Only I can find softlocks.

Next up on the Winter Jackpot, I am given another horror game. But just like The Midnight Walk... there's no jump scares up your ass. It's more horror in the ambience and environment. Albeit unlike The Midnight Walk, this game... I'm not sure if I understand what story this game is trying to tell me.

The game starts with these flashes of several visions. I think the idea is that perhaps we're being tested in a lab? Perhaps a hospital? Either way... once I wake up, I seem to be in some sort of abandoned laboratory room and I have to escape. In one of the shelves I search, I find a pair of scissors. Almost like one of those pairs you find in a haircut kit. But it's enough to uh... cut my fucking tongue off? And put it on a scale which opens a door... wait why couldn't I have just... I don't know push the scale down with my hand? That was too unnecessary. Seems like this hospital has been completely and totally abandoned. Although I do find one of those little waiting room toys where you move those beads across the curvy bars. Now that takes me back! Remember when waiting rooms had those? There is a radio I can... briefly turn off. But then it turns itself back on. Eventually I find my way out of the hospital... which then suddenly no longer exists as I make my way through this forest type area. There's a couple buildings near me. Neither of which I can go in. There's a lantern I can turn on and off. I can't take it with me but I can interact with it! There's not much in terms of landmarks. Other than a campfire I come across. I walk up some stairs and... holy fuck that sky looks... ominous... going up and holy shit that music is getting intense. And uh... well I see something in the distance that only looks like some giant eye looking thing... I climb up a wooden structure... find out I can fall off it... and I'm back in the hospital... oh don't tell me I have to go through this all again... thankfully I don't have to! The hospital exit brings me right back to where I was! Nice! So working my way through this structure, I find a lever I can pull which sends down a platform me to ride down... violently... I take another ride down and I come face to face with a massive tree... so now what do I do from here? Where do I go? Turns out I'm supposed to grab one of the axes from the tree. Doing so launches a weird flashback. Seems like our guy was just living a normal day when... just a casual nuke goes off in the town... just a normal Tuesday! Oh and then a... soldier or whoever just gets sniped... rest in piece to them.

Going out of the flash back and suddenly my hand gets a blade... okay that's horrifying. It's like a knife has been infused in it... disgusting. But I am able to chop the tree down! My hand goes back to normal but now it has... well I don't know what it is but I assume if I inject this, my hand will go back to blade form. As I ride down the tree, there's a big branch that stops me. I assume I have to cut it down... but there's a problem... I don't know how to go back to blade form. But it didn't matter. I wasn't even supposed to chop down the branch. I could just fall down. But now where do I go? It looks like I can move forward... that I have enough room to sneak by... but... an invisible wall is stopping me? So where do I go? Well not falling to my fucking death that's for sure. Can I climb up the big branch? Uh... no. In fact by doing so, I fall into a gap I should not be in. And in doing so, I am soft locked... wow... only me right? I literally have to quit out and reload. When I get back in... I am right back to the first big structure. That's... a heartbreaking setback. But it's not that bad. I know what to do and where to go. And very quickly, after having to watch that cutscene again... I am back to where I was. But now I face the invisible wall again... if only I knew I just had to walk to the left? Chopping down a piece of wood... and somehow figuring out how to go back to blade form allows me to ride down another lift lets me make my decent down as I watch structures near me fall and collapse. Being careful to balance as I then make my way through the damage. I find myself in a closed train tunnel... oh cool... I sure hope there's no train coming... thankfully there isn't. After cutting down some ominous tentacle thingies... I find myself in some sort of mines. Dark... scary... quiet... it's hard to tell where I'm going. And I find myself falling to my death again and going back into the hospital. I do find where I am going this time. But with it being so dark... I find myself quickly getting lost again. And falling to my death again. And again even after thinking I found where I was going. I end up restarting again when sends me back to the beginning of this cave area. I don't know how I saw it before but after that first little wooden ramp thing. There was another to my right I was just walking past this whole time.

So I head up and cut down some more tentacles and eventually head into an elevator that uh... well looks like it hadn't been used in 5 million years as despite its best efforts, it comes crashing down and now it's all... damp and liquidy where I stand. Going through this very jagged cave area, I cut down some more tentacles, chop down some planks covering up a door, make my way through a very jagged corrdior, and now I have a choice. Do I take the right or the left path? Well we all know right is indeed always right! There's a light I can move around. Oh yeah don't mind the squirmy tentacle things that surround me. I move the light to reveal an open path to take me to another light I can move. Again, don't mind the tentacles. In fact they're scared of the light! As I move the light around, one after one there are more lights I can move around. To which all look like I am supposed to point them all to one center light area. At first I think I'm supposed to interact with this ball of light in some way that sits below some squirmy tentacles... oh yeah... don't walk into them by the way... horrible things will happen. Eventually, after pointing several lights to the middle, there's one more I try to move. However... this one won't let me point it to the middle. No matter which way I move it. But turns out I was supposed to move this one into the open path. Where we do the same song and dance as I avoid deadly tentacles to take several lights into a center point. Honestly it's pretty easy to avoid the tentacles. As threatening as they look. I'm able to make the center light point large enough to get access to a couple levers I can pull. Doing that opens up a pathway to what will eventually become a... it's hard to tell because it's dark. But maybe a large abandoned castle? Or mansion? Don't mind the large tentacle creatures below the bridge. Anyways, the game saves here so I take a stop here. This is a... very weird game. It's a good weird game though. Just like The Midnight Walk, it's more about the art style. And even if I don't understand it, the aesthetic overall is quite fascinating. And I'm interested to see how this game carries on!

Hope I don't find any magical soft locks next time though.