GO HOME ANNIE [PC Game Review]





Go Home Annie

GO HOME ANNIE
Available on Steam, GOG and Epic Games
Developed by Misfit Village
Published by Nordcurrent Labs

GO HOME ANNIE is at atmospheric sci-fi horror thriller puzzle game, where you play as Annie, a low-level D-class worker for the SCP Foundation, a covert organisation that investigates, secures and contains paranormal incidents and entities to protect citizens from harm. However, behind the scenes, the SCP Foundation has created a division whose sole focus is to actively try to replicate the events to isolate and reproduce the supernatural object responsible. As a D-class worker, Annie is sent into different scenarios to test these SCPs in the hope that the entity can be successfully replicated and is forced to take amnesiac drugs to clear her mind so each test she partakes in is done so with a clean slate, with no fragments of a previous test, to keep the results isolated and unaffected. Unable to successfully reproduce an incident involving a camcorder that can unify different dimensions in a house involving a little girl, the supervisor at SCP is beyond frustrated. However, he becomes a little preoccupied when a code red incident occurs at the facility when an SCP entity makes a break for it. This could be the perfect opportunity for Annie, who’s looking for answers to her own past and feels that her presence at SCP is not merely coincidence.

Developer Misfit Village has crafted a captivating, nightmarish vision in GO HOME ANNIE, using the fictional organisation SCP Foundation, an online collaborative work of fiction submitted by internet users, as its backdrop. Think Creepy Pasta but sci-fi/horror. I hadn’t a clue about SCP before playing GO HOME ANNIE but this game wonderfully utilises the premise and applies the stories and themes behind the fiction in an engaging way, that both sucks you in via its story mechanics but also acts as a fantastic platform to tantalise with horror tidbits.

Controlling the character of Annie in first person mode, you get to interact with a limited number of other characters but the main focus is exploration and puzzle-solving. The game opens with you investigating a house, armed with a camcorder, and it’s here where the player gets acquainted with the mechanics of the game. The gameplay is quite linear and there’s always a task list that can easily be pulled up if you’re stuck on what to do next, but the game very rarely needs an explanation as each environment flows wonderfully into the next, even in a surreal, dreamlike way… or nightmare.

Go Home Annie wall hands
Yep, this game is weird alright!

The atmosphere is what really stands out about GO HOME ANNIE. You can feel an almost tangible sense of doom lurking just out of reach. As you explore the SCP Foundation facility after exiting your test, you get a feeling that there’s answers being withheld from you and the urge to seek out the truth is insatiable. You have little else to do except do some digging and this is where you come across the SCPs in their cells. Reading each of the corresponding screens next to each cell gives the backstory of the paranormal event and entity. I was fascinated and creeped out by some of the tales, whilst some of the cells give you the option to solve a puzzle or interact with the contents inside, such as a bathtub inhabited by two personalities which provide a bit of a giggle. Yes, you read that right. To say any more would spoil the fun of these SCPs, but you better believe if you’re looking for weird, this game has it!

Playing GO HOME ANNIE has elements of working at an office or factory mixed with a surreal nightmare. Imagine if X-Files met Lovecraft and you’d get a bit of an idea on the kind of vibe going on here. There’s no fighting, shooting or anything like that in the game, just simple interaction, a little bit of driving and puzzle-solving exercises in which you may have to use your brain (and in some cases, your patience) to succeed. The real entertainment comes from the experience that link up these puzzles and seeing how the story plays out given the clues and prompts you’re given.

At around 4-5 hours long, GO HOME ANNIE is a short but tremendous example of horror gameplay that really knows how to set the scene. From the visuals and stories to the sound design, voice performances and puzzles, it really puts you in a state of unease and can be very disturbing, frightening and disorienting at times, working to brilliant effect. There’s also a very cool game mechanic where you get to switch between two different realities to traverse sections that adds a bit of challenge to the proceedings when jumping from platform to platform.

Having played the game on both PC and the Steam Deck, I can say it works fantastic on both devices without any issues with the game recently being given the Deck Verified green tick of approval from Steam. There’s also 22 achievements to unlock, many of which can be unlocked by completing the story but an odd few require you to achieve certain things which I won’t spoil.

Blending dreamscapes and nightmarish scenarios, GO HOME ANNIE oozes a sci-fi psychological horror aesthetic that I simply can’t get enough of. I really wish the game was longer as I was enjoying it that much I didn’t want it to end. The puzzles have the right amount of challenge to keep the story flowing (maybe one or two take a little longer to complete until you work out what to do) which means you’re never out the loop of the main narrative for that long. With the game set within the backdrop of the SCP Foundation, there’s so many other stories that could be told should the developer decide to explore the world further.

Rating: ★★★★½

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About Bat 4554 Articles
I love practical effects, stop-motion animation and gore, but most of all I love a good story! I adore B-movies and exploitation films in many of their guises and also have a soft spot for creature features. I review a wide range of media including movies, TV series, books and videogames. I'm a massive fan of author Hunter S. Thompson and I enjoy various genre of videogames with Kingdom Hearts and Harvest Moon two of my all time favs. Currently playing: The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, Yakuza Zero and Mafia III.

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