Back in 2023, I had a blast with developer Frogwares' remake of Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened. Its blend of detective work and Lovecraftian horror felt like the studio fully in its element. I enjoy its straight Sherlock Holmes games, but increasingly they have this undercurrent of dark strangeness—particularly noticeable in most recent entry Chapter One—as if the team are straining to stop themselves slipping a tentacle and a cult sacrifice into the middle of the mystery.
All of which made it particularly sad to look back on the original fate of The Sinking City, Frogwares' full-on, mask-off Lovecraftian detective game. It felt rough on launch, and then owing to a dispute with the game's publisher, has existed in an awkward limbo for years that has prevented post-release support. Players on Steam couldn't get the latest patches, including basic features like achievements as well as serious bug fixes and even DLC.
It's definitely getting its second chance now, at least. Not only did Frogwares regain control of the Steam page last year and update the game to its most recent version with all expansions available, it also announced a sequel. And now there's one more treat to secure the game's legacy: it's getting a remaster, and it'll be free to all existing owners.
This release will move the game from Unreal Engine 4 to Unreal Engine 5, and sounds like it will spruce things up significantly. The main changes are visual—lighting is being reworked, it's getting 4k textures and improved reflections (a good tweak in a game with this much water), and there'll be support for DLSS, FSR and TSR upscaling.
Beyond the graphical changes, the remaster will add a photo mode, so you can take lots of nice screenshots of horrors beyond man's comprehension. The changelist also mentions "enhanced locations with additional levels of detail and objects"—it's not super clear whether that just refers to more visual enhancements or if that's tweaking the detective gameplay a bit too. At the very least, being able to see details more clearly should make some of the game's environmental clue-finding easier and more satisfying.
Check out some comparison shots below.
There's definitely a striking difference. It all looks much crisper than the sometimes muddy original release, and the crucial atmosphere seems much improved by the new lighting, which creates more subtle and spooky shadows.
I've been meaning to go back to The Sinking City for a while now for a reappraisal. I bounced off it when it first released, thanks to the pretty frustrating survival horror elements, but I loved the detailed detective work and the quirky, atmospheric world. This remaster sounds like the perfect excuse to finally take that second crack at it.
Unfortunately there's no ETA yet for the remaster's release, though given the Kickstarter gives the sequel's ETA as being as soon as December 2025, I'd imagine this can't be far off either. It is worth bearing in mind that Frogwares are still based primarily in Ukraine, however—it's pretty miraculous it's been able to continue making games at all during an ongoing invasion, so when it comes to release date, a bit of patience is definitely warranted.
