In just a few hours, Taken Soul – Death Grab will officially hit the shelves. This is an adventure horror action game produced and developed by a Vietnamese studio. As soon as it was revealed on forums, this project received attention, interest, and enthusiastic support from the community. Gamers are eagerly awaiting the official launch on Steam on February 28th.
Before the launch, we had an interesting conversation with the project’s creators.
Hello Taken Soul team, can you introduce your group?
Hello readers, we are members of SOGA Studio. The production team of Taken Soul – Death Grab are all Vietnamese, not professional game developers but amateurs, mostly working in different fields.
Where did the idea for this game come from? What is the game’s content? What is the meaning of the name “Death Grab”? What is special about the characters and graphics?
In recent years, after a series of Vietnamese horror games launched, Vietnamese gamers have been looking forward to a groundbreaking game with high graphics and significant investment in game effects, so we also strive to accomplish that.
In Taken Soul – Death Grab, players will take on the role of Trung, who is on a vacation trip in Da Lat with his family. Unfortunately, tragedy strikes when his mother and younger sister mysteriously go missing. From there, Trung embarks on a journey to find and rescue them. However, to achieve this, he must face dark forces and uncover the mysteries hidden within the city.
The meaning of the name “Death Grab” evokes a battle between life and death, where players must confront and overcome many challenges to protect their lives and those of their loved ones. It also alludes to discovering dark secrets and spiritual forces that players need to fight to “reclaim” life from the hands of evil.
A diverse and profound character lineup: The characters in “Death Grab” are built with diverse backgrounds and distinctive personalities, from the main player to local residents and spiritual forces. Each character has their own story, creating a rich game world where players can interact and explore deeper into each fate.
The graphics are designed with great care and detail to realistically depict the context of Da Lat city in the 2000s, featuring familiar locations such as pine hills, Xuan Huong Lake, Da Lat station, and Da Lat Pedagogical College,… vividly recreating a lively yet somewhat eerie feeling for players.
Why did you choose Da Lat as the game’s setting?
When starting the journey of creating the game Taken Soul, the main inspiration for the team came from Da Lat – a famous tourist city in Vietnam, with a dreamy, romantic beauty but also concealing many eerie, spiritual stories. The team decided to set the game in Da Lat during the 2000s to provide players with a more relatable story.
How long did it take from the idea to completion of the game?
It took less than a year from the conception to completion.
What challenges or advantages did you encounter while making the game? How did the team overcome difficulties?
The challenges the team faced included:
Accurately researching how to recreate the geography, architecture, and culture of Da Lat in 2000, but research materials are quite scarce; The team had to find ways to narrate horror stories and spiritual mysteries delicately, stimulating the curiosity of players to reflect the cultural identity of Da Lat.
Besides, advanced graphics technology and gameplay are crucial to vividly recreate old Da Lat. The development team faced challenges in terms of effort and resources to create beautiful graphics effects and smooth gameplay. In storytelling and character development, creating an engaging storyline and multidimensional characters in the context of old Da Lat was also quite challenging. Each character needs to have their own story, personality, and clear goals for players to interact with and deeply feel.
Moreover, meeting the expectations of the supportive community, especially those who love Da Lat, is also a significant pressure. Collecting and integrating feedback from the community into the development process to make “Death Grab” more perfect is also not an easy task. Finally, with a limited team, allocating resources and time for tasks became more challenging, each member had to take on multiple roles to support.
Nevertheless, we also have many advantages such as: The interest and support from the gamer community, especially fans of horror and adventure games, create strong motivation for the development team. Choosing Da Lat as the setting for “Death Grab” brings uniqueness and novelty. This city is not only famous for its natural beauty but also rich in cultural and spiritual materials, creating an ideal backdrop for horror and spiritual stories. The Steam platform’s wide distribution helps “Death Grab” easily reach a large number of players both domestically and internationally.
Can you reveal some details about the game’s production costs?
Quite low, the game’s budget mainly consists of the contributions of the team members.
What are your expectations for your “baby”?
“Taken Soul” is the team’s debut title, so we hope for support from both domestic and international players and feedback for future projects. The game is not only an entertainment product but also a spiritual journey, an adventure into the past, present, and future of Da Lat. Those who have not yet known Da Lat will have an interesting experience of the landscape here.
The production team revealed that the game’s price will be announced on February 28th on Steam.
Thank you, Taken Soul team, for these detailed insights! Wishing your project great success!