Sundown

As a small side note, this game has a nice navigation system that made me think, 'That reminds me of a game I liked a few years back.' Then I remembered that that game was 'we, the remainder' by this same author.

Anyway, this game is melancholy and gradually disturbing, reminding me a bit of The Yellow Wallpaper but also a few other stories (which I won't mention as they are spoilers).

You play as a woman wandering around a mostly-empty house, with clear indicators that you've experience many things in life (an old wedding photo, a dress that is now threadbare, etc.). The background sounds and animated color changes contribute to a mild sense of unease. One of the things that felt most off-putting to me is the matter-of-fact way the game lets you turn on all the water in the house and describes it just running and running.

Much of the game centers around alienation and also the search for your dog. More happens later on, and new NPCs mix it up a bit.

I found the writing evocative, and several sequences did a great job at 'bewildering' horror, like The Spiral entity from The Magnus archives.

Not enjoyable (intentionally so! it would be bad in a way to call this game enjoyable) but a game that I am glad I played and would recommend to others.

Sundown is a surreal horror game made in Twine, where you play as Dolores, an old woman exploring her house as she looks for her dog. As you go through the motions, the game hints at the peculiar situation she is in, leaving you to fill in the (very obvious) blanks. You’ll expect the twists coming, but when it does arrive, it still hits like a ton of bricks.

From what seems like a slice-of-life story, with Dolores, trying to find her footing as she wakes up from a nap, and to reminisce on her past, it progressively gets stranger before downright getting disturbing. She’s seems surprised at the presence of guests, at their frustration when she asks again and again the same questions (what are they doing here?), but most importantly, it seems, at why she can’t find her beloved pet, no matter how many times she calls it.

It is a pretty tragic tale, enhanced by the interface and the background score (creepy as heck). We experience Dolores’s confusion, through that semi-confusing maze (or maybe I’m the problem, forgetting where things are), her inability to find things (only available after a specific conversations) or remember events (which are obscured to us too). The only insurance that we are advancing the story is the changing colour palette (reminiscent of the sun setting). Still, in the context of the story, that change is incredibly off-putting.

While the first section of the (Spoiler - click to show)Charlie act brought things to a new level of scary and creepy, I am not sure if their conversation really added to the story as a whole. We didn’t know/learn/explore enough about their past, their relationship, and the consequences, for that revelation to make a real impact (compared to the other ones). It seemed a bit out of place. I would have preferred a focus with Dolores’s child instead in that section - I think it would have made the final section even stronger.

Overall, this was a great piece of writing, especially being good at conveying that confused state of Dolores, and the frustrations of those around her. Pretty heartbreaking.