Media creates fandoms, and fans go onto the internet to connect and converse. Here, theories and facts are shared, breathing life into the stories they were derived from. This is the natural order of things, but occasionally there are instances where the roles are reversed. The Mirage Project is one of these pieces of media that do this. The upcoming game is based on the popular internet horror phenomenon of liminal space and has its own online series that precedes it and adds to the story it tells.
The Mirage Project places you in the year 2000, where you allow your curiosity to get the best of you and break into a facility that has been mysteriously shut down for years. EQUO Research Facility has been abandoned and left to decay since its closure in 1985, and you are there to snoop around. Along with the building being forgotten about, a revolutionary machine was also left behind within the walls. You discover The Mirage, an experimental time machine that was kept hidden from anyone who entered the facility. Unlike an average time machine that places people in the year they choose, The Mirage simulates the world as it was, creating a false reality for those who use it. It was created to recreate places, not people; “It builds a version of the past — empty, silent, frozen in time. Until you enter it.”
Being used to its solitude for the past 15 years, the machine is confused by your presence. This leads it to attempt to recreate once again, but it gets it terribly wrong. Rather than creating an empty world as it should, you realize you are not alone. Shadows begin to appear. They follow you and morph into “something else.” Explore the ever-changing virtual worlds The Mirage makes for you and uncover what EQUO was hiding in their facility.
As stated before, this game does things a little differently. If you are eager to learn more about the lore of The Mirage Project, developer Josif Weller has a multipart series that adds a world-building aspect that most games do not have.
The Mirage Project is available to wishlist on Steam now.