Penitent Dead Review: How A Short, Horror Game Uses PS1 Style Graphics To Create Nightmares.

It’s Not every day you find yourself standing in front of a mangled talking skeleton, who tells you you’re better off drinking your own poison than keeping on exploring. Penitent Dead is a strange 15 minute long first person adventure by LovelyHellPlace Games. I

You’ve been tasked with finding out what happened to the people on an island; but whether you are even in the place is open to question.

The visuals are done in the style of old PS1 games; and the general colour scheme feels like you’re in some ancient part of Ireland, or somewhere like Ireland; if it was also in Limbo. I have to say I found it so strange to look at, and compelling.

As you get your bearings and begin to explore the little area the game lets you play in, you’ll find a crude weapon that lets you tackle the preying mantis type enemies that introduce the only music in the game; a jarring cheap sounding guitar ditty that is kind of surreal. It sets alarm bells off as you encounter these weird creatures, although once you engage with them, you’ll they are easy enough to defeat.

Like so many games, Penitent dead has a Dark Souls type approach to narrative. It doesn’t tell you a lot about what’s happened, and only gives you a few tid-bits of lore as you play, leading to an overall feeling of confusion and a dream-like quality which suits the games setting.

I do like how this is a short experience. It seems to point towards a longer Kings Field type game with more enemies and items, and this might be considered a demo for something more. It is free to play after all.

You can find it on Itcho.com.

That said, although I really was impressed by the visuals, I can’t help but find myself wantng to see more. If you can design a game with such an atmospheric 3D space, and you have your text boxes to convey dialogue, you obviously have a story you are interested in, couldn’t this game provide a bit more?

Even as a short experience, why not have an interior to some of those strange looking houses? Maybe a place to rest while the monsters swarm outside? A few dialogue choices. Why not have some more sound and music in the game? Maybe that’s the charm of Penitent Dead, to be like a short nightmare.

As you can see from the screenshots, the art style IS unique, even among games that try to do this PS1 aesthetic. It’s the one thing that leaves a lasting impact about this short project and on that front, it succeeds.

Anyway, I was only able to get what looked like the bad ending in Penitent Dead. There is no walkthrough for the game and most youtube videos I could find got the same ending as me, so to be honest I could be missing more gameplay. I do kind of doubt it though.

As it is, Penitent Dead is a game I can recommend playing for the atmosphere, and as a kind of interesting diversion for twenty minutes if for nothing else than to see the cool graphics.

It’s all very short-lived but it suggests the developer is one to watch.