Those who played The Sinking City back in 2019 know this is a solid and very good action and adventure game. In the game, protagonist Charles Reed has to investigate strange events taking place in the city of Oakmont. The US city is slowly flooding, while it is also plagued by “eldritch horrors”, fearsome creatures inspired by the books of author H.P Lovecraft.
Yes, this game made by Ukrainian studio Frogwares was based on the books of the celebrated US author, and featured a rich open world and compelling cases for players assuming the role of detective Charles Reed to investigate. Its remastered edition was also one of the best video game releases of 2025.
So it makes a lot of sense, then, that many gamers are looking forward to the game’s sequel, which is coming on August 18. This was recently revealed by Frogwares, while the Ukrainian studio also put out another trailer showing off more of their upcoming game, which also states the August 18 release date for the game.
More interestingly, though, the studio also released a playable demo for The Sinking City 2. This only available on PC via Steam, while the full game will also come out for PS5 and Xbox Series X/S.
And having played through the demo, I was left with the impression that this could be a good sequel to the original The Sinking City game, although the game itself does feel quite a bit different to its predecessor.
Actually, players are informed right off the bat that The Sinking City2 leans more towards survival horror, and this became obvious as I started playing. This is because while I could read documents scattered throughout the game world, getting up to speed on the lore, and even connect this evidence in protagonist Calvin Rafferty’s “mental place”, it seems this will be optional in order to progress in the game and is tied to weapon and character upgrades as Frogwares itself revealed in a recent X post.
So instead of connecting evidence while in some grisly place in order to figure out what events had transpired and watch a recreation of the same as in the original Sinking City game, I found myself solving puzzles and shooting down undead as I made my way to a library in order to get hold of a book.
As players get to find out in a pretty great cutscene at the beginning of the game, Calvin has performed some kind of “dream ritual” with his girlfriend Faye in order to contact an “eldritch god”. she has ended up bed-ridden, and the book is necessary to get her out of her predicament. There’s another intro cutscene that is interactive and shows Calvin taking care of Faye. It just involves pressing one button on the controller, though, in order to perform an action (such as applying eye drops to Faye), so it feels like Frogwares has made this part of the game interactive for the sake of it.
The Sinking City 2 looks much better than the original game, but the focus is on survival horror now.
The US city of Arkham looks very good, and graphically this is far ahead of the first Sinking City game too. There are some nice graphical effects (and smoke does look particularly good here). The city of Arkham, though, does not feel quite as atmospheric as the original’s Oakmont did, which had atmosphere you could cut with a knife… There was also some freezing and stuttering, particularly when I was navigating one of Arkham’s flooded streets on the boat, so Frogwares still has some optimization work to do before the game’s release date this summer.
Meanwhile, solving puzzles like fixing a control panel in order to open a floodgate had a Resident Evil feel to it… There are also zombies here – worms plaguing the city can reanimate corpses, and putting the zombies down also has a Resident Evil feel to it. The action does not come close to that seen in this year’s Resident Evil Requiem, but after the success of Capcom’s game who can blame Frogwares from trying to imitate the record setting survival horror franchise.
Reaching the library in the background and getting hold of a book is the goal in The Sinking City 2’s playable teaser.
There are also several cinematic moments here, such as at some point when Calvin is surrounded by too many undead enemies and has to make a hasty escape from a building. Once I reached my destination (the library) I got those Resident Evil vibes again as I searched for the book in the dimly lit interior, although navigating obstacles and solving an environmental puzzle in order to reach the book felt tedious at times.
So what to make of The Sinking City 2 demo? While this will likely be a good survival horror game, it seems Frogwares might have partly given up or relegated to the background some of the most interesting aspects of the original game in favor of survival horror gameplay.
The Sinking City 2 might still be a worthy sequel and good survival horror, but Calvin Rafferty’s time in Arkham is not looking as compelling as Charles Reed’s adventure in Oakmont judging by what I’ve played so far. Nonetheless, I’ll reserve my final judgment for when I play through Frogware’s full game this summer.