Developed by Cain Maddox // Releasing 8 November 2024 on Steam and Itch.io // PC, Mac, Linux // $5.99 USD

Inquiries at contact@cainmaddox.com

Pitch

PROXIMATE is a dread-driven narrative game where you investigate a deep sea laboratory and piece together the events that lead to the research team's demise.
You'll be required to wear a sonar-based visor that only tells you the bare minimum information you need to succeed — and sometimes less. Use text information, proximity data and audio clues to form a mental map of your surroundings and pray that your technology won't fail you when you need it most.
The full game will be 1 hour long.

Gameplay

The main hook of the game is its unique movement mechanics. You navigate using traditional first-person controls, but your perception of the environment is limited to only a textual readout on a visor that's worn by the player character.
The visor is comically unreliable, so your imagination will often have to fill in the blanks. See the words “MAN”, “MINCE MEAT” and “KETCHUP” in the corner of the room and try not to assume the worst — though the worst might actually be correct, given that the laboratory isn't as “abandoned” as you were led to believe.
Your primary task is to collect the deceased team's research notes for the benefit of an uncaring, profiteering investment firm. Read through petty office drama, a situationship between two hopeless lesbians, and a CEO who's still not over his ex, and then go right back to stumbling over their dismembered [REDACTED].
If all of that sounds overwhelming, don't worry! Your manager (voiced by Luke Austin) will occasionally call you to provide passive-aggressive commentary and make your already difficult job somehow even harder.

Story

After labor rights movements sweep large parts of India and Southeast Asia, companies around the world lose their supply of cheap exploitable workers. Melbourne-based tech startup Neuras decides to attempt the impossible: installing AI drives into the freshly dead to create a cheap and endless supply of workers.
After a year of disappointing results, the Neuras lab suddenly cuts all contact with their investors. You, a contractor for the country's largest investment firm, have been tasked with investigating the lab and recovering the firm's rightful IP. But it's the firm's other investment project — a sonar-based image recognition visor — that might end up being your bigger problem.
That, and the breathing you keep hearing behind the door.

History

Cain Maddox spent seven years working in tech startups before one day deciding to find out how long it'd take his employer to fire him if he spent all his work hours making video games instead.
Two months later, he was officially free and announced his work on PROXIMATE. He pitched to VicScreen and secured funding in 2023. He then got into an eight month long situationship with another trans crustpunk, which mildly delayed development but also shaped the game's narrative focus on messy, imperfect queer characters.

Media

Download as .zip