The Sinking City 2: Lovecraftian survival-horror from Frogwares explores a flooded Arkham beset by eldritch terrors

Frogwares has announced The Sinking City 2, its upcoming Lovecraftian survival-horror set for a 2025 release.

The sequel to The Sinking City focuses on combat, exploration, and story as you navigate the rotting city of Arkham in Lovecraftian 1920s United States.

The Sinking City 2 | World Premiere Trailer (PC, PS5, Xbox Series)

Plagued by a supernatural flood that brought decay and eldritch monsters to its streets, the infamous city of Arkham is a semi-open world of decaying mansions, flooded markets, and abandoned hospitals. As you progress, the flood waters will rise, changing the layout of locations when you return to Arkham. While exploring, you will scrounge for limited resources and balance a finite inventory, deciding which items to keep or drop.

Featuring a new, stand-alone story separate from the one told in the original game, you will find a morally grey tale set around the Lovecraft mythos of cults, mutant creatures, and incomprehensible gods. You will fight these nightmarish abominations using an arsenal of 1920s-inspired firearms and melee weapons.

To help discover the dark mysteries that brought you to the forsaken city, you can solve puzzles that allow for a deeper investigation into your surroundings to uncover secrets, alternate options, and additional lore. While you have the option to be a cunning detective, the feature will be entirely optional.

“We want the investigation aspect to be a beneficial part of the game for those who want it, offering tangible gameplay bonuses and eureka moments without it being a requirement to progress,” said the game’s executive producer, Denys Chebotarov. “By taking time to piece together clues, you’ll arm yourself with more knowledge and awareness of your options versus just coming across them by chance.

“We are also doing this for our existing fans who have come to love this feature so they don’t feel left out. For those not keen on combat and survival-horror mechanics, we will also have various accessibility features to help.”

With The Sinking City 2, Frogwares said it hopes to pivot the studio to a “horror-first” focus and has been able to move over to Unreal Engine 5 to utilize everything it offers to developers.

“The original Sinking City is still one of our most successful titles, most likely because of stronger horror genre leanings and setting,” said the studio’s publishing director, Sergiy Oganesyan.

“We created quite a few detective adventures in the past but now we’re going to mix things up to keep doing what people love about us - meaning story-rich experiences - while still being able to evolve. It’s exciting but risky. We’re an independent studio that for over 24 years has become known for detective games. But we need to start taking bolder moves. The industry is changing around us, and we want to secure the studio’s future.”

Due to Ukraine still in a state of war, Frogwares will take The Sinking City 2 to Kickstarter, and once the crowdfunding phase is live, you can aid in the game’s development. The Kickstarter campaign will help to create a safety net for the studio and help secure some additional features for the game.

“At this stage, we have learned and adapted to our reality but the ongoing war adds an ominous layer of uncertainty, and the additional funds will help us deal with potential disruptions, on top of helping fund various extra features we would love to implement,” said Frogwares CEO Wael Amr.

“Our previous game, Sherlock Holmes The Awakened, was fully developed and released during the war. Through Kickstarter and our supporters, we built ourselves a safety net that saved us more than once. From power cuts as our electrical infrastructure was targeted for months, to the need for team members to relocate at very short notice, this financial safety net proved invaluable to us. So we need to do the same now with The Sinking City 2 as this game is vastly bigger and more complex.”

The Sinking City 2 is a 2025 release on PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X/S.