SOMA left me sitting in my chair after I witnessed the ending, elbows on the desk, hands holding my head up. SOMA brought about ideas I would have never thought of before, and left me with the purest of feelings at the end of it all. The game’s presentation of what first seems to just be ethically challenging choices and actions, grows into an incredible representation of existentialism and related philosophies. No other piece of media left me feeling nearly as such, and the story in this game is fucking fantastic for doing so. The gameplay may suck as a horror game, but some parts are very atmospheric and legitimately incredible in its environment which really helped me enjoy walking around. I believe this game has one of the most thought provoking stories and scenes, and must be experienced as a video game to truly get the experience that it tries to deliver with its story. It’s a failure of a horror game, but that doesn’t do much to hold back the great environmental design and story.

Que jogo senhores... Esse jogo proporciona uma experiência única. Principalmente em relação à história. Pra mim, esse jogo é o magnum opus da Frictional Games.

De fato, o que mais torna esse jogo dentre a imensidão de jogos de terror é a sua história, que na minha opinião, é uma das melhores histórias de todos os tempos no mundo dos jogos e no entretenimento de modo geral.

É uma história apresentada da maneira mais perfeita, no ritmo perfeito, e é uma história perfeita, aterrorizante, trágica, e profunda em um nível completamente diferente de (talvez quase) tudo que o terror em jogos já apresentou até 2023 (minha humilde opinião).

O resto do jogo é muito bom também, principalmente a triha-sonora, a edição de som e o level design do jogo.

É uma experiência muito imersiva e vai me marcar para sempre.

I've played through this multiple times and each time I enjoy it less. I suppose if you just graduated middle school the story may be deep in some way, but taking any deeper look into it will reveal the lazy design, constant plotholes, and overall pointlessness.

Some of the worst gameplay I've experienced in my life. It feels like a complete after thought. Although frightening at points, the game is not nearly as scary as I hoped it would be.

Characters are not consistent, especially Catherine, and Simon appears to have the intellect of a monkey as he is told multiple times (and shown) how scans work, but still believes he will be magically transferred to the Ark at the end of the game. I don't enjoy playing as an idiotic character.
The voice acting also leaves a great deal to be desired.

It is hard to even get through the game knowing the main objective is to launch a very small amount of scans into space that will only last a few thousand years. This is virtually equivalent to doing nothing. This isn't a second chance. I've seen some defend this by saying that the ark may be discovered by aliens who would descan them back to humans. Thanks for the funny joke.

Why not a 0 then?
The game is beautiful and builds a nice atmosphere. That is all. It does explore some interesting ideas, but only at a very shallow level. It has a small degree of originality although most is very derivative and basic. I would hope most people have properly looked into the concepts this game fails to explore before playing.