Samantha Lienhard's Blog, page 32

Celebrating All Things Spooky: Without Escape

Without Escape is a short point-and-click adventure game in which you wake up during the night after hearing a noise and decide to investigate.

Although you don’t find the source of the noise, you soon learn that something strange is going on.

This is a point-and-click adventure game with static backgrounds. You’ll visit each screen and click things to interact with them. Sometimes you’ll find items, which you’ll then use automatically when you click the right spot.

Some of the puzzles are logical, while others operate on game logic or surreal dream logic, so it sometimes devolves into revisiting locations and clicking everything until you find the right thing. Fortunately, it’s a fairly small setting, so that isn’t as tedious as it would be in a larger game.

(One puzzle also requires you to know a specific chemical symbol, and I didn’t see anything in the game that would provide that knowledge.)

The story… is an excuse to find keys and open doors and enjoy a creepy atmosphere. It’s clear the developers love Silent Hill, as there’s a lot of references to it, but the story is less coherent and just left me scratching my head at the end. There are multiple endings, of which I got the two main ones – the remaining endings appear to involve things like getting a game over in a specific situation and reaching a certain point in the game within a time limit.

Without Escape is a decent game, some mildly spooky fun that takes under an hour to complete. It’s nothing groundbreaking, but it’s the sort of game where I’d be interested in seeing what the developers come up with next if they expand and polish the ideas found here.

---
If you want posts like this delivered straight to your inbox, enter your email in the box below to subscribe!

Did you enjoy this post? Be sure to share it with your social networks! The post Celebrating All Things Spooky: Without Escape appeared first on Samantha Lienhard.

Celebrating All Things Spooky: Corpse Party: Book of Shadows

Two years ago we talked about the remake of the first Corpse Party, and now I finally moved on to the next game in the series.

…Which is not Corpse Party 2 or the upcoming Corpse Party II, but rather Corpse Party: Book of Shadows.

The official description for Book of Shadows calls it a “sequel, prequel, midquel, and alternate universe tale all in one.”

It is split into chapters, and each one has a different focus. In some, the characters are thrown back into the first game’s events through some sort of time loop. Others show a character’s backstory or retell the first game’s events from new perspectives. Finally, if you complete every ending (including the numerous bad endings), you unlock a final chapter called Blood Drive that serves as a genuine sequel and sets up future events. That was the most exciting part, although the other chapters were interesting as well.

Unlike the first game, which was more of a top-down adventure game, Book of Shadows is closer to a visual novel with some adventure game elements. You traverse each area by opening your map and selecting an area to walk to. That area then becomes a screen you can investigate point-and-click style. Unfortunately, if you’re trying to see everything, this becomes much more tedious than the first game’s exploration.

Based on what you interact with and choices you make when prompted, there are a number of endings to get in each chapter. Many parts, especially in the bad endings, are downright brutal. It would already be firmly in the horror genre for its themes and creepy moments, but the gruesome fates described in horrific detail cement its place in the genre.

After you complete each chapter, you unlock messages from the voice actors of the characters prominently featured in that chapter. That was a nice touch, and I looked forward to hearing each actor’s thoughts.

While Book of Shadows feels more like a supplementary game to the original, I enjoyed seeing new details and alternate events, and I was especially intrigued by the final chapter’s setup for a sequel. While the chapter title “Blood Drive” would make me assume Corpse Party: Blood Drive is the next game to play, apparently Corpse Party: Sweet Sachiko’s Hysteric Birthday Bash comes next and is actually important to the story. I’ll have to pick that one up… and who knows, maybe we’ll talk about it next October!

In short, if you enjoyed Corpse Party and want to see more of its characters and world, Corpse Party: Book of Shadows is worth playing despite having some tedious aspects and mostly expanding the story rather than continuing it.

---
If you want posts like this delivered straight to your inbox, enter your email in the box below to subscribe!

Did you enjoy this post? Be sure to share it with your social networks! The post Celebrating All Things Spooky: Corpse Party: Book of Shadows appeared first on Samantha Lienhard.

Celebrating All Things Spooky: Amelie

Today’s spooky game to discuss is a short visual novel called Amelie.

A young woman named Amelie lives alone with her friend Lilika in an isolated manor. Now her pen pal, Sofia, is coming for a visit, but things in the manor are not what they seem.

Amelie is a psychological horror yuri visual novel, with more emphasis on the psychological horror than on the yuri. There is some romance between Amelie and Sofia, but it’s secondary compared to the creepy atmosphere and unsettling events that occur.

You play through the story from the perspective of each of the characters in a set order, and each adds a new piece to the puzzle. It’s written in a clever way to ensure that the first route only provides hints that something is wrong, so the second route has some significant (and creepy) reveals just by providing a different perspective.

The downside is that since the story covers the same events each time, there is a fair amount of shared dialogue between the three routes that can’t be skipped. I found myself mashing through those parts to reach the new scenes.

The entire experience is pretty short, only taking me about an hour and a half to complete. This is the sort of story I think could benefit from being longer, with more time spent building up the atmosphere and showing the characters’ lives. As it is, it still does a great job with its atmosphere in what time it has.

Amelie is a nice little slice of spookiness worth checking out if you’re looking for a short, creepy visual novel.

---
If you want posts like this delivered straight to your inbox, enter your email in the box below to subscribe!

Did you enjoy this post? Be sure to share it with your social networks! The post Celebrating All Things Spooky: Amelie appeared first on Samantha Lienhard.

Celebrating All Things Spooky: Dementium

Last month, we talked about the announcement of a Dementium: The Ward remaster for the Nintendo Switch.

At the time, I said that as part of this October’s celebration of spooky games, I might play either that or the 3DS version I already had. Well, I decided to play the 3DS version, Dementium Remastered.

My first thought upon starting up Dementium was, “Oh, this game will benefit from having a right stick to control the camera,” since camera controls were otherwise relegated to either the face buttons or the touchscreen on my old 3DS. Nevertheless, I eventually got used to using the stylus to aim.

You also use the stylus to write notes in your notebook, and that’s one of its best features. I loved actually writing down notes about puzzles, lock combinations, etc. in the notebook, so it’s a shame that mechanic is presumably cut from the new remaster. It’s a small touch, but one that makes the game feel a bit more unique.

Combat in Dementium plays like a first-person shooter, with several weapons you obtain along the way. You can’t hold a flashlight and a weapon at the same time, so a considerable amount of tension is added from needing to quickly switch to a weapon when you see an enemy approaching. I found it beneficial to avoid certain enemies, especially since you can only use healing items right when you find them.

Bosses are especially dangerous. Without being able to bring healing items to a boss fight with you, you really need to stay alert. One boss fight was so frustrating it nearly soured my view on the whole game.

Click for Dementium boss spoilersI’m talking about the wheelchair boss, of course. I looked up a guide, only to find advice that seemingly didn’t work in the 3DS version, and the only other major piece of advice was to look up the code for obtaining the sniper rifle to get it earlier than you should. I finally beat him by adopting a very aggressive approach of shooting him and chasing after him instead of playing it safe, but it was a very frustrating fight.

Dementium is split into chapters, and the chapters are pretty much separate from one another. At first, I assumed I would be revisiting areas often, but that’s not the case. Backtracking is minimal and mostly occurs within the same chapter. You might see a locked box at the start of a chapter, and then spend the chapter finding what you need in order to unlock it, before moving on to a different area for the next chapter.

The backtracking can be somewhat annoying, though, because the map doesn’t mark blocked hallways. It was common for me to follow what looked like a path back to where I wanted to return to, only to find it blocked and need to take a long way around.

This factors into another flaw – the level design is kind of boring. There are a lot of areas where sections are blocked off so there’s only one way to go, and the small number of puzzles means most rooms are either empty or contain only health and/or ammo. The story is minimal and difficult to follow, too.

While this might sound like I’ve done nothing but complain about Dementium all this time, I actually had a decent time with it. The gameplay wasn’t stellar, but it wasn’t bad, either. And the audio design was great; I often could tell what enemies were in a room with me just from the sounds I heard, and could plan accordingly. That aforementioned frustrating boss also had me using audio cues to determine when I should act.

Dementium is the sort of game I found to be just fine. I’m not jumping up and down to recommend it to people, but I still enjoyed playing it. Maybe someday we’ll take a look at its sequel, Dementium II.

---
If you want posts like this delivered straight to your inbox, enter your email in the box below to subscribe!

Did you enjoy this post? Be sure to share it with your social networks! The post Celebrating All Things Spooky: Dementium appeared first on Samantha Lienhard.

Celebrating All Things Spooky: Shadows of Rose

Two years ago, I played Resident Evil Village and generally enjoyed it despite some mixed feelings.

Last year, its story DLC Shadows of Rose came out, and I picked it up… only to forget about it until this year.

But now it’s finally time to talk about Shadows of Rose.

Note: Certain implied spoilers for Resident Evil Village are impossible to avoid while discussing the premise of Shadows of Rose, so keep that in mind if you haven’t finished Village yet.

Shadows of Rose is set 16 years after the events of the main game and follows Rose as she sends her consciousness into the Megamycete in an attempt to rid herself of her powers by finding a Purifying Crystal. This setup for the story allows for a bit more psychological and supernatural horror, although it didn’t lean into it as much as I expect.

For the most part, it feels like a miniature version of Village’s castle and house sections. You explore with a mild amount of backtracking and puzzle-solving, and face enemies both with guns and with Rose’s powers, which you unlock as you progress.

I worried a character with special powers might feel overpowered for a survival horror game, but instead they serve more as a means of stalling enemies to buy yourself some extra time. They also play a role in exploration, which helped the DLC feel a bit more distinct.

Story-wise, Shadows of Rose is fine. It didn’t wow me with anything exceptional, but it was a decent personal story for Rose. The most disappointing thing about the DLC is probably that it takes advantage of its Megamycete concept to just reuse areas from the main game. That makes it feel like a bit of a retread. It would have been much more interesting to see unique places from the Megamycete’s many stored memories. Similarly, it ends with the main game’s epilogue scene instead of adding anything new.

Where the DLC shines the brightest (or darkest), though, is in its scares. Shadows of Rose made me jump a few times, and its take on House Beneviento comes close to the main game’s section in terms of scariness. It might even surpass it. I wanted a scary game for October, and this was a good choice.

I still have concerns that the series could be leaning back toward action-oriented adventures instead of the slower-paced survival horror style that finally made a return, but as far as this DLC goes, I had quite a good, spooky time with Shadows of Rose.

---
If you want posts like this delivered straight to your inbox, enter your email in the box below to subscribe!

Did you enjoy this post? Be sure to share it with your social networks! The post Celebrating All Things Spooky: Shadows of Rose appeared first on Samantha Lienhard.

Celebrating All Things Spooky: Higurashi When They Cry Chapter 5

Earlier this year, we discussed the third and fourth chapters of the horror visual novel Higurashi When They Cry.

Now, as part of this year’s spooky October, it’s time to talk about Higurashi When They Cry – Ch. 5 Meakashi, which is an important turning point since it’s the start of the Answer Arcs.

The previous chapter presented things from a different viewpoint instead of following Keiichi, the protagonist of the first three. Chapter 5 also has a different point-of-view character, this time showing us events through the eyes of Shion.

Chapter 5 covers two periods of time. The first part of the story takes place a year in the past, to show the events leading up to Satoshi’s disappearance. This was an interesting look at events only referenced before.

Click for Higurashi Chapters 3 and 5 spoilersI also found it unsettling just how closely the events surrounding the murder of Satoko’s aunt parallel the murder of her uncle in Chapter 3. During that part of Chapter 3, Keiichi spent a good deal of time thinking about how it probably happened exactly like this for Satoshi, but it almost seems too close (except, of course, that the aunt stays dead). Coincidence? Like so many other things in this story, I don’t know.

The second part of the story covers events we’re more familiar with, as it follows the same path as Chapter 2. Many parts of Chapter 2 were unclear, and seeing them from a new perspective explains quite a bit.

Not only is it informative, but it’s also quite dark, one of the creepier entries so far. If you’ve played Chapter 2, you’re already familiar with how things spiral out of control… and now here in Chapter 5, you see how it all happened. That’s not to say everything is explained, though. My biggest questions coming out of Chapter 2 still remain.

Click for Higurashi Chapters 2 and 5 spoilersThe timeline surrounding Shion’s death and her stabbing Keiichi is still unclear. It doesn’t address Takano being dead before the scene in the storehouse, either.

More interestingly, this chapter carefully builds up an explanation for how the Sonozaki family could be responsible for the supposed “curse of Oyashiro-sama,” but then tears it down, with Mion swearing that her grandmother only let it be implied that they were responsible for the deaths/disappearances because of the power that suggested.

Rika is very suspicious in this chapter, as she shows up with a syringe that causes the victim to tear out their own throat, like how Tomitake died (and Keiichi in Chapter 1). The game makes an intentional parallel between her footsteps and the extra footstep that someone cursed by Oyashiro-sama hears, too.

Right now, I’m sticking with my theory from Chapter 4 that Rika is trying to avert a bad future and causing multiple timelines as a result, but it still doesn’t explain everything.

Anyway, Higurashi When They Cry – Ch. 5 Meakashi had me thoroughly invested, as it shows events from a different point of view and explained some of the confusing events from Chapter 2. It’s also the last one I already had in my backlog, so I’ll need to pick up the remaining three chapters someday soon.

I still have many questions. Where is this going? Will everything be explained? Will the payoff be satisfying after all this buildup? One way or another, our Higurashi journey will continue with Chapter 6.

---
If you want posts like this delivered straight to your inbox, enter your email in the box below to subscribe!

Did you enjoy this post? Be sure to share it with your social networks! The post Celebrating All Things Spooky: Higurashi When They Cry Chapter 5 appeared first on Samantha Lienhard.

Celebrating All Things Spooky: The Recipe of Madness

Today’s game is a short indie horror game called The Recipe of Madness.

You arrive at a creepy house to conduct an interview, but find yourself locked inside with no sign of the interviewee anywhere. With no other choice, you begin to explore…

This is a short game with a handful of actions you can perform as you look around – you find a lighter early on, and using it to light candles is the most frequent form of interaction beyond opening doors.

There are a handful of puzzles to solve, as well as plenty of notes to find that help explain the ominous situation you find yourself in.

My one criticism is that it’s often unclear what your actions will do. After solving a puzzle or finding a key, I often had to run around to all the locked doors again to see what had changed. However, since it’s a fairly small gameplay area, that’s not too big of a problem. The entire game takes under an hour to complete even including time spent wandering. It’s also very dark (visually), even with a flashlight.

It’s creepy and atmospheric, with a handful of scares that made me jump. The Recipe of Madness might not be groundbreaking, but it was an enjoyable slice of horror as we get into the spooky season.

---
If you want posts like this delivered straight to your inbox, enter your email in the box below to subscribe!

Did you enjoy this post? Be sure to share it with your social networks! The post Celebrating All Things Spooky: The Recipe of Madness appeared first on Samantha Lienhard.

Celebrating All Things Spooky: Onimusha

The first game we’ll be taking a look at this spooky season is Onimusha: Warlords, the first game in the Onimusha series.

The original Onimusha: Warlords is still surprisingly easy to find if you don’t mind a used copy. However, it was remastered a few years ago, and I picked up the remaster in a sale on Steam.

(Physical copies of the remaster appear to be available as well, at least Japanese copies that include English.)

Onimusha: Warlords follows Samanosuke, a warrior in the Sengoku period who enters a castle overtaken by monsters and demons in order to rescue the princess. He gains a strange gauntlet that allows him to seal the souls of demons, which becomes an important part of gameplay. Defeated enemies release souls that restore your health, restore your magic, or can be spent on upgrades, depending on the color.

You primarily fight with a katana, although you gain a couple of ranged weapons along the way. As you progress, you also obtain orbs that let you use magic attacks and also unseal doors of the matching element.

Onimusha actually started development as a Resident Evil spin-off, and I could really see that in the game’s structure. As you progress through the game, you find many locked doors and obstacles that require specific keys or puzzle-solving to get past. In this way, the game area gradually opens up, with the player backtracking to previous areas upon finding a new item or power.

So structurally, it’s a survival horror game, although in terms of gameplay I’d say it’s firmly an action game. Instead of de-emphasized combat, fighting is almost always beneficial in Onimusha because of the souls. You can effectively grind if you really want an upgrade before continuing on.

Click for Onimusha spoilersThe exception is when you play as Kaede. Since she doesn’t absorb souls, fighting never benefits you, so I found myself avoiding and running from enemies whenever possible.

The story, meanwhile, definitely has horror elements. From the monsters attacking the castle to the dark plot they’re trying to enact, it’s a horror story that made Onimusha: Warlords a worthy game to start off this month’s reviews with.

Its sequels have yet to be remastered, but since an Onimusha anime was recently announced, I have my fingers crossed that the other games will follow. I had a lot of fun with Onimusha, and the more fun I had, the more I wished the second game was easier to find.

---
If you want posts like this delivered straight to your inbox, enter your email in the box below to subscribe!

Did you enjoy this post? Be sure to share it with your social networks! The post Celebrating All Things Spooky: Onimusha appeared first on Samantha Lienhard.

Celebrating All Things Spooky 2023 Contest, Sale, and Details

October is upon us, and that means it’s time for Celebrating All Things Spooky 2023!

Celebrating All Things Spooky is a month-long event where we spend October looking at anything that falls under the umbrella of “spooky” – whether it’s a classic survival horror game or a cute Halloween story.

It also means another contest and sale, so let’s dig into the details!

Celebrating All Things Spooky 2023 Contest

You could win a horror game or another great prize this October, and all you need to do is join in the conversation. Every comment you make gives you a point toward your overall score, and the top three point earners get to choose a prize at the end!

Contest RulesNo purchase is necessary.Only comments made between October 2, 2023 at 12:00 PM EST and October 31, 2023 at 11:59 PM EST will be counted.1 non-spam comment with a means of contacting you (see below) on any Celebrating All Things Spooky blog post = 1 point. This includes replies.You must use an email address or website URL (or include another way of contacting you) while commenting so I can contact you if you win. This won’t be visible to other users, if you wish to stay anonymous.The top 3 point earners will win prizes.The person with the most points will get their first pick of the prizes. The person with the second most points will pick second, and the person with the third most points will pick third.In the event of a tie, tied winners will be contacted at the same time. If tied winners choose the same prize, duplicate prizes will be possible. A tie for third place will allow for more than 3 winners.The winner will be contacted by November 2, 2023.PrizesNot It: Spookiest Edition (gift sent through Steam)Onimusha: Warlords (gift sent through Steam)Silent Hill 4: The Room (gift sent through GOG)Paranormasight: The Seven Mysteries of HonjoDead Age (Steam code)Five Nights at Freddy’s: Sister Location (Steam code)Lakeview Cabin Collection (Steam code)eBook copy of The Book at DerniereBook copy of It Came Back$15 sent through PayPalYou pick a game for me to review!

If you choose the review option, your chosen game must be something I either own or is easily obtainable, which you can discuss with me beforehand. It must be a single game, not a collection (although the chosen game can be part of a collection). I will start playing it in November.

I’m actually still playing the game that was selected for me after May’s contest, but I intend to finish that up soon, so there should be no conflict there.

Sale

Celebrating All Things Spooky also means a sale on my work! My comedy novella The Zombie Mishap, which follows two scientists who accidentally revive a zombie and set out to stop their creation, will be on sale this weekend only. From October 6 through October 8, the ebook copy of The Zombie Mishap will be on sale for only 99 cents!

Further sales may come throughout the month, so be sure to keep your eyes on my horror novellas The Book at Dernier and It Came Back as well.

And while it’s not currently on sale, you can also check out the horror visual novel Not It: Spookiest Edition that I wrote the script for during a game jam a few years back. There’s plenty of spooky content for everyone!

Celebrating All Things Spooky 2023 Begins!

That’s all you need to know ahead of this month’s celebration, so let’s get ready for Celebrating All Things Spooky 2023! I’ll leave open the possibility of having a non-themed post once a week in case anything earth-shattering is announced, but aside from that, we’re focused on spookiness for the rest of the month.

Happy October!

---
If you want posts like this delivered straight to your inbox, enter your email in the box below to subscribe!

Did you enjoy this post? Be sure to share it with your social networks! The post Celebrating All Things Spooky 2023 Contest, Sale, and Details appeared first on Samantha Lienhard.

Dementium Remaster Announced for Switch

Yesterday, the first-person shooter survival horror game Dementium: The Ward was announced for the Nintendo Switch.

Dementium was a DS game later brought to the 3DS as Dementium Remastered.

It’s also one of the games I picked up ahead of the 3DS eShop closing, since at the time there was no sign that it would get a port.

The first hint of something happening came in April, when Dementium director Jools Watsham tweeted that his company Atooi had the rights to make Dementium sequels and ports.

Now that’s coming to fruition with the announcement of Dementium: The Ward for the Nintendo Switch. It will be out on October 12, right in the middle of the spooky season.

In an interview with GameXplain, Watsham discusses adapting the game for a single-screen system, along with quality-of-life additions and other adjustments for the Switch version. It’s a good video to watch if you’re interested in how the new remaster will compare to the previous versions.

Since I never played the Dementium games before, maybe I should put the remaster on my list to play this October… or maybe I’ll play the 3DS version, since I already have it. Either way, it’s exciting to see a niche horror series like Dementium make a return!

---
If you want posts like this delivered straight to your inbox, enter your email in the box below to subscribe!

Did you enjoy this post? Be sure to share it with your social networks! The post Dementium Remaster Announced for Switch appeared first on Samantha Lienhard.