Fans of Frictional Games’ survival horror video game, SOMA, have come close to solving the game’s recently introduced ARG that is related to the developer’s next title.
Update: Frictional Games has released a trailer for its next project. The video description states, “Thank you so much for taking part in this “little” journey we’ve all taken together. We really wanted to try and create something fun to show you a bit of what we’ve been working on. What we didn’t expect is just how much you would impress us with your ability to all come together as a community and work with each other to solve everything we threw at you. Admittedly, we did have to increase the difficulty when we realised the scale of the team we were up against, so give yourselves a pat on the back for that.
We can’t tell you how much fun we’ve had watching you all solve each step and create top-tier level memes and inside jokes. It’s been a pleasure, waking up excited every morning to check the Discord and seeing which rabbit holes you ended up falling into. Hopefully, you enjoyed it as much as we did.
You have reached the end of the path (for now). Thank you.
Frictional & Kepler”
Original Story: On September 22, 2025, Frictional Games released a patch for SOMA on its 10-year anniversary, introducing a mysterious ARG (Alternate Reality Game) in the game. Protagonist Simon’s in-game computer, a previously nonexistent spam filter, now displays a strange, glitch-ridden email containing hidden text. Since then, a series of cryptic updates have fans inching closer to unraveling (via Frictional Games’ Discord server) the ARG, which appears to be tied to a new, unannounced project from the developer.
Decoding the email led to hotelsamsara.com, a website that allowed visitors to sign up for a newsletter. By Day 2, alternate emails based on newsletter responses pointed to FollowersOf__, a Twitter/X account. This account carried cryptic messages and a SoundCloud link. Fans were then able to parse spectrograms of the posted audio.
Over subsequent days, more encoded tweets and emails delivered partial images, leading to sites like eraseandbecome.com and seektomorrowwithin.com. Fans discovered “lock pieces” and “key pieces”, and mapping them across websites unlocked additional clues. The color schemes on eraseandbecome shifted (red, purple, green, blue, black, white), and hidden CSS files contained number sequences that translated to more text.
By September 23, 2025, the newsletter had sent out updates to subscribers, pointing again to FollowersOf__ and its cryptic posts. A few days later, Frictional Games dropped a glitched image of Simon’s apartment, though this hasn’t yet yielded concrete leads. Over the next few days, further encoded messages led to new web addresses (e.g. eraseandbecome.com/97874395) and CSS files hidden in source code. Fans discovered up to 4 of 6 required files, and worked with subtle clues embedded in metadata.
By September 27, 2025, two new site branches, eraseandbecome.com/0071 and seektomorrowwithin.com/901830281791182919, were traced, eventually pointing to the ancient text Physiologus, specifically page 71 which discusses ants. A new SoundCloud release added Greek words into the puzzle code. At this point, only one file remained undiscovered. As of 28 September, participants were greeted with the message, “WOULD YOU LIKE TO REQUEST A Y / Thank you for your response. The team will send out a password reminder shortly…”
The effort and care that has gone into this ARG strongly indicates that Frictional Games is using it to lead fans toward hints about its next big project. As of writing, fans are very close to solving it, as the final piece of the puzzle seems just out of reach.
