Darkwood co-creator announces psychological horror game HOARDER for PS5, Xbox Series, and PC
To hoard is to possess, to possess is to control.
Publisher Awaken Realms and developer Byzel, an “indie team” within Awaken Realms Digital led by Darkwood co-creator Gustaw Stachaszewski, have announced psychological horror game HOARDER for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series, and PC (Steam). A release date was not announced.
Here is an overview of the game, via Awaken Realms:
To hoard is to possess, to possess is to control. What hope do you have in controlling the truth?
Welcome to HOARDER, a game by a team led by the co-creator of Darkwood, a unique horror experience.
HOARDER begins as a mundane cleaning simulator that spirals into a submerged nightmare. Pilot a submarine, recover what shouldn’t be found, and uncover the secrets of your new home by night.
This is an adventure game with horror elements, not tied to a single genre. It begins as an atmospheric take on the cleaning simulator formula. The player is tasked with decluttering the house of a hoarder couple. As the cleaning progresses, they uncover details about the previous inhabitants and what happened to them. A mystery slowly takes shape, but it’s up to the player whether they want to follow it. If they earn enough cash through cleaning, they can simply end the game there by buying a ticket for a dream vacation.
However, if the player digs deeper and is curious enough, they will uncover a huge secret — an underground staircase of unnatural proportions. If they choose to venture further, they will find themselves in an environment in stark contrast to everything they’ve experienced so far. The established rules of gameplay begin to break down. Quest descriptions and markers become corrupted. The familiar mechanics of the cleaning simulator are gone.
At the bottom of the staircase, the player arrives at a mysterious facility where the main part of the game takes place. A day-and-night cycle begins, and the facility becomes the player’s new home. Each day, they explore more of it, as it changes over time and through their actions. They can operate an underwater submarine to explore the deep-sea floor, viewed through a LiDAR scanner. In the outside world, they come across all sorts of strange finds, which can be brought back to the base and used as salvage, to unlock new parts of the facility, upgrade existing ones, or push the story forward.
Watch the announcement trailer below. View the first screenshots at the gallery.