Years in the making, Synapse’s transformative gameplay combines brutal firepower and surging telekinetic powers to deliver a level of immersion and connection not yet seen on the hardware.

Synapse places players in a beautifully abstract world withdual-wielding combat that evolves Fracked’s run and gun gameplay, putting expressive 1:1 telekinesis in one hand and deadly, tactile weaponry in the other. Players harness this lethal combination as they master their own combat style to fight their way through a hostile mindscape.

Synapse is designed to take full advantage of PlayStation VR2’s boundary pushing hardware.

“Synapse is the culmination of a decade of VR-only development.” said James Shepherd, Head of nDreams Studio. “Following the success of Phantom and Fracked, we challenged ourselves to push VR gameplay to new limits using the power of PS VR2. The team have more than risen to this challenge and the result is a milestone release that sets the benchmark for our next 10 years of innovation.” 

We saw the opportunity with PS VR2 to create a new, expressive mechanic that is perfect for VR – telekinesis. We’ve seen from non-VR games how telekinesis can add so much to combat and gameplay, but VR transforms the experience, making telekinesis feel even more immersive through full 1:1 motion control.

We’ve tailored the wielding of telekinesis to feel instinctive and expressive, giving players new ways to take down enemies and progress through levels. A key element in this is eye-tracking enhanced aiming which equips players with pinpoint precision when targeting their telekinesis and combines with motion controls to make wielding telekinetic powers a full-body experience.

We were wrapping up Fracked just as we were starting work with the PS VR2, and we knew this was the perfect foundation to build upon with Synapse.  Our new game evolves this core gameplay, making full use of the Sense controller’s analogue sticks, adaptive triggers and haptic feedback, but we wanted to go beyond this.

We wanted to give the player the freedom to shape and master their combat style through dual-wielding, with telekinesis in one hand and a deadly arsenal of weapons in the other. How you use this lethal combination is up to you. As an example, something I love about the guns in Synapse is the ability to reload by slamming the magazine against any surface you choose: the back of your hand, the cover in front of you, your chest, or my personal favourite – the head of an enemy you have propelled towards you with telekinesis!

There are so many abilities and combat styles for players to discover, from using objects as weapons or moveable cover, to telekinetically launching enemies into mid-air and blasting them with your trusty firearm as you truly unleash your inner anti-hero.

A next gen hardware launch is always an exciting time, especially for us as developers. From very early on in the development cycle, we could see that the graphical fidelity of this generation of hardware was going to be a huge leap forward. So, we placed a focus on tailoring Synapse’s surreal mindscape visual style to showcase the PS VR2’s OLED display and the seismic increase in graphical horsepower. The monochrome art style with its bursts of vibrant colour can only truly be done justice on the stunning 4K HDR screen along with foveated rendering, showing the world vividness and sharpness at a level that we haven’t seen before.

Key Features:

• Motion-controlled, 1:1 telekinesis with eye-tracking-enhanced aiming that equips players with the power to launch, levitate and smash enemies through destructible environments. 
• Adrenaline-fuelled gunplay engineered for PlayStation VR2’s Sense™ controllers. Feel every moment through haptic feedback and adaptive triggers. 
• A stand-out art style designed to make full use of the PlayStation VR2’s stunning 4K HDR display.

Synapse is coming exclusively on PS VR2 in 2023.