of PlayStation VR’s more accessible virtual reality titles. That is: VR games that want to not only make your jaw drop through the beauty of the 360-degree environment you’re in, but help you have more traditional (at least for videogames) fun while doing so.
In the brief trailer shown during Sony’s conference, the player is seen zipping around their space environment, gun firmly in hand, shooting anything that crosses their path. At first glance, Project Boundary really is ADR1FT with guns. Although, Project Boundary’s version of space has a primary difference: it’s a space easily inhabited by humans. Where ADR1FT flourishes in its quiet horror of being alone—as do similarly-themed films, such as Alfonso Cuarón’s Gravity (2013) or Duncan Jones’ Moon (2009)—Project Boundary finds its footing in the well-populated and colonized, hence the ability for multiplayer battles.
“Tired of the heavily crowded and tightly confined earth, people flooded into the uncharted ocean of heaven,” reads the game’s description on their website. “Putting hands on everything they can have a grasp.” Including guns, apparently. By way of gigantic space elevators connecting Earth to the wonders of space aided the ease of practical, quick space travel for the world’s citizens. Project Boundary’s space is a place of infinite wonder and hope. And, fittingly, a place for the age-old hobby of shooting things.
While Project Boundary so far is only confirmed for mainland China, you can still keep up to date with its space antics on their official website.
