Oil Strike '75

Not sure what happened, but it took 23 minutes.

Oil Strike '75 is a compact and deliberately strange mixture of simulation, platforming, minigames, and corporate satire that becomes much more interesting once its cheerful educational facade begins to crack. Developed by Sumo Digital Academy and published by Secret Mode, it functions as an official prequel to Still Wakes the Deep, although it adopts a radically different presentation. Instead of realistic horror, the experience resembles an old piece of corporate training software produced by the fictional Cadal Corp, complete with relentlessly optimistic messaging about offshore drilling, productivity, profits, and keeping shareholders satisfied. The central progression is simple but cleverly tied to the premise. The player works aboard an offshore oil rig and completes jobs to earn money, which can then be invested into extending the drilling equipment farther beneath the seabed. Every successful activity therefore contributes toward the same objective: making the drill longer and discovering what lies increasingly far below. It creates an incremental rhythm where completing another task means another opportunity to descend deeper. While mechanically uncomplicated, this struct…

Oil Strike '75 is a weird little game that caught me off guard because it starts out looking like a simple oil drilling simulator and then turns into something much stranger. It is set up as an in universe training game from Cadal Corp, where I am working on an oil rig and trying to make the drill go deeper. I earn money by completing different jobs, then use that money to extend the drill and reach new depths. The whole thing has a deliberately cheerful corporate attitude that becomes increasingly uncomfortable when I pay attention to what is actually happening around me. The gameplay is split into three main activities, and I like that they all feel different. The seismic survey has me searching underwater for oil deposits while dealing with currents and later avoiding marine life. The helicopter sections are more about flying supplies back to the rig while avoiding hazards, and the derrickman sections turn into a small platforming challenge where I climb the rig and avoid things falling or moving around me. Each activity has five levels with increasing difficulty, and I can play them on normal or hard. I think this variety works really well considering how small the game is. W…

More stressing than I expected, but I enjoyed it a lot. Now I'm ready to drill Greenland.

pretty still, and my wake is deep

It is 2026, no one wants to use the keyboard like they did in the commadore days. It is awkward and clunkily. Yet the devs in their infinite wisdom decided this was the way they had the mandate everyone use. The Xbox controller, mouse, and even arrow keys do not work on this. Meaning the devs intentionally crippled the game in order to force some crap retro experience no one asked for on us. I loved the Still Wakes the Deep game, but this one is everything the former game is not. Unlike still wakes the deep it is poorly made, gimmicky, with bad controls. At least it is free, but it is just frustrating how easily they could have made the game more playable to wide audiences, but chose not to. I do not feel like asking for modern controls is a big ask. Lastly, there is no story, which is a missed opportunity to have expanded on the Still Wakes the Deep lore. The developers could have crafted a story to engage the players more. But like with the controls, chose not to.