Tag: short games

A Man Outside

~ Kathryn ~ Leave a comment

A Man Outside
https://litrouke.itch.io/a-man-outside

A Man Outside is a short vocabulary quiz game. This twist is that, while you play, a creepy shadow man watches you from outside your bedroom window. You’re tasked with doing three sets of ten vocab cards as spooky ambient sounds play in the background, and you can look out of the window at any time to see if the man has gotten closer. Between quiz sets, you can text a friend to update them on the situation.

I hope it doesn’t spoil this game to say that there are no jumpscares. The vocabulary gets progressively creepier, though, and there are fun distortions in the quiz interface. The vocab game itself is quite good, even without the added attraction of the creepy man. Necrophagy is my new favorite word.

Based on what I’ve seen in YouTube playthroughs, your vocab score doesn’t matter, and the choices you make in the text conversations simply add a bit of extra flavor. In order to get the true ending of the game, you have to play it from start to finish three times. There are three different vocab difficulty levels, so I suppose that adds a bit of replay value. Each run only takes about seven or eight minutes, but I don’t think the second or third ending is anything special. The alternate endings are nice bonuses for vocab flash card enthusiasts who want to try every difficulty level, but the first ending is perfect.

As an aside, as someone with ADHD, I often have to pretend that someone is watching me in order to get past executive dysfunction. I used to “have someone watch me” by going to coffee shops, but that only worked in Tokyo and Washington DC, which are beautiful and walkable and filled with cafés. Philadelphia has many charms, but it’s not that sort of city. Now, if I’m having trouble sending emails or whatever, I have to conjure an amorphous imaginary person who’s sitting in the room with me just out of eyesight like some sort of sleep paralysis demon.

So, for me, playing A Man Outside was kind of comforting. Cozy, even. Honestly, this might actually be a decent way to study vocab.

One Hell of a Maid

~ Kathryn ~ Leave a comment

One Hell of a Maid
https://bun-tired.itch.io/one-hell-of-a-maid

One Hell of a Maid is a free, ten-minute RPG Maker horror game about a young man who has been dispatched on his first assignment for an at-home maid service. Unfortunately, the apartment he’s been contracted to clean belongs to a group of cultists. Using a handy set of cleaning tools, you follow the handsome maid as he cleanses the apartment of blood on the floor, eldritch horrors in the bathtub, and coffee stains on the couch.

The apartment has three rooms, and each of them has a (very) mild jumpscare. I love the monster design, and I also love the poor maid’s no-nonsense attitude regarding the horrors he encounters. This was the only job he could get, apparently, so he might as well do it. It’s unclear why he has to wear a frilly maid’s outfit, but it’s probably best not to think about that too hard. 

The ending of the game is very sweet. When the cultists finally come home, they are adorable. The gameplay in One Hell of a Maid is minimal, but the art and writing do a lot of heavy lifting. Just like the maid himself, bless his heart.

One Hell of a Maid is not for everyone, but…

Actually who am I kidding. The appeal of this game is universal. What a fun and tasty snack.

List of Free Short Horror Games on Sidequest

~ Kathryn ~ Leave a comment

I’m excited to share a project I’ve been working on for several months: an annotated list of ten retro horror games that are free to play on Itchio. I posted reviews of many of these games here on this blog over the summer, and I’m grateful to the amazing editors at Sidequest for allowing me to refine my thoughts and present everything in one article.

To me, one of the fun things about indie retro horror games is that many of them deliver their central idea with as much concision and impact as possible, allowing the player to become thoroughly spooked in one sitting. So that readers can get a decent idea of what to expect, I organized my list according to roughly how long each game takes to play.

If you’re interested, you can check out the article here:
https://sidequest.zone/2023/10/23/ten-short-horror-games-on-itchio/

I really enjoyed putting this list together, and I’m looking forward to making another one next year!

See You Soon

~ Kathryn ~ Leave a comment

See You Soon
https://not-jacob.itch.io/see-you-soon

See You Soon is a free narrative horror game on Itchio that takes about seven minutes to play. You wake up in the middle of the night because the phone won’t stop ringing, a classic setup that takes an interesting turn. I can’t say much more without spoiling the surprise, but there’s a fun twist in the middle.

See You Soon has 2D graphics with very simple controls, and there are only four screens to navigate. There are two endings, and one of them results in a special surprise if you the launch the game again. That was delightful. Also, if you decide to let one of the monsters catch you, you get a fun little jump scare.

There’s a brief moment of tension when something starts (very slowly) chasing you, but I felt that See You Soon is more silly than spooky. The writing is a little awkward, but I found its earnestness to be almost wholesome. The simplistic pixel art is charming, and the monsters are kind of cute.

To me, See You Soon has the vibe of a chihuahua going aggro. Sure, it’s doing its best to be nasty and unpleasant, but it’s just a little guy. See You Soon is definitely a horror game and probably won’t appeal to people who aren’t fans of the genre, but it made me smile from start to finish.

As a sidenote: See You Soon opens with a content warning about flashing lights. I’m generally sensitive to such things, but nothing in this game gave me any trouble. There are no strobe effects, only quick jump cuts.

A Perfectly Normal Cooking Game

~ Kathryn

A Perfectly Normal Cooking Game
https://ribyrnes.itch.io/candypink

A Perfectly Normal Cooking Game is exactly what it says on the label: a cute and pastel-colored pixel game that teaches you how to make marshmallows. You play as a pastry chef who has just been promoted to the kitchen of a company that makes pink heart-shaped confectionery. The recipe includes sugar, corn syrup, water, and a secret ingredient… love!

Just kidding! The secret ingredient definitely isn’t love. Anyone who is squeamish about gore should probably avoid this game.

A Perfectly Normal Cooking Game was made for the Two Minute Horror Jam, with “two minutes” being about how long it takes to finish the game. The experience of playing A Perfectly Normal Cooking Game actually takes about five or six minutes to properly savor, which will probably include you laughing and saying “oh no no no no no no fuck no” to yourself at least once.   

The game also has a secret ending. Along with a lot of people in the comments, I got the secret ending the first time I played the game, as the alternative was too horrible to contemplate.

There’s not much I can write about such a short game without spoiling it, so let me just say that this is a neat little story with perfect presentation that uses its medium well.

Another fun two-minute horror game on Itchio is:

Make Sure It’s Closed
https://corpsepile.itch.io/make-sure-its-closed

Make Sure It’s Closed does a fantastic job of creating a palpable sense of dread in a very short span of time, so much so that I want to recommend this game to any writer who needs an easy and effective reference for what “dread” feels like. I was so impressed that I also played the creator’s game The Open House (free on Itchio here), which is a bit longer and less immediately accessible but still a lot of fun.