Dark Days

Genre: First-Person Graphic Adventure / Horror

Players: 1

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Review:

There are multiple games bearing the title Dark Days, but this one, originally bearing the subtitle Narrative Escape Room, is a First-Person Graphic Adventure and Horror game that was originally released as a VR game on PC in 2016, with a non-VR version of the game released in 2024 on PC and Nintendo Switch. This game puts players in the role of a writer still reeling from relationship issues who rents a room in a creepy motel in Death Valley, California, only to find strange and unsettling events happening, and a bizarre masked figure stalking her, even in her dreams.

When it comes to the presentation, I have very mixed feelings about this game. This game’s original release was eight years ago, and even at the time it was a pretty low-budget release, and it has only gotten worse with age. Low-poly 3D character models with stiff animations, blocky-looking environments, and an odd sepia haze that seems to hang over everything all contribute to a really washed-out and outdated look, along with the first-person narration that’s poorly written and does a terribly job endearing us to the protagonist as she seems to have little criticisms of just about everything.

Yet despite the many presentation issues here, this game still does a great job delivering a creepy atmosphere. Even before the creepy masked figure becomes a recurring threat, the motel you’re lodging in is filled with some extremely questionable decorating choices that make for a really unsettling vibe (but also make you wonder why the heck anyone would want to spend a night here after seeing it). And the masked figure’s creepy animation along with the overall solid sound design do a great job delivering the horror here.

Unfortunately, it’s a very familiar horror, as the masked figure works on Slenderman rules: don’t look directly at this creep or it’ll charge you. Plus, I do have to knock it just a bit for relying heavily on jump scares. I should note that Slenderman, you’re not in a large area here, but instead searching for clues mostly within an enclosed environment. When the masked figure seemingly teleports into your room, your only recourse is to duck into the closest hiding spot and wait until the sound indicates things have gotten safe again.

Unfortunately, that brings us to another issue with this game – it’s just overall poorly-designed. The control layout you’re shown early on doesn’t indicate that there’s a button to duck, which you’ll usually need when hiding. It’s far too easy to get stuck on the environments. And interacting with objects is extremely finicky, with many having tiny hotspots you need the cursor aimed at juuuuust right or it won’t even show you it’s an object you can interact with.

I suppose I should also mention that this game can be completed within an hour or two, but here the game is a bit more justified, as it only costs $8. However, I think this time to completion is somewhat inflated by the number of times you’ll die while fumbling with the game’s terrible controls.

In the end, Dark Days does one thing well, and that is the most important part of a Horror game – it delivers the scares. Unfortunately, what it does right it partly borrows from Slender, and everything else it does works pretty poorly. You might enjoy this if you like Horror games and have a lot of patience for poor game design, but at that point maybe you should just play a better Horror game?

tl;dr – Dark Days is a First-Person Horror game where players find themselves trying to escape a creepy motel while being stalked by a masked stalker. This game does a decent job with the horror, but fails at just about everything else, with ugly visuals, terrible controls, poor game design, and a concept that borrows heavily from Slenderman. Horror fans with patience for poor game design might find this worth a try… though they’re better off just playing better Horror games.

Grade: C-

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