The House Abandon

As a pure text adventure, it's passable: a standard short horror story with a twist of the type that now litters the internet. The parser is awkwardly non-standard (use LOOK ROOM, LOOK <object> and GO <location> instead of LOOK, EXAMINE and compass directions) and causes initial frustration.

But it's not a pure text adventure, it's displayed on a monitor screen attached to an old computer in a dark room: and this visual and sonic ambience surrounding the text is crucial to the experience, delivering the shocks and surprises so the text adventure itself doesn't need to.

This forms chapter 1 of "Stories Untold", a commercial compilation of four spooky adventures, and it sets the creepy tone very well. This chapter can be downloaded for free from Steam and GOG.

This isn't a pure text adventure: it's a simulation of a text adventure, coded in Unity, with a fairly static visual background that changes alarmingly as the story unfolds.

The entire experience gives off a "Stranger Things" vibe, from the Stephen King-esque typeface to the Tangerine-Dreams inspired ambient electronic music playing in the background.

The parser was frustrating at times: it seemed to struggle to understand very similar commands, but was workable, and thankfully there are no convoluted puzzles or complex verb/noun issues.

The overall experience was short and well-plotted. I think the central conceit is one that could easily grow stale, but the author ended this perfectly, while the idea was still novel, frightening, and evocative.

This is a very cool work that plays with nostalgia and horror in very satisfying ways.

Play this one with the lights off and the sound on so you can enjoy an innovative text adventure that moves beyond the ordinary.