Turns out Resident Evil 8 wasn’t the only new game Capcom had to show off at Sony’s PS5 reveal event. In addition to the highly-anticipated horror sequel, the publisher revealed a brand new IP going by the name Pragmata.
Many were expecting to see a lot of the games that ended up being announced today, like the sequel to Marvel’s Spider-Man, Gran Turismo 7, and, of course, RE8. Unlike those games, though, Pragmata is a complete surprise, having only been teased beforehand by a mysterious trademark that's been floating around since February.
If anything, the announcement trailer only adds to that mystery. In it, viewers are greeted with an unusual scene of an abandoned city being explored by an astronaut in a high-tech spacesuit that looks like it was ripped straight from Death Stranding. Who this person is, the trailer doesn’t say, choosing instead to focus on their encounter with seemingly the only other person in the city, a little girl accompanied by a holographic cat.
Then things get even weirder when the camera pulls back to reveal a distorted and twisted up building floating above the street amid other pieces of impossibly-distorted scenery. Before that image can fully sink in, the sky begins to glitch out like a screen and a satellite crashes right through from someplace beyond, causing the astronaut and the girl to fly into the air before somehow ending up on the surface of the moon.
It is truly bizarre, and it leaves one wondering all sorts of questions like “Who’s the astronaut?”, “Why do the girl’s eyes glow when they get sucked up into the air?”, and “Are they actually inside the moon?” It’s clear that Capcom is trying to build up a sense of mystery with its new IP, so much so that the trailer doesn’t even hint at what kind of game Pragmata is. In that sense, comparing it to Death Stranding, another game that was cryptically-teased ahead of launch, is fitting.
It’ll probably be a while before Capcom gives any answers to those questions, since the game won’t be released until sometime in 2022. While that means people eager for a clearer idea of what’s going on may have to wait up to two years for any sort of answer, it will at least give them plenty of time to come up with theories.
Pragmata will be released sometime in 2022 for PS5.
