In this ambitious stage adaptation of the indie videogame Narcosis, the creator transforms a first-person deep-sea survival narrative into a psychologically charged solo performance that pushes the limits of theatrical perception. While the original game centers on navigating darkness, dwindling oxygen, and hallucinatory isolation, the theatre version reframes these elements not as environmental challenges but as symptoms of a consciousness fraying under pressure. The result is an engrossing hybrid of physical performance, experimental video design, and sensory disorientation—a descent not into the ocean, but into a collapsing mind.

What immediately defines Narcosis is its use of experimental video as an atmospheric and conceptual anchor. Rather than relying on representational imagery of underwater worlds, the video surfaces as corrupted interfaces, distorted memory flashes, glitching sonar scans, and digital fragments that behave like malfunctioning neural circuits. These visuals create the production’s “cover image”—an emblematic aesthetic built from technological instability and psychological erosion. The stage becomes a membrane where the diver’s perception leaks outward, saturating the space with fractured data and ghostly echoes of the game’s immersive viewpoint.

Against this unstable visual field stands a lone performer who must navigate both the digital storm and their own disintegrating sense of self. Their physical vocabulary—tightened breath, spiraling gestures, sudden freezes—suggests a body caught between instinctual survival and overwhelming cognitive distortion. Switching fluidly between narrator, survivor, and hallucinated witness, the performer embodies the shifting logic of the game while grounding the piece firmly in the language of contemporary theatre. Their body becomes a fragile anchor in a world that never stops slipping.

The narrative unfolds like a collection of broken logs rather than a linear storyline. Moments emerge as fragments: a crackling radio transmission, a remembered domestic interior, the oppressive rhythm of a deep-sea suit, the phantom presence of another voice that might be real or imagined. This fragmented dramaturgy mirrors the game’s structure but pushes further, inviting the audience to assemble meaning from uncertainty. In this sense, Narcosis maintains the game’s spirit of exploration—not spatially, but emotionally and psychologically.

Sound and lighting enhance the sensation of internal collapse. Multi-point audio generates an acoustic labyrinth where sources seem to drift or distort, producing a sense of pressure closing in. Lighting behaves like a malfunctioning sensory system—flickering, pulsing, sometimes swallowing the performer whole. These design elements avoid literalism and instead operate as manifestations of the diver’s mental state, constantly challenging the audience’s perceptual footing.

Perhaps the most compelling aspect of Narcosis is its refusal to deliver the spectacle one might expect from a deep-sea narrative. There are no visual monsters, no dramatic underwater vistas. The threat is internal, located in the gradual collapse of memory, identity, and orientation. The production’s power lies in its restraint—its insistence that the most terrifying descent is not physical but psychological.

Narcosis succeeds as a rich, unnerving meditation on isolation, sensory distortion, and the fragile architecture of consciousness. It is a rare adaptation that understands the emotional truth of its source material and reimagines it with theatrical boldness. In the end, the audience is left suspended in darkness—uncertain, breathless, and profoundly awake.