Analog Fear: What attracted players to Mouthwashing
At the end of September, the small studio Wrong Organ released its second horror game on Steam - a short horror game Mouthwashing. The game quickly gained thousands of positive reviews, and by the end of the fall became the most discussed on the Internet and the level of interest of the audience began to approach the projects Five Nights at Freddy's. What makes Mouthwashing appealing? The answer is in the Izvestia article, plus a selection of indie games similar in visuals and atmosphere.
Mouthwashing
Year of release: 2024
This first-person psychological horror takes players aboard the wrecked space freighter Tullar. Outside the porthole windows is an eternal sunset, on board is a captain fatally injured in the crash and a small crew who must endure isolation, starvation and each other's dark secrets. Mouthwashing is not a quest, it's a mix of visual novel and interactive movie, with a finale in which the player learns the unflattering truth.
The success of Mouthwashing is due to several factors. The game successfully fell into the wave of popular in recent years stylistics of "analog horror " - games specifically styled as retro games, for example, on the Play Station 1 platform. This genre is also characterized by a very dark reflection of various psychological traumas and realistic depiction of physical mutilation. For experienced horror fans, the main plot twist of Mouthwashing is unlikely to be a revelation, but the gameplay itself and the delicate balance of disgusting, sad and scary will definitely not leave indifferent. The developers were inspired by the classics of space horror movies - "Alien", "Event Horizon", "Pandorum".
Signalis
Year of release: 2022
Signalis was eight years in the making by a team of just two people. The result is an unconventional and good-quality "old school" horror. The game also presses on the feeling of nostalgia - graphics, menus, start screen. At the center of the plot is an android girl named Elster. She wakes up on a ship that has crashed on a cold planet. The heroine finds a picture of another girl, suspects that the girl is also an android, and sets out to find her. Signalis doesn't scare you right off the bat with monsters, blood and other horrors, it's more of a grim psychological puzzle of memories that the player puts together to find out what happened.
Ratshaker
Year of release: 2024
This in every way experimental game can be completed in an hour, but, according to reviewers, may cost the player a couple nights of sleep. Ratshaker's stated gameplay is disconcerting: you have to shake... a screaming rat, because it's an innovative tool for dealing with rodents. But what looks like a silly joke turns out to be a horror story about domestic violence, alcoholism, schizophrenia, and even, to some extent, experimenting on the player.
Threshold
Year of release: 2024
A psychological indie thriller, again with PS1 graphics, combining minimalistic gameplay and a gripping story set in a dystopian world. The player assumes the role of an employee of a remote railroad post, responsible for keeping the endless train in working order. An important nuance - it is necessary to manage the oxygen supply at the station, which is located in a high mountainous area with very rarefied air. The game is frighteningly surreal, with clues and disturbing events gradually revealing the grim nature of the hero's job and the world around him.
Buckshot Roulette
Year of release: 2024
In Russian roulette, it's perhaps the very nature of the game that makes it creepy. And if you try to play it with a shotgun, and even with whom it is unclear, the degree of fear grows in progression. Buckshot Roulette ingeniously mixes analog horror and gambling gameplay. The plot unfolds in a sinister gambling hole. After signing a mysterious agreement with the Dealer with unmistakable hints, players begin a deadly game of roulette. As the player progresses, they are confronted with increasingly confusing and disturbing revelations about the identity of the Dealer and the nature of the game itself. The story is saturated with existential and supernatural elements, and the endings range from a triumphant escape with winnings to a monstrous failure.
Iron Lung
Year of release: 2022
In the plot of this horror movie, all the planets in the universe have disappeared, leaving only asteroids and moons. People also did not escape, except for those who were at the time of the apocalypse on space and research stations. The plot is already scary, but that's not what makes Iron Lung scary. Players will have to experience all the "charms" of claustrophobia, floating in the bloody ocean aboard a tiny submarine. The ship has no viewing porthole, only a camera, on which it is necessary to shoot various anomalous points, gradually going crazy and learning the history of this strange world.
Paratopic
Year of release: 2018
This experimental first-person horror game was named one of the best of 2018, also for its soundtrack. The story switches between the lines of three characters, and the gameplay is like a strange fever dream. The player has been caught smuggling VHS tapes across the border, and now has to pay the price. You have to find a rare bird in the forest and capture it in a photo. You need to kill a man in the back room of a dubious diner. The game can be run in 45 minutes, but in low-polygonal muddy scenery developers have hidden a lot of details and secrets that enrich the story.
We Harvest Shadows
Year of release: 2025, demo available
A very promising novelty that perfectly fits the atmosphere for this selection, and you can play the demo now. This is an emotional narrative game with elements of horror and farm simulator. Players will have to control Garrett. He is a broken man, convinced that the world will only be better off without him. Garrett has moved from the big city to an abandoned farm and is trying to live there alone and establish his life. The developers promise diverse gameplay: you can explore the abandoned territory in the wilds of Appalachia, build a farm to earn money for improvements, clean and put the house in order. The latter is crucial, because it scares away uninvited guests and helps keep Garrett from going crazy. Of course, like any mysterious hero, Garrett's past hides a mystery that needs to be solved.
Переведено сервисом «Яндекс Переводчик»
