Sorry We’re Closed

Genre: Graphic Adventure / Horror

Players: 1

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Review:

Sorry We’re Closed, released on PC in 2024 and then ported in 2025 to PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch, is a Graphic Adventure and Horror game that channels the classic “Survival Horror” games of the PlayStation and PlayStation 2 era, albeit with its own unique approach to the genre. In this game, players take the role of Michelle, a convenience store worker still mourning her breakup three years prior, only to find her life take a turn for the worse when she discovers she has been cursed, and must fight demons and other strange things in her hope of finding a way of avoiding a dark fate.

Sorry We’re Closed feels like a love letter to classic Survival Horror and other Gothic and Horror-themed games, channeling games like Silent Hill, Fear Effect, Legacy of Kain: Soul reaver, and the Persona franchise in various ways.

This old-school influence is felt first and foremost by the game’s retro art style, which uses low-poly low-res 3D visuals for its characters and locales, mimicking the look of a game from the original PlayStation platform. Like games in the Persona franchise, Sorry We’re Closed intersperses its dark imagery with splashes of bright color, combining its more gruesome elements with offbeat style.

This is combined with an eclectic mix of sounds, some fitting the traditional Horror mold like a creaky door sound that seems spot-on for something out of Silent Hill, but this is mixed with more bizarre sounds, such as your handgun reload sound dinging like an elevator and then barking like a dog. Yes, very odd. This mix of horror and outright strange extends to the soundtrack, which similarly has Silent Hill’s moodiness but mixed with unintelligible vocal clips and animal sounds.

Sorry We’re Closed is a game that is extremely focused on the topic of relationships, both yours and the relationships of those around you, some of which you can influence over the course of the game through your choices. Furthermore, this game is overtly sexual, even if it never quite tips over into outright nudity or anything like that. Michelle’s bedroom has some “reading material” strewn near her bed, and she’s not above salivating over eye candy as it presents itself to her. In addition, the characters around her are varied and interesting, with unexpected relationship dynamics popping up.

I think if there’s one area I’m less than thrilled about, it’s the actual combat. One element of Survival Horror games that Sorry We’re Closed has copied are the odd overhead camera angles that suddenly and jarringly cut to new angles when you move from one area to the next. Readying your gun or melee weapon to attack shifts you into First-Person perspective, but this shift is jarring, and I really wish there were an option to just play through the entire game in first person.

It’s a shame this clunky old mechanic has been foisted onto the game, because there are actually some clever mechanics built into the combat and puzzles here using Mechelle’s “Third Eye” ability, that allows her to see an alternate version of the area around her, which not only helps with some puzzles, but it also stuns nearby enemies and reveals their weak spot, a heart you must target while using this third eye ability, but which takes more damage than your standard attacks give. It’s a clever mechanic, but the implementation is so clunky that often by the time I’ve gotten used to the change in perspective, the stun has worn off.

Still, while the adherence to the terrible camera angles of retro Survival Horror games is frustrating, I think that Horror fans and especially fans of old-school Survival Horror will be really delighted with Sorry We’re Closed. It’s unique, stylish, and a pretty refreshing take on the genre while referencing numerous classic PlayStation games. Just be prepared for a bit of the retro jank to go with the retro nostalgia.

tl;dr – Sorry We’re Closed is a Graphic Adventure and Horror game in much the same style of classic “Survival Horror” games, and it pays homage to numerous classic PlayStation games while presenting something that’s still unique and original in its own right. Its adherence to some elements of those older games like the terrible camera angles can make this unnecessarily frustrating, but nevertheless this is still a game Horror fans should check out, especially if they love the old-school games in the genre.

Grade: B

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