Bloober Team is developing the psychological horror adventure "Star Trek: Shadow Frontier" for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series, PC and Nintendo's upcoming Switch 2, with a planned release in 2027. Paramount Games Studio is thus handing the franchise over for the first time to a studio known for dark psychological games.
The playable protagonist is no stranger: former Lieutenant Ro Laren, once again voiced by Michelle Forbes, crash-lands on an uncharted planet. The premise radically breaks with the Federation's familiar optimism. Instead of diplomatic exploration, the focus is on bare survival in a hostile environment controlled by a planetary consciousness.
This consciousness directly attacks the protagonist's psyche, distorting her memories and creating hallucinations. This is the classic Bloober concept. It's the exact opposite of classic Star Trek games.
Tricorder meets Survival
The game changes playfully “Star Trek: Shadow Frontier“Into a third-person perspective. The developers promise a mix of exploration, puzzles, and combat against the planet's mutations. Technological cornerstones of the franchise remain, but are given a new purpose.”
The tricorder, for example, is used to analyze the corrupted environment, while the phaser is employed in combat and for solving environmental puzzles. According to the developers, the gameplay mechanics require a tactical balancing act between direct confrontation and stealth. Resource management is likely to play a central role. The mention of the Nintendo Switch 2 as a release platform in 2027 further reinforces the hardware requirements, which are based on the current generation of consoles.
Bloober Team's move to the sci-fi genre after titles like "Silent Hill 2" and "Layers of Fear" carries a certain risk. Star Trek's past strength lay in its ensemble casts and philosophical discourse, not in psychological horror and isolation.
The choice of Ro Laren as a psychologically unstable cinematic character fits the studio's style. Whether the gameplay can maintain the balance between Star Trek identity and survival horror hinges on the quality of the combat mechanics. The studio has regularly faltered in this area in the past. Fans should prepare themselves for a gameplay-oriented, defensively focused, and narratively dark experiment. The year 2027 is still a long way off.
