House

House is a disturbing action game, kept in the survival horror style, which was produced and published by an independent studio Bark Bark Games. The game uses a simple, pixelart style and, although it is short, it has a few different endings.

Plot

The action of the game starts innocently enough. The main character wakes up in her room and decides to look around the house, inhabited by her and her family. As the game progresses, however, it turns out that the house hides many dangers - monsters, waiting for the slightest opportunity to grab the girl and take her life. The protagonist tries to outrun time and save not only herself, but the rest of the family as well, if saving anyone else is even possible...

Mechanics

House is an unforgiving game, where one small misstep can result in the death of the protagonist. As you explore different rooms, you need to be constantly vigilant, as you never know when something or someone will come out of hiding and attack the protagonist. Not only monsters, but also individual family members pose a threat. In some situations the protagonist can save herself by running away, but sometimes a more sensible option is to grab a weapon.

As you progress through the game, you'll gain a shotgun, an axe and snares, which you can use to hunt down the various inhabitants of your home (but be careful not to fall into the trap yourself). Some creatures can be killed with a single blow, others require a more complex strategy. There are also monsters in the game, which attack the heroine for a certain period of time. If the girl manages to survive until the end of the time trial, the creature is killed. The main character can run, but she gets tired quickly and slows down after a short time. If the monster catches up with her, she will not be able to free herself and the game is over.

Some characters can be interacted with, and some of the items found in the flat help attract or distract them. By performing certain actions, the player also unlocks special achievements to fill a journal that can be found in one of the rooms.

Endings

House has 5 main endings and also secret achievements and endings. The main endings are Patricide, Good Girl, The Song, Family and The End. The last one is the real conclusion of the game. To obtain each of these, the protagonist must perform certain actions and decide who to kill and who to keep alive. In addition, to get the true ending, the player must first unlock all the other endings.

In the moment of getting one of the endings, just after the credits, a ghostly doll appears, which discourages the player from further play, claiming that getting out of the closed circle in which the protagonist found herself is impossible. The situation changes when the player unlocks The End. Then the doll appears in front of the credits, insulting the player until the protagonist starts to approach it. A similar move is most likely a reference to the platform game Undertale, in which Flowey plays a similar role.

Technical aspects

The game has simple, 2D graphics, kept in pixel art style, and the game is enriched by an emotional and disturbing soundtrack.