Ecstatica and Ecstatica 2 are coming to Steam and GOG after decades off the market

Two of the most visually distinctive PC horror games of the 1990s are finally getting a proper commercial re-release. Ecstatica and Ecstatica 2 are heading to Steam and GOG later this year, courtesy of retro publisher SNEG — their first time being commercially available in decades.

Both games were created by London developer Andrew Spencer and published by Psygnosis. The original Ecstatica launched in 1994 as a medieval survival horror, and its sequel followed in 1997 with a similar look but noticeably dialed-back horror elements. What made them stand out then — and still does now — is the engine Spencer built entirely from scratch, which renders characters using ellipsoids rather than polygons. The result is a soft, bulbous, almost organic look that no other game quite replicated. As Spencer explained to Next Generation magazine in 1996: "Triangles tend to make hard, robotic-looking figures, whereas ellipsoids can be used to create more rounded, human alternatives. Ellipsoids can also be more efficient because you can make a much better looking character out of fewer shapes." Games like Little Big Adventure achieved a superficially similar softness through Gouraud shading, but Ecstatica's ellipsoids were the real thing.

Both games play like contemporaries of the early Resident Evil and Alone in the Dark titles — tank controls, fixed camera angles, puzzle solving, and plenty of instant-death moments. That means modern players will need some patience, but the ellipsoid art still holds a strange visual charm that makes the occasional frustration worthwhile. The SNEG re-release batch also includes Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor from 2001, the 1997 3D action game Dark Earth, 2001 turn-based strategy Warlords 4, and 1998 military tactics sim Soldiers at War.

No exact release date has been given beyond "later this year." For anyone who remembers being floored by Ecstatica screenshots in mid-90s PC gaming magazines, this is a rare chance to revisit them through legitimate channels rather than hunting down abandonware.