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Trial Version S03E02

Nightmare, horror, video games, truth and fiction…

Nightmare, horror, video games, truth and fiction

A cash-strapped American traveler signs up to test a revolutionary new gaming system, but soon can’t…

A cash-strapped American traveler signs up to test a revolutionary new gaming system, but soon can’t tell where the game ends and reality begins.

He’s a twenty-something world traveler with a scruffy beard and backpack, looking for a break from his annoying mother after his father recently passed away from Alzheimer’s. He travels the world, partying in various countries Instagram-style, but when he arrives in London, his identity is stolen and his money is drained from his accounts. Refusing to call his mother, he opts to answer a classified ad from an internationally known game developer.

Cooper arrives to find himself in a veritable maze of a house, where guests interact with devices ra…

Cooper arrives to find himself in a veritable maze of a house, where guests interact with devices rather than each other. While the spaces he walks through are warm and somewhat inviting, when he arrives at the room he will be working in, it is cold and sterile. He then learns about his assignment: in true Freudian style, they will immerse him in a video game where he will face his own fears through an implant in the back of his neck.

Soon Cooper is in an old house, fighting various demons; they start innocently enough, with a camping trip reminiscent of the Scream franchise: a spider scurries across the floor, a guest appears who is a former high school bully, a large, disgusting, fleshy crustacean that resembles the thing crawls out of the kitchen.

Leaving home

Backpacking, mourning for his mother, mourning for the other, mother-son relationship

Alzheimer’s, memory, trauma

I, you know, just… trying to do,

you know, shit I’ve never done before.

Is that what you’re doing on this trip?

You’re, like, finding yourself?

Yeah, um… in a way.

I mean, I… [stammers]

Really to get away from the

family home is what I’m doing. - Yeah, he was my best friend.

Sometimes he’d just look at me

and wouldn’t even know who I was.

Well, my mum, like, I don’t even…

I don’t know how to talk to her.

You know, I don’t have that connection.

I don’t even know where to start.

So that’s why I left. - Just to get away and make, you know,

all the memories that I can…

while I can.

Stolen credit card, App to find work, freelance

Gaming Company: Augmented Reality

Hologram, trapped in virtual reality

What we are working now

is the most personal survival

horror game in history.

One that works out how to scare

you by using your own mind.

Now, nothing you’ll see

can physically harm you.

It’s all just audio-visual,

like the gopher game.

But if it does get too intense,

we can pull you out at any time

• and stop the experiment.

Horror: Bullying, mutilação, corpo despedaçado, - Perseguição, Escapar, acordar, ser resgatado…

Horror: Bullying, mutilação, corpo despedaçado, - Perseguição, Escapar, acordar, ser resgatado

It’s worked out you’re an arachnophobe quickly. It’s probing for weak spots…

It’s worked out you’re an arachnophobe quickly. It’s probing for weak spots.

There’s a guy in the window. That wasn’t…And now he’s gone. Now nobody’s in the window. - Which is the…

You’re Josh Peters from high school! He was a bully. I wasn’t scared. - Hard to explain. It’s like a huge-ass spider with a face and dicks coming out of his mouth. It’s… Peters. Peters is inside. Like a Peters-spider mash-up.

Sorry, can you say again? Katie, hello?

• You’re Sonja. You’re actually here. - Are you actually here right now? - I’m real. I’m actually here And we have to go.

• You have to listen to me. - How are you here?

  Five people have disappeared in the past year. All tourists, all registered with that stupid odd jobs app.

  Do you ever wonder how your bank account got hacked? I cloned your card as you were asleep. I drew your attention to this job. - She… I was stabbed! I would know! Nothing you see can harm or even touch you. It’s purely audio-visual. - There’s no physical sensation. - Fuck! Yes, there was!

  The neuron net, it could have maybe worked out some means of replicating physical experiences, - but that would be unprecedented.

  Okay, you know what? Stop the game. I want out. Just pull me out now. Stop, stop, stop. Safe

  I’m fucking with you, Cooper. I told you to come up here to see if we’ve broken you enough to obey instructions without question. - And we have.

  It’s fucking taking my memories! Overwriting them, technically. - Get out of my head! You’ll never see her again.

Susto, medo

Fobia: animais gigantes

Voz, olhar, toque, cheiro, paladar, respiração