Hey everyone, we have huge news to share with you today. Once Human’s largest free expansion yet, Isles of Abyss, is officially launching tomorrow, October 22 (October 21) on PlayStation 5. We’ve taken the strange worlds survival you know and love, and plunged it into uncharted waters. Starting tomorrow, you can leave the safety of dry land behind, set sail across five brand-new oceanic regions, and face down brand new threats unlike anything you’ve ever encountered before.
Dive into a “living” ocean
When we set out to build this expansion, we wanted to make sure that the sea felt like more than just a blue backdrop or a way to get from A to B. In Isles of Abyss, the entire ocean is a massive, conscious entity known as “The Sunken Lord.”
The water surface you navigate is its physical body, while the eerie, staring lighthouses “The Tower” and spectral ghost ships “Voyagers” drifting through the fog act as its organs and manifestations of its dark will. The sea is constantly watching you, reacting to your presence, and feeding on your fear. As you explore, you’ll encounter dynamic regional threats – from suffocating mysterious fogs and violent black tides to skies raining temporal fire. To untangle the secrets of this world, you and your squad will need to brave these anomalies, defeat regional bosses anchored in colossal towers, and ultimately confront the Sunken Lord itself.
Build your dream Mobile Sea Fortress
To survive a sea that actively wants to devour you, a basic wooden raft isn’t going to cut it for long – though that’s exactly where your journey begins.
We’ve given you complete freedom to build, customize, and upgrade your vessel into a fully functional, mobile Sea Fortress. Your ship isn’t just transportation; it’s your forward base, workshop, heavy artillery platform, and primary survival tool. Want to build a classic wooden pirate ship armed with heavy broadside cannons? Go for it. Prefer an industrial drilling rig, a sleek sci-fi aircraft carrier, or a completely wild, abstract floating fortress? The design is entirely up to your imagination.
How you engineer your vessel serves as your tactical answer to the ocean’s threats. You can team up with friends to form entire player fleets, coordinating your ship designs to tackle different hazards together as you sail through uncharted waters.
The land-sea dual progression loop
Your survival journey begins as you wake up on a starter island, but from there, the order in which you explore the remaining four oceanic regions is entirely up to you, allowing every player to carve out a unique growth path.
Isles of Abyss introduces a seamless, mutually feeding progression loop between land and sea. Resources gathered from exploring mysterious islands fuel the naval tech and heavy weaponry needed to survive open-water encounters. In turn, venturing into the deep sea unlocks specialized materials that enhance your terrestrial gear and base progression. Beneath the waves, a dedicated underwater exploration layer awaits, where you can dive deep into sunken ruins for lost treasure, harvest rare aquatic resources, and engage in deep-sea hunting to sustain your crew and gain special materials.
Feel every wave with PS5 features
We’ve fully tailored this aquatic journey for the PlayStation 5 to make navigating a hostile ocean feel as tactile as possible:
DualSense haptic feedback: Feel the low, rumbling heartbeat of the Sunken Lord beneath your hull, along with the distinct rhythm of crashing waves, roaring sea storms, and hull-creaking impact during naval combat.
Adaptive triggers: Experience realistic resistance with every shot as you pull the trigger on heavy naval cannons or launch grappling lines into enemy vessels.
Lightning-Fast SSD Loading: Seamlessly transition from land exploration to captaining your ship, or diving deep into underwater trenches, without interrupting your survival flow.
Prepare to set sail tomorrow
The tide has turned, and the living ocean is waiting. Grab your friends, head over to the PlayStation Store, and download Once Human to be ready for the free-to-play Isles of Abyss expansion arriving on PS5 tomorrow..
We’ll see you on the open sea – try not to let it swallow you whole.

