#61 - The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog

Sheesh, Amy, don't look so happy that Sonic's dead...

Hey all! It was my birthday last week, so to celebrate, I wanted to play a game themed around a birthday party. And since I'm a huge Sonic the Hedgehog nerd, I decided to play the murder mystery game, The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog! As usual, there will be no spoilers in this post, so read on for details!

The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog randomly dropped for April Fools Day in 2023, with the announcement that SEGA has decided to just kill off Sonic. This was a free game to play and turned out to be pretty fun! (It's still free on Steam, if you want to check it out.) It's a point-and-click visual novel, where you get to help Tails and Amy solve the death of Sonic the Hedgehog.

But he's not really dead... is he?

The game starts with Barry the Quokka, a timid and insecure character, beginning his first shift aboard the Mirage Express. This is a passenger train designed to host parties and events. You play as "Barry," although you can give him whatever (respectful) name you want. For simplicity's sake, I stuck with his canon name. I'm not one to mess with the canon.

In the dining car, Barry meets the conductor, who is one day away from retirement. That always goes smoothly in murder/mystery stories, right? He coaches Barry on his roles and responsibilities and offers to assist him in greeting the guests and collecting their tickets, before disappearing to the conductor car to run the train.

By the way, the conductor's mention of 32 years as conductor was a reference to the 32 years since the first Sonic game released in 1991.

The guests show up, dressed in unusual attire. It's Amy Rose's birthday and she's rented the train for a murder mystery party!

You and the conductor collect tickets from the party members, giving you a chance to chat with everyone and get to know their personalities a bit.

Vector has misplaced his ticket, which gives you a quick warm-up mystery to solve. It's mostly to ensure you're observant of the rooms you're in. You'll need to find various things to click on in every room throughout the game, in order to solve each mystery. Don't worry, clickable items are highlighted in neon green when you hover over them; you can't miss them.

When it's time to collect Amy's ticket, the conductor hands her a key that opens every door on the train. She's the birthday girl; it's the rules.

You may notice the robot hand giving her the key. The train itself is sentient, responding to the needs of all its guests. Barry, despite being hired to work on this train, is basically a glorified microwave expert, as the train handles everything except heating up food for guests. You'll see robot hands working in every car of the train.

Amy gathers the party together to announce the rules of the murder mystery party. One person has been designated as the murderer and they have an hour to mingle amongst the guests and pick one person to murder, which must be done in-person. The rest of the guests have to collect evidence and interrogate everyone else to determine who the murderer is.

Everyone has a role and a car they are stationed in:

• Sonic is the ship captain and is stationed in the conductor's car.
• Tails is the detective and stationed in the dining car.
• Knuckles is the sheriff and stationed in the saloon car.
• Vector is the butcher and Espio is the poet, and both are stationed in the library car.
• Rouge is a business tycoon and Blaze is a titan of industry, and both are stationed in the casino car.
• Shadow is the locksmith, stationed in the lounge car.
• And finally, Amy Rose is the journalist reporter, with freedom to roam around all the cars.

The detective and journalist are the only two who CAN'T be the murderer, as they're trying to solve the crime.

Everyone disperses and Barry hangs back in the dining car with Amy and Tails. After chatting for a while, the train suddenly jolts forward at an incredible pace! Tails, Amy, and Barry are knocked into the dining car's closet. Upon awakening, they find themselves trapped! Amy is acting suspicious and ignoring direct questions about their predicament. Tails jumps into detective mode! He asks Barry to help him figure out what's actually going on.

You can scan the room for various things to click on, which will give dialogue between you and Tails. Anything that seems like a clue, Barry will keep in his inventory for later.

Tails and Barry can then interrogate Amy and try to solve the mystery! While trying to formulate a reasonable argument, Tails encourages Barry to close his eyes and think... what would Sonic do? Barry follows this advice, which spawns a mini-game to play. This mini-game will appear every time Barry is attempting to resolve a mystery, and it only gets more challenging as the game goes on.

The "Dream Gear" and the overall design of the handheld device is a loose parody of the SEGA Game Gear, which was SEGA's first portable gaming system.

The objective of this mini-game is to collect enough rings to pass the level. If you succeed, Barry puts together a logical and reasonable argument to help solve the current mystery. If you fail, it will just restart the level. There's no way to actually lose unless you give up playing.

After solving the first real mystery and escaping the closet, the team finds the dining car trashed... and Sonic dead on the floor! (See first screenshot) Amy is excited that the murder mystery has started and runs off on her own to solve the case! Barry has some reservations, though...

Barry and Tails move on to the saloon car to begin interrogating the guests. Be sure to click on everything you can to find clues! Tails will tell you when you've collected enough clues and when it's time to interrogate the guests.

The "Birthday Girl" has decided to solve the mystery on her own, so she runs ahead. All the doors are mysteriously locked, but she has the Birthday Key, so she can help herself to each car. The guests have their own keys to their cars, which they lend to Tails and Barry so they can move on when they're ready.

In the library car, Amy is already wrapping up her investigation with Vector and Espio and leaves Tails and Barry behind once again.

The clues are pretty simple, and if you're struggling to figure it out, Tails will basically hold your hand through the game. If you say or do the wrong thing, he'll usually tell you to try again until you get it right, so it's not a particularly difficult game.

If you're not familiar with Sonic lore, Tails is essentially a genius with a 400 IQ, so he mostly sits back and lets Barry solve the mysteries, giving him a guiding nudge if he's off-course.

When Tails and Barry get to the casino car, they get roped into a heist mission with Rouge and Blaze. As usual, Rouge is more concerned with looting valuables than playing the murder mystery game.

In the lounge car, you catch up with Amy, already throwing accusations at Shadow! It's up to you to do some quick deductions that will either support or refute her claims against him.

Finally, you end up in the conductor's car, where signs of a struggle are visible. This was where Sonic was stationed, after all. After a quick assessment of the room, you're ready to solve the murder! Amy calls all attendees to the conductor's car to hear the results. Who do you think did it?

For a simple, free game, this was actually quite enjoyable! I think I beat the whole thing in roughly 2.5 hours of gameplay. It's mostly linear; you have some places where you can choose multiple options for dialogue, but it's mostly inconsequential. If you get too far off the plot, Tails will assist you in the right direction.

Despite being a straight-forward plot, there were a few surprises and twists along the way. They managed to keep it interesting so you're not just spending 2 hours clicking through the same dialogue options with everyone. And it doesn't end the way you'd expect... Go play it to find out what happens!

By the way, Sonic says something in this game that's really excellent life advice. I'd share the screenshots, but the background might be a bit spoilery, so here's just the dialogue: "I get it, the road's getting tough. It's easy to question the decisions that got you here. But when negative thoughts hit you, let it pass, and keep on living." There's a reason Sonic is my #1 favorite character!

#25 - Vampire Survivors

Vampire Survivors is a top-down survival game where you essentially just try to stay alive as long as possible while endless waves of monsters come at you from all sides.

Your weapons and abilities are all automatic; you just need to worry about moving around the map and staying alive.  Some of your abilities only fire in the direction you're facing, while others target the nearest enemy, and still others just randomly fire off and hit anything in their path.

Extra strong enemies will drop treasure chests when they die, which will give you gold and a random ability to enhance your character.

As you gain XP and level up from killing monsters, you'll get an option to pick your next ability. Choose wisely; you're given three random abilities and you can only choose one. Make sure you pick something that will help you survive long enough to level up again.

You fight until you're eventually overwhelmed. Then you pick a new character (or the same character if you like) and start over again. The more gold you earn, the more core stats you can boost from the main menu, which will give you a starting advantage in your next playthrough.

There's a timer on the top of the screen that shows how long you're surviving. If you start to do really well, you'll unlock more levels to play. And honestly... that's pretty much it. It's just a fun game to see how long you can overcome insane odds against hordes of monsters. Pretty simple, yet rather addicting. A great way to pass the time.

#23 - Viscera Cleanup Detail

As the name implies, Viscera Cleanup Detail is a very gory game, so finding a non-gory screenshot to post was challenging. Be warned that this post is very NSFW. Suffice to say, the awkwardly disposed dead body above is pretty tame for this game. Here’s another relatively tame scene:

Have you ever wondered what happens to those nightmarish scenes in violent video games? After the science experiment goes wrong, or the machines turn on their masters, or the alien monster escapes and kills the space crew, etc? What happens to those explicit murder scenes?

Viscera Cleanup Detail is a game where you play as the cleanup crew that comes in after some nightmarish tragedy took place. Your job is to clean up all the blood, bodies, and damage to the scene of the crime and make it pristine again.

You can play solo or co-op, and I highly recommend playing with friends. Just be careful not to step in the gore, or you’ll spread footprints all over the scene and make more work for yourself. Or for that matter, make sure to clean your mop and dirty water regularly, or you’ll just make more messes.

This game has a “House of Horror” DLC that lets you clean up a house after more than a dozen teens were grisly murdered on Halloween night. This DLC pays homage to all the classic horror films, with references to Friday the 13th, Evil Dead, The Shining, A Nightmare on Elm Street, and many more. As a huge horror movie buff, I had fun searching for movie references while cleaning up this house.

I especially like that my disposal machine in this level was a massive industrial wood chipper that just sprayed everything into the neighbor’s yard. 🤣

Hey, look! I found the One Ring!

#22 - Little Nightmares

Little Nightmares is a wordless, side-scrolling game about a tiny girl in a yellow raincoat named Six, stowed away on a massive ship called The Maw. She journeys from room to room across the ship, trying to escape.

She finds herself surrounded by giant, terrifying, warped versions of adults, who will stop at nothing to capture her. Like this blind guy with stubby legs and horrifyingly long and stretchy spider-like arms. When we meet him, he's packaging up living children in paper and twine like they were hocks of meat. He's very sensitive to sounds; don't let him hear you walking on the creaky floorboards!

Or this chef who is preparing a grisly feast for the grotesque guests aboard the ship.

Six herself is crippled with hunger several times throughout the game. To the point where she starts considering some awful food choices...

Fortunately, she's able to find sustenance around the ship. Next to a cafeteria of sorts, a small child drops a piece of bread for her to eat. She also runs into these little gnome-like creatures scurrying around the ship. After eventually befriending one of them, he offers her food when he sees her struggling.

Little Nightmares is a side-scrolling stealth/puzzle game. You're trying to silently find your way across this massive ship without being caught by the giant adults, but you occasionally find yourself stuck and need to find a lever to turn or pull, or a button to press, or a key to unlock a door. They're simple puzzles, but the atmosphere is dark and spooky, making any hesitation in the open a frightening ordeal. Not to mention, the creepy details in the background, like how this bed has straps across it to hold someone down:

The scariest part of the game for me is when you're trying to walk across the dining tables of all the grotesque guests who are shoveling food into their fat faces as fast as they can. If you're not quick enough, you'll get snatched up and crammed into one of their maws. It's such an anxiety-ridden scene, I almost didn't take any screenshots. I was too focused on trying to stay alive!

Not to mention, the creepy subtle music throughout this game. I especially like Six's Theme Part I and Hunger II (for those of you who bought the soundtrack). That haunting child's hum set to a spooky background theme makes for some terrifying mood-setting music.

This game has a sequel, Little Nightmares II, which I believe might be a prequel story. You play as a tiny boy named Mono, who discovers a fading Six and attempts to save her, while also searching for a signal tower that's corrupting everyone through horrifying broadcasts. I daresay it's even more terrifying than the first game, with a horrifyingly dark end to its story.

Also, a new game, Little Nightmares III, has been announced for release next year. It follows two new children, Low and Alone, trying to find their way out of Nowhere. I'm excited to see what that game will be like! And I hope Six shows up at some point. I'm fascinated with her story and hope we get some more expanded lore on her.

#19 - The Exit 8

Today we’re diving back into the world of psychological horror with the Japanese game The Exit 8. This game is a walking simulator, except the purpose is to escape a single underground passageway that you’re stuck in. Every time you round the corner, you find yourself back in the same hallway you just left.

The rules are simple. You start at Exit 0 and walk down the hall. If you notice something changed or abnormal in the hallway, turn around and go back the way you came. If you don’t notice anything out of the ordinary, keep going.

Once you round that corner, if your exit sign on the wall has moved up a digit, then you’re one step closer to finding Exit 8 and escaping. If it has reset back to Exit 0, then you made a mistake and will be starting your journey over.

You need to pay attention to details in this game, because some changes can be extremely subtle. Like the guy in the hallway smiling as he walks:

Or perhaps more obvious, like the eyes of this poster darting back and forth instead of staring straight ahead.

Or they’ll be glaringly obvious, like walking into the hall to find it covered in no smoking posters:

Some of the abnormalities are sounds, like the vents clicking noise will be slightly different. Or there will be a banging noise coming from one of the doors on the right. Sometimes it will just be a slight change to a poster on the wall, and if you haven’t studied the posters, you might miss it.

There are 32 anomalies, and you might be exposed to a random one every time you go down the hallway. If you can successfully avoid all anomalies, you’ll find yourself at Exit 8, which is a stairway back to the surface. I won’t give away too many of the anomalies, but here are a few others to look out for:

That last one is the closest to a game over you get. A rushing river of red water comes at you quick, and if you don’t turn around and run, it will overtake you and the screen will go black, before you find yourself back at Exit 0.

The Japanese developer (KOTAKE CREATE) also made a sequel game of sorts, called Platform 8. It’s the exact same premise, except this time you’re stuck on a subway line, trying to find your way to the front train car.

And if you enjoy these kind of games, there’s yet another game called Shinkansen 0, made by Chilla’s Art, a small 2-person indie development team who makes Japanese horror games. As you may know, the Shinkansen is what we English-speakers call the bullet train. This is a very similar game to Platform 8, except for a few more horror twists in it.