Frictional Games’ survival horror SOMA has sold over 450,000 copies, revealed in a developer blog. Six months ago, when SOMA’s sales figures were only half that, the company had not yet broke even on its development costs. Today, Frictional games were happy to report that “we have now broken even and then some!”

The sci-fi horror title, which had a large focus on narrative and philosophical discussion, released one year ago today and received acclaim from journalists and customers alike. Our local Wesley Scott gave the title a 7/10 praising its “powerful narrative” and “incredible atmosphere” but feeling displaced with the monster sections and some bugs on PC. Personally, I adored SOMA and thought it was one of the very best titles released last year – in a year absolutely chock-full of great releases.

The recent surge in sales comes from being featured in the recent Humble Monthly bundle as well as a large sale a few months ago on the Playstation Store.




Frictional Games state that, compared to their previous Amnesia: A Dark Descent, SOMA was “far from a safe bet” and cost over “ten times what Amnesia cost us”. Thomas Grip, creative director at Frictional, says that “The game relies heavily on getting certain themes across to the player, and communicating this proved to be a hard task indeed” as “weaponless horror games are no longer anything special and by no means a stand-out feature.”

The team were “constantly worried about a backlash based on faulty expectations” but despite a comparatively massive budget and a hard sell, the SOMA team are incredibly happy at reception to the title – especially user reviews.

Since the game’s release, Frictional have since switched to being a two-project studio with their goal being to “aim even higher than the scope and quality of SOMA”. The first title is expected to enter production at the end of this year and the second is currently in research and development stages.