Game: Scratches
Platform: PC
Genre: adventure game
Style: light Lovecraft influences
Verdict: Highly Recommended
Buy: Amazon
It’s unfortunate that the Steam and GOG versions of Scratches were removed, because it’s a great horror adventure game. Scratches puts you in the shoes of Michael Arthate, a horror writer who has recently moved into a Victorian mansion.
The mansion’s history has quite a few twisted secrets that you uncover as you explore, as well as strange scratching noises that disturb you at night.
Scratches is a slow-paced, exploration-driven adventure game filled with puzzles (sometimes rather obscure ones), but the true delight comes in the form of its unsettling story. It is disturbing and scary, with Lovecraftian influences that become readily apparent despite not being as overt as in some games.
One of its greatest strengths is how it places you in the role of Michael, because the early parts especially capture the sense that you’re just doing what you’d actually do if you were in that position (aside from the fact that you can’t flee the house, which is what some of us might do in reality).
If you can get your hands on Scratches, it’s a tense, intriguing adventure well worth looking into… whether you’re a Lovecraft fan or not.
Buy: Amazon