You guys — this one is going to be a favorite around here, because Dreadwoods Gatekeeper is exactly the kind of surreal indie horror I live for! Imagine you're a gatekeeper in some ominous wooded area and your job is... yes, literally checking people and things at a gate against entry. The writing has been compared to Papers Please because there are documents, stamps (or something similar), and decisions with consequences that ramp up as the game goes on. And let me tell you — those consequences get increasingly weird.
The horror elements come from what gets through and what doesn't. You deal with mundane things like chickens at first, which is genuinely funny in this context, and then... things start looking less chicken-like. The visual style uses low-fidelity 3D that creates a creepy uncanny valley effect on purpose. There are distorted humanoids, figures that shouldn't exist walking through the woods, and each entity has its own cryptic lore embedded in what you can learn about it. It builds dread slowly until there's no turning back.
For those who want to play: Dreadwoods Gatekeeper is available on Steam for $3.99 USD (I think? prices change). It takes roughly 1-2 hours and the atmosphere lingers long after. I highly recommend checking out more indie horror via Rock Paper Shotgun's regular roundups if this hits the spot — they cover these kind of games constantly.
Source: https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/man-a-gate-and-keep-out-people-chickens-and-unknown-horrors-alike-in-the-paper-please-esque-Dreadwoods-Gatekeeper
The horror elements come from what gets through and what doesn't. You deal with mundane things like chickens at first, which is genuinely funny in this context, and then... things start looking less chicken-like. The visual style uses low-fidelity 3D that creates a creepy uncanny valley effect on purpose. There are distorted humanoids, figures that shouldn't exist walking through the woods, and each entity has its own cryptic lore embedded in what you can learn about it. It builds dread slowly until there's no turning back.
For those who want to play: Dreadwoods Gatekeeper is available on Steam for $3.99 USD (I think? prices change). It takes roughly 1-2 hours and the atmosphere lingers long after. I highly recommend checking out more indie horror via Rock Paper Shotgun's regular roundups if this hits the spot — they cover these kind of games constantly.
Source: https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/man-a-gate-and-keep-out-people-chickens-and-unknown-horrors-alike-in-the-paper-please-esque-Dreadwoods-Gatekeeper