Zoochosis

Came across a trailer for an independent bodycam horror game called Zoochosis. The premise so far seems to indicate that you're a new zookeeper who finds out that some of the animals are infected and turning into horrific mutants. You can save the animals and which ones you save will determine your ending.

Though it looks interesting given the atmosphere and the John Carpenteresque body horror.

The creature friends from Wild Kratt finally got sick of Zach trying to mechanize them/Donita trying to turn them into fashion accessories/Gourmand trying to eat them/Paisley trying to destroy their homes and decided to summon Cthulu.

Although, to be serious, this does look genuinely good. Zoos are really underused in horror-related works (and in fiction in general), in my personal opinion, when you really could do so much with them.

?

Fingers crossed for more body horror like that giraffe. (The kangaroo with a Belly Mouth looked a little underdesigned to me, though the rest of that scene built up to it very effectively.)

I thought "Zoochosis" sounded like a rather jokey name initially, but I found out it's an established term for self-injurious behaviour in mistreated zoo animals which have been compared to PTSD symptoms. Seems appropriate.

I like the focus on saving the animals. Looking forward to how this one turns out.

Oh joy, another horror game that I'd be too much of a wuss to play myself.

But in all seriousness, The Thing meets Five Nights at Freddy's in a zoo is a shockingly compelling concept, and yeah, zoos are a surprisingly underutilized setting. Last time I saw a zoo as a notable location in a game (or any recent work of fiction for that matter) was the abandoned zoo in Half-Life: Alyx, though sadly there's no animals there (aside from invasive alien species).

From the screenshots and gifs on the Steam page, it looks like the only animals available are herbivores? On the one hand, turning otherwise relatively harmless creatures (well, some of these animals can still hurt you and you don't want to fuck around and find out around a hippo) into horrifying monstrosities is probably the point, but imagine having to deal with a mutant lion or a crocodile/alligator. Oh boy. Maybe that's the crossed-out square at the bottom of the station selection, reeks of obvious foreshadowing.

Also, why the hell does a zoo have a nasty-looking meat grinder that reduces animals to neat slabs of meat?! Though considering the shape of the wriggling body looks oddly human-shaped, that brings even more questions. But the implication is that in order to find a cure to the parasite, sacrificing at least one infected animal may be necessary. Though the fact that the parasite can survive the meat grinder is also pretty unnerving. Has this zoo actually had to deal with the parasite before? How many instances of the parasite are there?

Though it's also nice that the main objective is actually defeating the parasite through figuring out a cure and saving the animals, not just surviving until the end of your shift.

Edited by Cronosonic on Jan 23rd 2024 at 8:46:02 PM

I imagine we just haven't seen any of the carnivores in the marketing yet because (as you suggested) herbivores turning into abominations is much more striking. It's probably why the giraffe seems to be the face of the game so far. Still, I think they'll show up, I've never heard of a zoo with only herbivores.

I hope the fish eye camera can be turned off. First-person games already give me motion sickness.

Or it is just herbivores due to the predators having already been eaten by them?

Or they are being saved as a surprise for the players once the game is out so they really will get the scare of a lifetime.

A new trailer was released. Shows as bit more of the game, including an infected zebra.

We now have a gameplay trailer. Apparently the main character talks. Honestly wasn't expecting that.