![]() And being such a dark and murky game, sometimes you’ll just bumble into a reload situation because it’s hard to see what you’re even supposed to do. It’s full of trial and error, mess up once and you’re reloading from the last checkpoint stealth or pseudo-action sequences. Maybe you’ll get it right away, but more than likely you won’t, and that sets the stage for a lot of the Home Sweet Home experience. If you don’t do it it right, you die immediately, then have to reload and watch the setup again. ![]() Before you even realize what’s happening, the game expects you to spin around, run into another room, realize you can hide in lockers, then hide in said locker, all within seconds. The first big scare in Home Sweet Home also sets the stage for its first big frustration. Especially since that sound is tied not only to the central threat, but also all the dying and continuing you’re going to be doing. In this case, after playing Home Sweet Home, the sound of a box cutter’s blade protracting and retracting might stick with you for a long time. In games especially, so much is communicated through sound, from your emotional state being manipulated through music, to being able to gauge your surroundings, to all the “fun” stuff. Sometimes it’s easy to forget how important sound is to a horror experience. This is not an impressive game from a visual fidelity or content volume standpoint, but where it does excel is its sound design. This includes your path, the problem of the moment, and of course your tools to deal with the threat. Very little is interactive, and what is interactive is immediately relevant. It looks and feels fairly low-budget, so the whole experience, clocking in at roughly four or so hours, is boiled down to only the necessary parts. Besides the horror, Home Sweet Home is more of a stealth and puzzle game. Home Sweet Home is not an action game, nor is it really a survival game. Perhaps, along the way, you find some answers as well. Armed with only a flashlight and your wits, your only goal is to get out. While making your way through the empty space, full of rot and debris, you realize you aren’t alone in the worst possible way. ![]() All you know in the beginning is that your wife, Jane, is missing, and after a night of coping with grief at the bottom of a bottle (implied), you wake up in a building you don’t recognize. Home Sweet Home doesn’t bother much with a setup, and that’s part of the story. While what I ended up with was definitely creepy and had its moments of thrilling, intense horror, it was often held back by rough gameplay snags that would turn big moments into drags. I was ready for some cool scares and a peek through a window at some new cultural imagery I wasn’t familiar with. So my interest was immediately piqued when I learned of this game, which draws its horror from the mythology of Thailand. I consider myself a fan of “Asian horror,” with plenty of films and comics under my belt, most of them hailing from Japan and Korea. Since I was aware of its upcoming release on the PlayStation 4, I’ve been intrigued by Home Sweet Home. ![]()
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