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A horror game where you have to survive a spooky haunted house by calming the paranormal

A horror game where you have to survive a spooky haunted house by calming the paranormal

Vote: (43 votes)

Program license: Paid

Developer: Shawn Hitchcock

Works under: Windows

Also available for Android

Vote:

Program license

(43 votes)

Paid

Developer

Shawn Hitchcock

Works under:

Also available for

Windows

Android

Pros

  • Co-operative and competitive multiplayer
  • Jump scares are well conceived
  • Above average sound design

Cons

  • Can be completed in an hour
  • Like too many other games on the market

Pacify builds on the core fundamentals of survival horror present in the game Emily Wants to Play and wraps them around a tense cycle of puzzle-solving that evokes the 7th Guest. The premise here is as one of the oldest in the history of gaming - and the history of storytelling. You venture into a house that's rumored to be haunted only to find that it is.

Fortunately, developer Shawn Hitchcock has added a whole lot of style to counterbalance the cliche of the premise. There's some history to this house, and it oozes out of everything from the environmental design to the choice of musical and audio cues. The core shock factor here may mostly amount to jump scares and orchestral strings, but they're undoubtedly well executed. And the core hook here is a pretty strong one. The house you'll explore used to be a funeral home, and that close proximity to death means that it can be used to summon the ghost of loved ones for one last brief time. But these rituals are also rumored to have potentially malicious results, and a series of disappearances has led to the house's fall into disrepair.

You play an investigator brought in to undercover what happened, but you come surprisingly unequipped for the task. There isn't much in the way of tools at your disposal, but there is a series of escalating puzzles that need to be completed to survive. You're on a timer too. Your primary opponent is the ghost of a small girl, but she alternates between being good and evil. That means that determining what causes these switches is the key to your survival. You can help quell the evil half of her soul by sacrificing items, but her dark half's intelligence grows each time she's dispelled. Hiding from her adds a twist of deeper puzzle solving and strategy than many indie survival horror games have, but much of the experience still amounts to running and hiding.

Also adding something unique to the genre is the inclusion of multiplayer. Both competitive and co-operative modes are available, and they both stay true to the formula while adding solid replayability. That's a good thing too. Once you're used to the formula and methods of the game, you can quickly play a match in an hour or less. That makes it a solid choice for a quick match with friends but also natural fodder for the YouTube Let's Play community.

Pros

  • Co-operative and competitive multiplayer
  • Jump scares are well conceived
  • Above average sound design

Cons

  • Can be completed in an hour
  • Like too many other games on the market