Dead-End Detective: The Sixpence Strangler

Dead-End Detective: The Sixpence Strangler

Set in the 1950s, and with jokes and double entendres that have all the subtlety of many of the comedy shows of that time, this is a reasonable reproduction of a typical police yarn of that period. This is more a visual novel with choices than an actual game, though you do get to create the character of the protagonist. You play as a police Inspector out to catch a serial killer and during your enquiries you meet the staple characters from that period: the complaining neighbour, the vampish bar girl, the ribald sailors and a pair of constables, one of whom is an eager and ambitious young man, and the other a typical cynical policeman who has seen it all, as well as a jealous colleague who resents your success. Its set in a cold, wet and wintry London.

Real player with 3.3 hrs in game


Read More: Best First-Person Visual Novel Games.


Dead-End Detective: The Sixpence Strangler on Steam

Covenanted

Covenanted

Covenanted is a hand-drawn rogue-like with RPG elements and an original turn-based combat system

A contract with the devil is always a bad idea [/]

The heroine of Covenanted, bound by a contract with the Devil, is on a journey through the magical world. Pursued by the Inquisition and blackmailed by the Devil, she has to balance between light and darkness in order to gain the support of powerful allies and break the endless cycle of rebirth

Combat Alchemy [/]

The journey is full of dangers! As the game progresses, the witch collects recipes for unique potions and gathers ingredients to make her magic even more powerful. Each recipe has its own unique effect

Procedural generation [/]

The global map of Covenanted is generated for each session. The variety of locations, the number of opponents and the available rewards are selected in such a way that each race is different from the previous one

Visual style [/]

We pride ourselves on the visual style of the game. All the main elements were drawn with ink on paper and digitized. The world of Covenanted is growing, our artists are working on new characters and locations

Random events and story quests [/]

We want players to feel the impact of the decisions made in story quests throughout the game. Despite one true ending, the fate of the Covenanted side heroes remains in the hands of the player

Fairy Middle Ages [/]

When creating the world, we were inspired by the worlds of the fantasy genre, world folklore, myths and legends. In Covenanted, elves and werewolves live in the same world with the characters of the Brothers Grimm fairy tales and ancient myths


Read More: Best First-Person Magic Games.


Covenanted on Steam

Drawngeon: Dungeons of Ink and Paper

Drawngeon: Dungeons of Ink and Paper

Drawngeon is a traditional dungeon crawler, which is equivalent of a first-person roguelite with 90-degree turns. It takes anywhere from 2 to 5 hours to finish without prior knowledge, but it has some replay value through different characters and achievement hunting. Can I just say that I absolutely love the UI in this game, you can actually point&click in a first-person view and move things into your inventory, also works when you need to drop or give items to the quest giver. You could play with a controller, but I find it a little difficult, so I just played with the keyboard instead. The game has pretty nice settings, including a camera lock and key binding. For the most part it’s a very creative game with fun gameplay, although it falls apart toward the end due to poor balancing and lack of coherent progression.

Real player with 11.0 hrs in game


Read More: Best First-Person Adventure Games.


Glorious solo-protagonist reincarnation of ancient “Eye Of The Beholder”, only if it was made by a non-DnD fan, in 2018. (and that’a actually how it was)

Unique drawn art style, droning ambience and atmosphere. Creepy twist in the end. No real ending, but probably the only thing that got me qualitatively scared for half a minute. Not an ARG or meta-game, but just a well-executed mind trick.

Not without its flaws, like eventual off-screen teleports or holes in the floor polygons, but maybe that will get patched out eventually. For a game made by 2 self-funded people, pretty impressive.

Real player with 7.0 hrs in game

Drawngeon: Dungeons of Ink and Paper on Steam

Mundaun

Mundaun

Mundaun is really good. It’s very refreshing to play a horror game set elsewhere than an asylum, a space station or a suburban house, there’s way too few games taking place in Switzerland. The game looks unique and I’m in awe just thinking how many graphite drawings it took and there’s quite a few striking setpieces I still think about to this day. The atmosphere is thick and eerie, you know something’s not right but can’t quite put your finger on it.

The characters are great, huge love for a certain evil one who oozes darkness. The romansh voice acting adds so much to the sense of mystery and it’s not like you’d play games in romansh everyday. The story is pretty straightforward and feels like a folktale you’d tell just before bedtime, a story the whole town would know.

Real player with 24.4 hrs in game

Sometimes it only takes one picture to see that the game will be - at the very least - interesting. I saw the first picture of Mundaun on an indie website something like two years ago, and after that was patiently waiting for release. I was expecting another tiny 2-3-hour horror game - only this time with actual style and atmosphere.

What I didn’t expect was was ten hours of high production values all across the board.

  • A culturally informed take on the classical European ‘deal with the Devil’ scenario.

Real player with 9.9 hrs in game

Mundaun on Steam

nightmAR Protocol

nightmAR Protocol

Challenging, spooky, intense, & tons of fun is what comes to mind whilst playing through nightmAR Protocol. Job well done by all the creators - artwork, game play & music were all a knockout. DOPE.

Real player with 2.6 hrs in game

My review of nightmAR Protocol

❤ Audience ❤

☐ Beginners

☐ Casual player

☑ Normal player

☐ Expert

🏆 Achievements 🏆

☑ Just a few (7)

☐ A dozen

☐ Many many

☼ Graphics ☼

☐ Bad

☐ All right

☐ Good

☐ Nice

☑ Fantastic

☑ Handmade

♬ Music ♬

☐ Bad

☐ All right

☐ Good

☐ Nice

☑ Fantastic

☠ Difficulty ☠

☐ Simple

☐ Average

☑ Easy to learn / difficult to master

☐ Difficult

☐ Injustice

§ Bugs §

☐ Bugs destroy the game

☐ Lots of bugs

☐ Some bugs

☐ You can use it for Speedrun

☑ Nothing has occurred

☯ History ☯

Real player with 2.1 hrs in game

nightmAR Protocol on Steam

Hope

Hope

The music is great, really atmospheric and fits perfectly. The storyline is ok. The puzzles are also ok and engaging. This game is a bit glitchy and not intuitive at all. Support told me where to find the menu, there are no clues to that, maybe that is part of the puzzle. It crashed a couple of times for me and I got stuck in a few places, not knowing if it was me or a glitch. Support are lovely and with a bit more development this will be a much better game.

Real player with 4.3 hrs in game

One of the most depressing and PUZZLING games I’ve ever played and a realistic portrayal of slowly losing your mind - realistic as in there are barely any “horror game insanity effects”, but rooms suddenly lead to unexpected rooms, people you once loved are there for a moment and then gone again. Often you’ll feel trapped and don’t know what’s expected of you in these strange escape rooms featuring cold, technical CAD graphics overlayed with crayon characters, a contrast that in some rooms works quite well and in others only looks jarring.

Real player with 2.5 hrs in game

Hope on Steam

Family Mysteries 3: Criminal Mindset

Family Mysteries 3: Criminal Mindset

Each chapter in this Artifex Mundi series features a different protagonist. The unifying theme is (tragic and at times disturbing) family secrets and a mystery to unravel. FM3: Criminal Mindset is one of the better new AM games, although it is still light on challenge. The plot is bizarre and a little spooky, and includes biomedical psychology (of the scifi-light horror genre) and conspiracies within conspiracies. That said, if you suspend your disbelief, there are some interesting HO scenes, better than (recent) average puzzles, and the protagonist is intelligent and very likeable.

Real player with 15.8 hrs in game

A little light on hidden object scenes, although there are plenty of mini-game puzzles. Hidden object scenes and mini-game puzzles are not randomised, the solutions are the same for each playthrough.

There are a couple of tricky puzzles, what makes the game overly difficult however is the “Unmistakable” achievement which is supposed to pop after completing a hidden object scene without any mistakes. Sadly however it is bugged and actually pops when you complete a scene in less than 60 seconds without any mistakes, and due to morphing objects and items hidden behind or within other items, it makes for a very difficult achievement to earn as a result.

Real player with 8.1 hrs in game

Family Mysteries 3: Criminal Mindset on Steam

KINGDOM of the DEAD

KINGDOM of the DEAD

KINGDOM of the DEAD is a pen and ink drawn horror FPS videogame where you play as Agent Chamberlain, professor turned Army General, now working for the secret government program known as GATEKEEPER, whose main purpose is to defeat Death and his armies.

Features:

• Close the Gates of Death, exploring 8 remote locations along the US East Coast

• Unique black & white, hand-drawn visuals

• 8 weapons, 22+ enemies and old school bosses

• Replayability like in the ’90s, with different goals at each difficulty level

• Cheat codes and customizable color palette

• Endless mode

Scour a world shrouded in shadows

Send the creepy creatures of the army of Death back to hell

Push on with your adventure, fighting the horrifying huge bosses you’ll meet on your path

KINGDOM of the DEAD on Steam

Lihue

Lihue

Very good game by a solo dev called “Nehual Pascale” from argentina.

Lihue is a game a narrative adventure about a trans-girl where you have to enter in a psicodelic environment and live his own feelings. if you want to enter in a very beatifull enviroment and history this is the correct game!!

keep the amazing work nehual :D

Best Regards, Maty.

Real player with 0.2 hrs in game

Lihue on Steam

The Cult: Marduk’s Longest Night

The Cult: Marduk’s Longest Night

Wow! That’s really cool!

I wasn’t expecting that the game turned out to be so gripping! It involves you immediately and doesn’t leave till the very end.

To begin with, the main character, Caleb Marduk, who stained his hands with blood of many people (and not only), must rescue his daughter – the only one character whose soul is not poisoned by Sins. At least not yet.

I gladly noticed that the game script pays attention to the smallest details. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration if I say that the game developers were able to create a full-fledged game universe and they’re pretty successful on this way: all the characters have their own stories and take specific place in Marduk’s journey. Nothing is casual here, and searching these connections is absorbing. Answers are not on the surface – gamers need to switch on brains and use logic to the maximum.

Real player with 19.8 hrs in game

I’ve just finished playing. Honestly, the game has its charm. I loved it. I know what I am talking about. I’ve played a lot indie-horror on my phone. I’m keen on this genre. Once I’ve seen this game I decided to pay for it and play. I’m not sorry for it at all. I think I have had great time, trying to listen up to any murmur at my room and solving puzzles:) Usually horror games use simple tactics as screamers and so on, but this is an exclusion. You won’t see here any screamers, but it has creepy atmosphere. Besides the plot is kinda deep. Idk why it reminds me some stories about penitence. The main character has interesting story behind and I hope I will learn more about him in next part of his adventures. What’s about paintings. I loved them. I see, they’re tasteful. Together with soundtracks they seem perfect background for such game.

Real player with 8.6 hrs in game

The Cult: Marduk's Longest Night on Steam