By Andrew Reiner
Game Informer Magazine
“Singularity” is a thrilling, provocative, yet oddly familiar journey through the fabric of time. In this alternate take on historical events, Joseph Stalin’s role in the Cold War is heightened when Russian scientists discover a new element on the island of Katorga-12. This element holds untold power, and even though it’s unstable, Stalin accelerates the experiments. Death, contamination, and unexplainable phenomena are all Russia has to show for its efforts. Katorga-12 is quarantined and forgotten. History stays the course until you arrive on the island in 2010.
Katorga-12 is a place of scientific wonder and supernatural horror. Rather than letting players free-fall down this rabbit hole, Raven Software sends them down in a bathysphere. Katorga-12 is bathed in Russian colors and propaganda, but the architectural design feels like it was stripped from the notebook of “BioShock’s” Andrew Ryan. This Russian base has an amusement park feel to it, and just like “Ryan’s Rapture,” its history is detailed in audio recordings, video reels, scientist notes and hastily written wall messages. The guiding voice even bears a physical resemblance to Andrew Ryan, who (surprise, surprise) tries to blow your mind in a similar way to Ryan’s “would you kindly” reveal.
Raven doesn’t hide the fact that “Singularity” is heavily influenced by “BioShock.” Rather, the developer uses this familiar design to paint a unique picture. Sure, I found myself thinking about Ayn Rand’s objectivism at certain points, but this story’s most intriguing moments are tied to the greed of an empire and the conflicting voices within it. Raven does a phenomenal job delivering the fiction. The experiments, and people conducting them, are fascinating and believable. This tale runs out of magic roughly halfway through the game, but it picks up in the later stages and concludes with three satisfying alternate endings. The good ending, if it can be called that, made me do something I never thought I would in a game a powerful moment, to say the least.