Whenever you go into E3, you always expect to see the gimme games, those that you've already heard of and have been anticipating greatly. Of course, then there are the games you hear a bit about, and end up being sleeper games that seem to come out of nowhere and thrill with possibility. And then there are those games you've never heard of before in your life, and when you finally see and experience the game, you wonder just why in the world that is. Enter Cryostasis, a first person shooter/horror hybrid, and one that definitely deserves more attention than it has gotten so far.

It's the year 1968, and you play as meteorologist Aleksandr Nesterov, who finds himself on a massive freighter called the North Wind, stuck in the ice way up north, positioned in the heart of the Arctic Circle. Since the ship has been stuck there for some time apparently, warmth has left it, leaving the inside of the ship a massive ice crystal, while you're the only living human alive, with the keyword being there "human."

You see, as you navigate the corridors and rooms of the freighter, you'll run across creatures that have the physical appearance of being human, but with their barbaric noises and the way their bodies are completely iced over, just what they are remains to be seen, and looks to be one of the mysteries that Alexsandr will have to uncover if he hopes to survive.

Based on the preview showed off, the game is really focused on blending the horror with the action, as there are some tense one-on-one firefights, but leading up to them there are those quieter moments where it's just you and the ambiance of the game. The fights we saw were of the one-on-one variety, though it's always possible that the battles could extend and include more people, perhaps depending on the size of a room. The combat is also very real-world based, featuring your brutal fists of fury, and the type of pistols, shotguns, and other assorted firearms that would've been prevalent around the time of 1968. The supernatural force, if it is alien, didn't seem to bring their weapons to the fight, so don't go expecting any Halo-ish weapons.

As you make your way through the game, you'll come across different crew members, and in a strange series of events, you'll be able to mentally jump into their minds to see their last minutes, and actually be able to change the outcome in ways to advance. For instance, one mental jump involved a guy frozen in water, and you being able to go back to stop the water flow, so the ice block isn't in your way. In another instance, you run across a dead crewmember, and you jump into their role when a creature was in some pipes, and busted through. By fighting the creature and hitting the pipe where's it's at, suddenly a new area is opened up before you to now get you through the game world.

The thing that amazed us the most about the game was the graphical detail in the world, which came mostly in the beautiful crystal shimmers of the ice forming on substances, which has something like three different graphical layers on top to give the shimmering, crystalline effect. The game is also very much tied into the ice, as the enemies will appear in areas where there is more ice, and spread it to sections where there isn't any. Also, as you combat these creatures and kill them, you'll drive the ice away, slowly decaying it while the ship slowly starts to gain back some control of whatever has taken a hold of it.

It remains to be seen just how long the game will be and if it will be able to keep the player engaged throughout it all, considering the fact that keeping the action solely confined to the ship could be a curse, but then again it could be a blessing and lead to a very claustrophobic terror. It was nice to see that though E3 might've been dominated by more of the name companies, a little game called Cryostasis managed to poke its head out and impress us quite thoroughly.