![]() McLaren Automotive revealed the McLaren Solus GT, a concept car from the screens of virtual racing into an extreme expression of track driving engagement that will exhilarate in the real world. The roof uses Polymer-Dispersed Liquid Crystal (PDLC) technology to provide a multi-faceted driving experience: it can be all-encompassing with the roof closed and opaque, offering a unique “sky feeling” when the roof is transparent, and allowing for a holistic experience with the top down. Unique to the convertible segment, the Cielo features an innovative retractable glass roof with a state-of-the-art electrochromic (smart glass) window that can instantly be transformed from clear to opaque at the touch of a button on a central screen. Cielo, which means “sky” in Italian, is the spyder version of the new MC20 super sports car and offers a perfect mix of sportiness and luxury. The Quail, part of the influential “Car Week” in the town of Monterey, was the perfect backdrop to share the open-topped version of Maserati’s newest super sports car with North American audiences. When the end comes, it's not exactly surprising, but it delivers a satisfying coda to the despair and horror that's been building for the past few hours.The new Maserati MC20 Cielo made its North American debut today with an unveiling ceremony during The Quail, A Motorsports Gathering, a prestigious automotive event in California. Just when the world starts feeling mundane and predictable, The Solus Project shocks with sights like spiky caves where organic blades shoot down and impale anyone passing through. The majority of it reveals itself through the notes and inscribed slabs you read with a scanner, but also in the hints of quick movement in spaces that once seemed empty. Jump scares are so rare as to be almost entirely nonexistent instead, it relies on a creepiness that inked its way under my skin through both visuals and an effective use of sound. Most of all, it succeeds on the strength of a building dread that intensifies as its roughly 25 hours roll to a close. The design of the beaches and ruins never changes significantly, but they're used to great effect. Moments and sights like these make The Solus Project worth playing. Elsewhere I might tiptoe through stonewrought corridors with cobwebs that spoke of centuries of disuse mere seconds later I'd be outside dodging fireballs in a meteor shower or running for shelter from an otherworldly tornado. ![]() In one sequence I'd crouch through claustrophobic tunnels barely wide enough for my shoulders the next, I'd be standing in vaulted temples where histories from a seemingly dead civilization lined the walls. ![]() Play Its presentation thrives on a constant tug-of-war between extremes, switching out one for the other just in time to avoid drudgery. ![]() Even more impressively, it manages to induce spine shivers and goosebumps within a game design that has no direct combat, and in which exploration largely consists of getting from one point to another. The Solus Project delivers that sensation fantastically, thanks in part to an appealing aesthetic that pulls as much from Stargate as The Blair Witch Project. But again, its survival elements seem to exist only to enrich the experience of being lost and alone on a strange planet rather than to make it a challenge. Unfortunately for the rest of us, it comes off as a little less than satisfying with a traditional gamepad. The PC version of The Solus Project is gaining some attention as one of the few "complete" virtual reality games on Steam, and fiddly things like robust crafting or convoluted puzzles might translate poorly to the HTC Vive's controllers and menus. I get the impression such systems are simple by design. Some admittedly stumped me for a bit, but often in those cases I'd find the answer had been almost right in front of me all along and I’d simply overlooked it. “Puzzles pepper the alien world as well, but they're rarely more demanding than finding a nearby item to open a gate or using a portable teleporter to sneak through barriers and up columns that would normally be impassable.
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