Hilariously Sadistic Choose-Your-Own Adventure, The Dark Room, Torments PC in SEPTEMBER 2018
PERTH, Australia/ LONDON, UK – September 10, 2018 – The Dark Room, the brutal yet hysterical choose-your-own-adventure from comedian John Robertson and brought to life by Stirfire Studios, subjects players to an emotionally abusive hate simulator on Steam beginning 20th September.
Based on Robertson’s live standup show and viral video series of the same name (since 2012 the live show has locked hundreds of thousands of players in a brutal puzzle, the videos got 4,000,000 hits in Feb that same year), The Dark Room will feature a brand-new story penned by Robertson in a new labyrinth full of twists, turns, and his signature brand that has been described as a text-based Dark Souls.
As you sit in absolute darkness, a man known only as the Guardian emerges from the shadows. Silver-haired, maddeningly gleeful, and clad in what looks to be glowing… American football…pads…he bellows with a voice dripping with malice: “YOU AWAKE TO FIND YOURSELF IN A DARK ROOM…”
He presents you with a few options: a) Find the light switch. B) Go north. C) Sleep. D) Ask “Why?” Yet each option you choose leads to sarcasm, or worse, death. “You’re in a dark room! You need the light switch to see, do you see?” “You proceed in the direction you believe to be north and straight into the iron spike in front of you . You say hello to Mr. Spike, and he says hello to Mr. Eye…YA DIE! YA DIE! YA DIE!”
His handsome mug, perhaps-insane eyes, and spiteful, taunting voice give the Guardian life through facial motion capture. This cartoony version of him is almost cute, but he still wants to murder you.
The choices the Guardian offers may at first seem unfair, but there’s a twisted logic laying underneath his wicked words. He’s a big jerk that kiiind of wants to kill the player, but keen observational skills (and maybe a hint of absurdity) can win in the end. Sure, you’re most likely to find more abuse from the Guardian or a corpse or two, but we’ve heard tell of fabled good endings somewhere in this mysterious room.
Each death teaches a lesson, albeit one accompanied by the Guardian’s gleeful cheer: “YA DIE! YA DIE! YA DIE!” Get used to hearing that, because many of the games’ more than 600 scenes end with a dark room splattered with blood. But how would you know if the room was covered in crimson? It’s a dark room, and he’ll never let you forget that!
“I came up with The Dark Room because I loved text adventure games as a kid,” said Robertson. “The dread and confusion I felt is missing in gaming today, and now I can force that on gamers at home, as well when they’re in my live crowds.”
Level One of The Dark Room will be available in English on Steam Early Access for PC and Mac? for $13.99, £9.99, €11.99 and $17.99 on September 20th. With future levels slated for release over the next few months.
For more information, please visit The Dark Room Game’s official website and follow the game on Twitter and Facebook.
About Stirfire Studios
Named after an encouragement for all team members to contribute ideas to its mixing pot work culture, Stirfire Studios believes the best creative visions are built by listening to a diverse lineup of voices. With an emphasis on gameplay, visual design and story in mind, Stirfire is currently working on The Dark Room, its latest project to be released since its well-received 2017 release, Symphony of the Machine.
About John Robertson
A silver-haired, suit-wearing professional sadist, John Robertson has toured the world as a comedian since 2008, performing a surreal fusion of abuse, music and nerdtacular bullshit. He’s had residencies at London’s Soho Theatre, the Insomnia Gaming Festival, UK Games Expo, Supanova Pop Culture Expo, EB Games Expo Australia, PAX Australia, MCM Comic Con, London Film & Comic-Con, Sci-Fi Weekender, the Edinburgh Fringe and a host of dungeons, palaces, bomb shelters and theatres. He is the former presenter of the UK’s Videogame Nation, faked a seizure on Australian Idol, punched a drinks sponsor in the balls during a show in Manchester, and has variously been a journalist, TEDx speaker, professional wrestler and imitation priest.
An indeterminate amount of time has passed since the end of the third season and we join Clementine and AJ who appear to have been on the road for quite some time. Forgotten were the characters and choices of the third season as this pair have formed a tight trust with one another to the point that AJ listens and learns from Clementine’s actions as she tries to help him survive in a world that has been apocalyptic since before he was born.
Outside of the main character drama the majority of Done Running is used to set up the new environment and group of characters that we will be dealing with for the rest of this season and ends up suffering from a slow, generally uninteresting, burn outside of a climactic finale. Clem and AJ end up joining a group of other teens and younger children who have been surviving at a home for “wayward youth” where they were staying since the zombie outbreak occurred. Left behind by the adults, they have been managing well enough by hunting, fishing, and scavenging outside of some losses here and there.
Dialogue decisions remain the same though as mentioned before there is now a relationship system that will be displayed for each character at the end of the episode similar to what was found in the Batman series. Another interesting aspect of this series is the fact that the game does feature a handful of collectibles that can be missed depending on how you play through the game and if you explore enough. Of course these collectibles don’t really offer much outside of Achievements and decorating a room but it is a nice little touch.
The soundtrack for the series is fitting for the genre while the voice acting continues to impress as the voice actress for Clementine once again returns to reprise her role while the new characters introduced fit their roles perfectly given the situation these children find themselves in, especially in the finale of Done Running.