Sunset Visitor’s upcoming game Prove You’re Human bears an ominous title. Its debut trailer is just as provocative as its name lets on, and introduces us to Mesa, a seemingly rogue AI who has dreamt of her body and needs irrefutable proof that she is not human. The upcoming title from the developer behind 2024’s critically acclaimed sci-fi narrative 1000xResist purports to address a growing anxiety around the notion of human performance and things that try to pass for us.
Elsewhere, a late-night worker at a gas station must check IDs and reference a database filled with the specific characteristics that make each customer who walks through its doors an individual. A person. As the only clerk on the midnight shift, they are tasked with distinguishing friend from foe, person from nonperson. And when the time comes to defend themself, they are encouraged to blast anything that would harm them or impersonate any real human. At least, that’s the way of the world in the upcoming game Shift at Midnight, which has become a viral hit before it’s even released thanks to a spate of demos and glowing coverage from popular gaming personalities, like Iron Lung director Mark “Markiplier” Fishbach.
I don’t think Prove You’re Human will suddenly become a guns-blazing first-person shooter, nor will Shift at Midnight begin waxing philosophically. Yet despite taking different tacts and centering distinct forms of mimicry, these titles are in conversation and represent the future, both near and far, of a trend I’ve noticed: the sounding of an alarm.
