When the first trailer for South of Midnight dropped, it grabbed my interest right away with its unique art style and rich Southern folklore.
In this game, you step into the shoes of Hazel, who finds her world turned upside down after a hurricane hits her hometown, Prospero. Discovering she’s a Weaver—a special person who can heal the land’s corruption—she embarks on a quest to find her mother, swept away by the storm. Hazel uses her magic to fight enemies, leap across platforms, and solve tricky puzzles. Each chapter unravels the tale of a mysterious creature transformed by past hurts into something legendary. After figuring out their stories, Hazel must face them head-on.
Fans might feel that South of Midnight echoes the vibe of Bridge of Spirits, as both games explore deep emotional stories tied to unique cultures—this time, the American South takes center stage.
South of Midnight brings a nostalgic touch, reminiscent of mid-2000s action-adventure games. Watching the demo, Hazel’s moves through enemy waves, platform hopping, and epic boss battles looked familiar yet fresh. The gothic-fantasy themes set in the Deep South are what make this game intriguing and different from others.
“Where the South really influenced the gameplay was mostly across three things,” said game director Jasmin Roy. “It was the world itself, how we were going to go through various regions that have different biomes, which means in level design, and different spaces to navigate–all these buildings that are abandoned, things like that. And we went like, ‘It would be cool to be able to jump on [buildings] and move around and do things. And that combined itself with magical realism–how you’re going to have powers to interact with the fantasy element of the settings. And when you combine those two things together, you start going, ‘Okay, I’d like to be able to jump, move, use the strands, manipulate objects, create objects with that fantasy of everything being this traditional arts and craft of weaving.’ And then the third thing I know that really influenced [the world] was the mythical creature, folkloric, the giant thing. So that informed how we built the world and how we created mechanics to go around them.”
Roy mentions that the game feels like a journey, guiding players from one place to the next. “The region informed all the rest [of the game],” Roy explained. “And that’s how we ended up creating a feature set and the gameplay loop and how it works. That’s why we think it’s a unique journey and it’s all built as a journey. So you are asking, ‘Oh, is it the same gameplay loop?’ It does fluctuate because it is narrative-driven. So most of the time with the creature, it will play out with, ‘Oh, I need to learn their story to go on.’ But there are also other different beats of narrative events that will happen because dealing with creatures and regions is not the only thing you’ll do in the game to progress. There are other events to be discovered once you get the game right.”
“Some of the [gameplay] loops do repeat, so I just want to make that clear,” studio head Guillaume Provost clarified. “The experience [of meeting] the creatures pass through multiple beats and [culminate with] filling your bottle–those are loops that do repeat themselves that you do recognize throughout the game’s structure itself. But to Jasmin’s point, you don’t always fight the creatures–there’s no fighting. There are different types of encounters that you’ll get throughout the game that kind of celebrate different beats that have to do with the story and/or contact your problem that the creatures are going through.”
Roy added that not every creature encounter is about fighting. “Some of [the creatures] are going to focus on traversal,” Roy said. “Some of them even focus on narrative beats. It really is a mixed bag. Some of them will evolve into direct confrontations, like we saw with the demo today. But there are other features that do focus on traversal. We have some of that, and we also have some that focus on that. I don’t want to reveal them too much because I really think they’re really cool. But yes, the idea was that even though the loop was going to be about experiencing their story and interacting with them and beating them, depending on which type of creature you’re going to encounter, fighting wasn’t always the right word. [Fighting them isn’t] always the right thing because [the creatures] do have wildly different stories of things that happen to them.”
“You as a player are there to resolve their trauma or help move past the situation that they’re in,” Provost continued. “So in certain cases, when it made sense from a narrative [standpoint], structural point of view, there is a combat sequence. For example, when Two Twod Tom eats your house, you get really angry. There’s a setup for it that creates the conflict. Hazel, the main character, is not roaming around trying to kill mythical creatures. That’s the key takeaway. When there is conflict, there’s conflict that’s instituted for a narrative construct and reason that makes sense. But in other cases, there are problems with the creature that don’t involve conflict. It’s better resolved either through narrative [choice] or puzzle-solving or platforming or other types of challenges that actually have to do with specifically the issues of that creature.”
At the event, I felt a bit uneasy about how the game tackles trauma, especially with words like “resolve” and “fix” being tossed around. Trauma isn’t something that’s just fixed like that, and considering the deep-rooted history of the South, I’m curious but cautious about how this plays out. But honestly, the game seems to respect Southern culture with its music, scenery, and language, so maybe they’re handling trauma with care too; we’ll just have to wait and see.
“They’re not statements on the here and now,” art director Whitney Clayton told GameSpot regarding South of Midnight’s mythical creatures and stories of trauma. “They’re folktales; they’re more universal. In this world, they’re legends that [Hazel] ends up coming across after she starts her journey. And then the more she sees, the more it stops becoming surprising for her, and that’s the magic-realism angle. Whereas after she leaves the most grounded area, which is where she’s from, this little town, her home, and she starts going into what we call the focal arc of the Deep South, and she starts meeting these characters and communities, those people just accept these creatures around them. And those creatures, their story is really tied to the land, to the history of that land. And they would have more, I guess you’d say, high-level allegorical messages behind them, if that makes sense.”
After getting a sneak peek of South of Midnight, I’m feeling mostly excited. I loved Bridge of Spirits, so another game like it sounds awesome—but I do hope the story aspects get the attention they deserve. Expect it on Xbox Series X|S and PC in 2025.
