The trailer opens with the view of a distant, metallic object tilting into a dark grey sea under a hazy, sherbert-orange sky.

The plaintive sounds of Deep Within from Ninja Tracks’ Megalith album blast as words glitch onto the screen announcing a “new journey” from the creator of ICO, Shadow of the Colossus, and The Last Guardian.

Despite a note that the trailer, captured on PC, is a mix of development footage, gameplay, and cinematics, and that none of it is final, the images and music combine to trigger something meaningful when you watch it.

Something robotic, or perhaps clad in a mechanical suit, caked in dry sand, rises from the ground. We get a glimpse — for less than a second — of a humanoid head with two glassy rectangles where eyes would be. A neck and arms perhaps sheathed in cloth, then covered in plates of dusty burgundy metal plates.

The scene shifts to washed-out video of landscape: a mesa near water, a massive robotic-looking figure sitting, legs straight ahead, arms at its side. Dead? Asleep? Turned off?
 

Then a view from a cover of water looking out from under a rocky view of something not nature-made. The next image confirms it. Here is a base of sorts, perched on the water. It’s design is both familiar and otherworldly. There are massive spheres, a tower, an antenna. 

Another shot shows what appears to be a massive wall, a giant humanoid robotic figure backed up against it, as if fleeing or perhaps falling. Its legs are slightly bent, its arms dangle. There is no head.

The video shifts to the original human-sized figure, looking out across a sky ribboned in subdued, pink-hued clouds. Next we see the person walking, a rifle of sorts slung across its back, toward another crouched, massive robot, seemingly inoperable.

A giant head is shown scanning the figure, and next we see what appears to be the head hovering across the landscape as day turns to night, turns to day. It finally hovers around a fallen, headless megalith. 

Arcs of electricity weave through the air between the hovering head and the neck of the body as the massive robot slowly lurches to its feet. Brush discharges arc between the lowering head and the neck stump of the body as the two fit together.

Then we see the goliath seemingly working alongside the person, lifting and slowly dragging what appears to be a  building. 

Other scenes show the human-sized figure riding on the back of a hover tank, blasting away at what appears to be a school of albino catfish scuttling in its dust wake. We see the head attaching to other bodies. Battles between two of the massive mechanical figures. The smaller figure darting up and around one of the larger ones with a jetpack. A missile launching, while the figure climbs the side of it. 

And finally, the smaller figure standing atop the head amidst smoke and a yellow-tinged sky as the words gen Atlas appear across the screen.

The Summer Game Fest trailer, the second shown for the game, reveals very little about what we can expect unless you know anything about the creators and the games they’ve worked on in the past.

This will be the first creation of GenDesign, the studio formed by Fumito Ueda in 2014, after he left Sony in 2011 during the creation of The Last Guardian. GenDesign includes a number of people that worked with Ueda on ICO and Shadow of the Colossus.

The studio refers to itself as innovators in the game industry and says it is committed to “creating with uncompromised vision and passion. Amidst a competitive worldwide landscape, we continually strive to create original games that push boundaries and stand out on a global scale.”

Back in 2018, Ueda mentioned that the new studio was in the midst of prototyping a new game, and then two years later Epic Games announced that they would be fully funding development of the yet-to-be-announced title.

During the 2024 Game Awards, GenDesign dropped its first tease for the game, at the time codenamed Project Robot. This new trailer, which hit during Summer Game Fest, also gave us the official name for the game: gen Atlas.

The trailer is, in many ways, evocative of the sort of work in ICO, Shadow and Guardian that made so many players such a fan of Ueda. His games are often creations of isolation, bleak, desaturated worlds, and immense scale.

Fumito said in this latest creation he and his team “hope to share an experience that inspires moments of quiet wonder and discovery.

“The team and I are grateful to all the fans who’ve been eager to learn more about our game. Their passion and enthusiasm has always motivated and inspired us.”

There’s little more to know about the game beyond what the landing page says about it on the Epic Games Store.

“Alone. Silent facilities litter the surface of a vast planet. In the distance, the silhouette of a colossal robot. With no clear destination, one soldiers on”

This planet… is still alive.

Without knowing why, you awaken on an abandoned planet.

Before you lies a vast, silent world. Colossal structures stretch over endless plains, deserted facilities, and an ever-changing sea. The remnants of some grand design litter the planet’s surface.

As you journey deeper into this strange world, a colossal robot awaits. Its overwhelming power opens paths to places once beyond reach, transforming your conception of the world.

Across an endless expanse of time, the remnants of those forgotten constructs begin to move once more…

gen ATLAS — a single-player, open-world action-adventure game.”

The press release also notes that the player awakes alone in a vast, “mystery-filled planet” and discover “colossal robots to transform the face of the world.”

The game, which is published by Epic Games, is available to wishlist now on Epic Games Store.