Creepy Tale 2

Creepy Tale 2 is an adventure game with puzzle and arcade elements, with dark atmosphere inspired by Grimm Brothers' fairy tales. It was developed and published by Creepy Brothers, an independent Russian studio, also responsible for creating the StrikeForce Kitty platform game and the Make War strategy sandbox. The game was originally released on Steam, but the creators planned to release it on other platforms as well, which has already been taken care of by Polish company No Gravity Games. Although the discussed game is the second installment of the series, it is not a sequel.

Plot

Lars' family leads a peaceful life on the edge of the forest. One day, while resting after a hard day's work, the boy hears footsteps and disturbing noises coming from the first floor. Looking out of the opening leading upstairs, he sees an unknown, ghostly creature tackling his father and finally pushing him over the stone fireplace and killing him. A mysterious girl is also watching the whole scene. After a while, her attention is drawn to Ellie, the main character's younger sister, who is hiding under the table. She introduces herself as Marta and gives the terrified girl a "gift" - a diadem similar to the one she herself wears. It turns out that a strong spell has been put on the object, causing Ellie to lose control over her mind.

Soon after, Lars gets out of the house and one of the friendly magical beings helps him to escape. The boy decides to find his sister and free her and the other girls from the spell cast on them.

Mechanics

Just like other adventure games Creepy Tale 2 is focused on exploration, collecting items, talking to NPCs and solving a series of puzzles. Puzzles which appear in the game are logically constructed, and hints help in understanding more complex tasks. Sometimes to pass a particular sequence the player has to use items collected on the way. Some of the acquired objects can be combined in an inventory or used several times.

Travelling through the gloomy, fairy-tale land, the protagonist often encounters other characters on his way, with whom he has the opportunity to start a conversation. Conducting dialogues not only pushes the plot forward, but also allows you to gather valuable information. Some of the creatures, however, are not so friendly. Some of them can be neutralized, while others you have to hide from. In the moment of being spotted and captured by an enemy character, the player is sent to another part of the location. Similarly in the case of time trials - if the hero doesn't complete the task before a certain time, he has to start it over again.

Technical aspects

The game has a characteristic 2D graphics, based on hand-made illustrations, and the events presented in it are shown in side-scroll technology. Both locations and characters are kept in an old-school, cartoon style, and the disturbing, fairy-tale atmosphere of the game is additionally diversified by a soundtrack.