I was confused reading this comment because I wishlisted it a while ago and I assumed it was a Sokpop Collective game, probably because of the style. I can't wait to play the game!
Well, the video isn’t created by AI! The narration at the beginning of the video is though. It’s pretty easy to recognize ChatGPT’s speech patters/writing style.
@anachimotte Funfact AI is trained on how REAL people talk..so..I wouldn’t go accusing anyone of AI scripts with no evidence especially if your evidence is just “AI usually uses this and this”, as some people use that too (hence where AI picked it up from). Seen a youtuber get accused of AI scripts for “fancier” words/way of talking despite the fact she has always sounded like that even before ai or people thinking ~ is only used by AI (real people use in text).
I gotta be honest. The pretense of being a cozy game is so thin it almost doesn't exist. The whole aesthetic is unsettling. Also, having to trim grass with clippers instead of a proper mower is horrifying enough! :P
I came here to post this. The color palette alone is unsettling and ruins any sense of coziness I would've gotten from this game. Seems like a really cool game but I would never describe it as "cozy," even before knowing about the horror elements.
"makes you wonder what the person who hired us is hiding in their?" uhhh probably their personal belongings, something that the gardener doesn't need to be going through.
I think the thing is that it's specifically pointed out in a video game. Like yeah that's a normal thing to have in real life, but with a video game, especially one this relatively small, details are important. So if the creator didn't want you going into the house they'd probably just make it impossible, not put it in a note as part of the exposition
@pastafarista2 Dawg I'd be heated if some fuckahh gardener js entered my hope and rummaged through my fridge because "I had suspicions." But in reality he just wanted my snacks🥀
Ok, but in the first one, messing up visiting a friend can get your whole face temporarily taken away and it was pretty jarring to have cocos face all of a sudden
The thing with short video games is that every detail is important. It would make sence irl no to do so but a game? not really, especially when the game's label is horror and you're told it's off limits
Dude, use your brain, it’s a video game, not a real life interaction. Clearly he means it’s interesting because the game is trying to keep your attention off of the house… we know it’s a horror game, so clearly there’s something relevant to the plot line in the house.
12:12 Sounds like your typical job to me. You're hired for a specific position(gardener), but the job listing says "additional duties as assigned" now suddenly you're also having to free a town from evil spirits. And to top it off they don't even give you a raise or bonus for your effort
3:48 the homeowner didnt inform your neighbours and they thought you were tresspassing only to see you were a gardener Edit: so many likes yet so little replies
The way I play Stardew Valley turns the game into a Cosy Horror because I'm rushing around trying to cram everything in before 2am because I'm terrible at time management 😂
Play Graveyard Keeper. Couldn't do Star Dew, but people suggested Graveyard Keeper and I have beaten it twice and play it to relax. No real time constraints.
@gigilee1302Thanks for the suggestion 🙂 It's a great game and I've only played the first few hours of Graveyard Keeper but I really want to finish it. The mortuary mechanic is a lot of fun.
@BritReadsBritAuthorstechnically there's no real time limit of the game as you can take however many years you need, but people may feel pressured to be productive in a day because it's a video game
I didn't know MetroidBrainia was a thing, and honestly? That's the best way to describe using previous experience to find shortcuts or cut corners in a game.
9:29 as someone who has lived in Groningen (province, not city) my entire life, i can confirm that is how it works up here. Unfamiliar people will take main roads and ways around, but there's usually 10 ways to get to the place you're going and the locals always know the fastest one (and the one with the least speed bumps)
I’ve always wanted to make a power wash simulator like game, but after doing a handful of jobs, you start cleaning what you realize is an already suspicious clean job, but rather then just being short, there’s small hints that imply something is very wrong. You hear whispers, extra footsteps that aren’t your own, and starting seeing showdowns. Eventually it shifts fully from relaxing to horror survival as you do your best to clean houses while being stalked and having to balancing warding off ghosts and demons while cleaning up their remains, and breaking into lived in houses to clean up stuff like ectoplasm. Taking them down to a specialist who burns their remains and offers you items to purify the house. But there’s no bar saying “100% done” and if you miss something the ghost will refuse to leave and gets more and more aggressive from house to house till it either kills you or you go back and finish the job. BUT going back makes it much harder as you must sneak around the house and secretly clean it up or get sued to shit. If you get caught with too little cash, you get caught and possessed by the ghosts who murders the household and forcing you to start over, implying “you” caused the death of household all over again. The end goal would be to clear all houses of gore (from recent murders), clean up any ectoplasm from old murders never properly cleansed, and avoid being fined so heavily that you’re locked away or possessed. Both resulting in death.
Every time I play house flipper I imagine how cool it’d be if it had a horror twist, and this sounds so much like that. I think there’s a lot of potential there
I think there's an art to combining cozy stuff with horror. This aesthetic has become increasingly popular recently, and there are definitely games that do it wrong and right. 1. Don't make a hard pivot from coziness to horror. Don't put me in a happy sunshine world where everything is fine and then suddenly show everyone screaming and dying with blood everywhere, ease me into it. Give me the impression that something isn't quite right with this world, and gradually reveal the horrors beneath the surface the more I dig into it. 2. Don't completely separate the cozy and horror parts of the game, try and integrate them into each other. Don't go from a completely cozy and relaxing game to a completely scary game with no way back, maybe do something like give me a relaxing task to do, then reveal something scary to me, then make me return to the job that isn't quite as relaxing now that I have knowledge of the scary thing. 3. A happy cozy world that becomes scary is okay, but what's much scarier is a happy cozy world where the scary stuff was there all along, you just learned to be able to see it. From the video it seems like Grunn succeeds at all of these.
Creature Kitchen does this really well as well! Short cooking sim experience with creepy aesthetic and vibes that also feels like a really cozy place to stay even with the tension
the second one is literally freddy fazbear's pizzaria simulator because the theme keeps going back and forth with the relaxing tycoon sectşln of the game and the uneasy office section of the game
Voices of The Void is the coziest horror game I've ever played. With the abilities to decorate your base mixed in with spookyness, its great. Although I do gotta say, cleaning up the base on a new playthrough is soul sucking.
IIRC there is an option to start with a clean base, though that way you lose the best early game source of money and crafting materials -- trash, duh. Honestly don't know how you can craft... stuff without that, I mean you CAN get metal, plastic and whatnot from the point shop but that would take a LOT of money
@aanakkThat's why its soul sucking, yes, I can clean it all up with a click of a button, but like... I gotta get O-Kerfur as fast as possible, so I need that trash, whether I want to or not. So even though I want all of it gone, I have to reluctantly pick up EVERY DAMN PIECE, turn it all into scrap and sell the garbage I can't turn into scrap and it just takes sooooo damn long, and while I'm doing that, I have to do my damn job whilst getting harassed by aliens and the paranormal. I'm making this sound like its the most horrible thing ever, and yes it is soul sucking, but honestly, I wouldn't have it any other way.
@Sunnycanoe87743you don't have to REALLY do your job when you do the initial cleaning tbh, just the bare minimum for daily tasks since it's unupgraded and you're getting 2 signals per day at most, and events don't harass you relentlessly at first. I just don't upgrade speed of signal catching and focus on cleaning for the first two days -- drag around a container with a bunch of trashbags, put everything in it including full bags, drag it to the garage and sell off all full trash bags from base, get metal from the pile at one of the transformers as needed. Afterwards you have a lot of points so you can just buy buckets for metal if there's somehow not enough, works for me. Maybe that's the issue for you -- you're trying to do everything at once instead of focusing on cleaning
This almost nails what I'm looking for in these types of games. The games still has at least a mysterious atmosphere throughout. Also The horror part of the experience is kneecapped because it's advertised as having horror. I would like a game that has that "Cozy" aesthetic and vibes and may even can be played as one. The horror only revealed if the player digs underneath the surface of the game.
I'd definitely recommend Outer Wilds ::D It's mostly got some psychological/existential horror stuff, although it does have some more traditional scary elements in a few places (I won't elaborate further, you just gotta experience it yourself)
Would love that too but it's pretty hard to pull off for a decent amount of time since people who have finished the game will just spread the fact that it's secretly a horror game anyway
I personally like more the existential dread kind of horror and the "fuck these people are messed up" kind of horror. I do not like the "something is behind me" kind of horror.
@dryelene Having the game exposed as a secret horror game through word of mouth is more than fine. That's how good video game secrets work. It kinda goes back to video game rumors of old where spread.
As a dutch person. from Groningen. You do nut understand how infuriating it was to hear the description of the North of the country. thinking to myself ''haha, ofcourse Groningen is haunted'' only for you to then later drop the title explanation and it clicking in place. I am so mad, so impressed, but so incredibly mad.
11:10 The reason why you struggle with understanding people up there is that people in the northeast speak Low Saxon (Low German) a fully separate language to Dutch! Grunn is the local Low Saxon name for the city/province! The first time I saw the name of that game I immediately recognized the name and was very pleased to see that the game actually takes place there
You should watch the movie Speak No Evil (the original 2022 version, not the 2024 one), it's a Danish movie about the horrors of a meek Danish family visiting a Dutch family they met on vacation.
When I realized what doing repetitive motions that show incremental progress do to my brain, it really made me happy to know "Oh this is a normal feeling and an already established genre! Cool!"
Home owner : "But, please my house is off limits." Player: "Let's enter and see what he's hiding!" Home Owner: "My wife is off-limits too" Player: "Let's enter and see what he's hiding!"
I love this genre of horror games because it lulls you into a nice calm and safe feeling and then when something crazy happens it gets you really ramped up. It’s like you forget you’re playing a horror game and then suddenly are reminded that you are playing a horror game.
@LizrdWizrd2 We literally need it put in MUSEUMS, because SIGNALIS is Contemporary ART at this point from how ILLUSTRIOUS it has become for a whole generation
A world on vrchat called “get lost” did the same thing it was sunny and I was in the tower listening to country road and the something squealed in the distance really loud and I got chills it went from so cosy to horrifying in literally 2 seconds
@toasterhavingabath6980yeah after I got my self together I rejoined and this was before the ai was released so it was just the scream but at the time I didn’t know if there was actually something there just thinking about it freaks me out
"Cozy Horror" made me think of Omori at first, but honestly that doesn't fit as well as this because Omori is mostly alternating between cozy and horror, not doing both at the same time
I was thinking this exact same thing. But the switch between fun cozy gameplay and possible horror switch at any moment put me so on edge playing it lol
Could be some kind of dementia/other kind of decline allegory; at the beginning it's super complex and scary and there's so much you have to do, but you keep losing capabilities until it's like. a cozy point-and-click adventure you never get to finish, or something.
Duck Season VR is a TERRIFYING example of a cozy horror game. So much so that if you play it a certain way you’d never even know it. But if you play it wrong…
Oh man i thought it will be multiple games and its only Grunn, since its on my wishlist i will sadly skipping this video. Dropping a like cause i love these kinds of videos
Not finished the video yet. The best cozy game that I thought would have made a great for horror, was The Witness. Everything was so serene but there was tension and unease especially in the village and underground areas that you weren't alone. When I unlocked the first video in the theater room under the windmill it jump scared me.
One of those properties which i class as "trust me" games etc. Where even knowing the genre/ basic story pitch is like a spoiler. It's a paradox where there's a super interesting piece of media, but what makes it interesting.. is that it's a subversion/ twist, but since that's the stand out thing.. you can never *really* experience it. I've stumbled on many movies, shows, games etc like this. But i just always wish someone (or my future self) could just say "Watch/play this thing, don't look into it at all, trust me"
The key is to have something interesting enough without the twist. Good enough in its initial genre that the twist is meaningful. I think of Twilight Town from KH2, There is No Game, or Totono. It has to stand on its own before it lays it down.
I saw this on steam, my brain immediately went to Groningen (also known as Grunningen, idk I never managed to learn Gronings despite being Gronings) now that I know it takes place in the Netherlands it makes more sense
Another cozy horror game I've stumbled across recently is Grimshire. From what I've seen it's basically Stardew Valley/Animal Crossing set in the backdrop of a global rabies epidemic, and honestly the way the game portrays this amidst the cutesy backdrop is *haunting.*
I think I played the game too well. On the hard mode, I went through the whole first year with zero deaths aside from scripted ones. I definitely enjoyed it, but it kinda just felt like a stressful stardew, rather than something that was gonna make me make hard choices. On the other hand, it being impossible to succeed would have cheapened it, so I'm not opposed to the way it operates.
I love when people make videos about horror games bc they always have the sickest lore and visuals but i have some real shitty paranoia and anxiety and playing these games get me real fucked up, so thank you for your content!!!!! I love the format of your videos and your voice is just perfect for the vibe! The way you explain also makes it perfect for my autism brain to understand everything even without the visuals (which i learned by watching it as i paint and craft) and speaking of visuals the editing is just top notch!
Its pretty common for people whom have English as their second, third, or fourth language to talk or type like this, which is why AI talks and types like that.
It's like your house,you know the ways around because you been there a million times but when something changed like a missing object or weird placements of things it becomes unsettling because you know your ways around the house and its your home,but it has betrayed you.
I have a category in my Steam library for "cozy indie eldritch horrors." It includes Dredge, GONE Fishing, Rusty Lake Paradise, Strange Horticulture (and the sequel Strange Antiquities, but I don't have that one yet), and Inscryption (which is a bit of stretch genre-wise but it has calm gameplay.) Always looking for more to add to the list, especially because I hate jumpscares and these kinds of games tend not to have them.
“I’m vibing” is not a common phrase, a human would maybe say they’re “vibing with” but mostly likely would only use it as a noun, i.e. “vibes”. “And honestly, _____” in a smug advertiser-friendly tone is a huge AI phrase. You’re making a comment in bad faith, as if a script written by AI would say “this was written by AI”. It’s not that everyone should be able to tell something was AI-made, it’s that enough people should be to show that it is. You couldn’t tell, but enough people can.
@hatwallet I think assuming that it's AI is more bad faith. You plus seven guys is not "enough people" for me to be convinced. On the other hand the "Thanks for not selling out to AI" comment has 12k likes so I'm going to believe those people for now.
Presumably you are the one with the crazy accent since it is their language? Can't wait for the thousand year history lesson as to why that is wrong and I am ignorant about the regions there though lol
@mattymerr701 Yeah that is kinda right tho lol, but like in belgian dutch you pronounce the words more clean so it kinda sounds for me like Netherlands Dutch has an accent while it's actually the opposite lol
This almost reminds me of that golf game where you try to play golf while playing silent statues with a killer on the course. I might get this! (I think the game is called “greener grass awaits”
Bro this deadass feels like a chatgpt script even if you say you didnt use AI. You keep repeating the same things it gets old. Its being sold as a horror game so whats the point in trying to persuade us its a cozy game when it clearly looks like a horror game from the first second
![Let's not Slob on Bob | Pokemon Grumplocke [18]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/RqXs176wY_M/mqdefault.jpg)
![😱 Майнкрафт, но Мы Зашли В МУЛЬТИК • Бенди [Полное Прохождение] + Фиксплей + Бонус](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/daB0xkvVfJk/mqdefault.jpg)
thank you for checking out my game!! 🙏
I was confused reading this comment because I wishlisted it a while ago and I assumed it was a Sokpop Collective game, probably because of the style.
I can't wait to play the game!
@T@THExRISERahh thanks for the wishlist! it’s cool that you recognize the style, and you’re not wrong! i’m 1 of the sokpop people :)
i will literally kms
@tomvandenboogaart1220 Ah, I wasn't crazy then.
But yeah can't wait to play the game, seems like a lot of fun!
@MEGVTRON ?
The fact we now need disclaimers saying AI wasn't used to make these videos is kinda nuts. Thanks for not selling out to AI
its a sad world we live in right now.
Well, the video isn’t created by AI! The narration at the beginning of the video is though. It’s pretty easy to recognize ChatGPT’s speech patters/writing style.
@anachimotte Funfact AI is trained on how REAL people talk..so..I wouldn’t go accusing anyone of AI scripts with no evidence especially if your evidence is just “AI usually uses this and this”, as some people use that too (hence where AI picked it up from). Seen a youtuber get accused of AI scripts for “fancier” words/way of talking despite the fact she has always sounded like that even before ai or people thinking ~ is only used by AI (real people use in text).
It's always funny to see this from people with extremely generic usernames that look like AI bots.
It's shows that we now subconsciously just assume it was used.
I gotta be honest. The pretense of being a cozy game is so thin it almost doesn't exist. The whole aesthetic is unsettling.
Also, having to trim grass with clippers instead of a proper mower is horrifying enough! :P
Imagine being a cow and having to EAT the garden🥀😭✌
And the fact that cozy games almost always start slow, which makes it a perfect buildup for a horror game.
I came here to post this. The color palette alone is unsettling and ruins any sense of coziness I would've gotten from this game. Seems like a really cool game but I would never describe it as "cozy," even before knowing about the horror elements.
ALERT, THE ":P" USER HAS BEEN SPOTTED!!!
THE POPULATION ARE GROWING EACH DAY! :D
Exactly. It's not the level of VotV coziness, which would fit this genre so much better
"It's impossible to make out what the locals are saying" Is hilarious to me because I'm in the Dutch side of Belgium right now as an American.
So what r they saying
Medicine wheel profile pic ☝🏻🙏🏻
Oh nah, look up NFPA 704 or fire diamond
Bro is the values of tankard contents
@Dinvo_the_robot at 11.19 it's just gibberish, not anything close to actual words
Is nobody else disturbed by how poorly and haphazardly he’s cutting the grass
It’s pissing me off so bad he didn’t clear one patch at a time!
Lolll
aghh for real
Its a game not real life
He’s gonna spend forever looking for those random blades of grass keeping him at 99%
"makes you wonder what the person who hired us is hiding in their?" uhhh probably their personal belongings, something that the gardener doesn't need to be going through.
Like yeah😂
Yeah I was like that's the most normal thing to say work on the garden don't enter my home😂
I think the thing is that it's specifically pointed out in a video game. Like yeah that's a normal thing to have in real life, but with a video game, especially one this relatively small, details are important. So if the creator didn't want you going into the house they'd probably just make it impossible, not put it in a note as part of the exposition
*in there
@pastafarista2 Dawg I'd be heated if some fuckahh gardener js entered my hope and rummaged through my fridge because "I had suspicions." But in reality he just wanted my snacks🥀
Animal Crossing, the Game: *honestly pretty chill*
Animal Crossing, in fanfics: *explores some dark stuff*
This game was probably inspired by the horror island tours
Ok, but in the first one, messing up visiting a friend can get your whole face temporarily taken away and it was pretty jarring to have cocos face all of a sudden
I still headcanon that Isabella and Doom Eternals Guy are best friends who swap jobs on occasion for stress relief.
There's animal crossing fanfics??
@luchirimoya Many. A few of them have plots too lol
2:12 no? it just means boundaries. people don't usually want to get robbed
Thats what Im saying like bro youre my gardener idk you why would I want a stranger in my house when Im not there
Best comment I’ve seen by far, honestly 😂
The thing with short video games is that every detail is important. It would make sence irl no to do so but a game? not really, especially when the game's label is horror and you're told it's off limits
Dude, use your brain, it’s a video game, not a real life interaction. Clearly he means it’s interesting because the game is trying to keep your attention off of the house… we know it’s a horror game, so clearly there’s something relevant to the plot line in the house.
finally someone said wht i wanted to say
Ah The Dutch that makes more sense
In their hubris, the Dutch reclaimed too much land from the sea.
"The Dutch! AGAIN!"
It's such a weird accent. Not the game, the actual accent.
@Ariamaki hey there dutch
@drewk9131 except that one flooded bunker apparently
12:12 Sounds like your typical job to me. You're hired for a specific position(gardener), but the job listing says "additional duties as assigned" now suddenly you're also having to free a town from evil spirits. And to top it off they don't even give you a raise or bonus for your effort
4 mins ago damn
"Cozy horror" in general just sounds like real life to me...
Average corporate job
The best cozy horror game that I know of is Voices Of The Void.
Dredge and Voices of the Void are up there
I’d say in a sense, death stranding also kinda goes in the cozy horror genre, mainly the delivery parts of it
Minecraft ps1 edition fits this description too I guess. The one that Vinny played.
@CosmicHorrorLore DREDGE IS A HORROR GAME? Because other than those spooky night creatures, I haven't really experience it being horror esc
@Willgame21 its a horror game. horror does not mean jump scare
3:48 the homeowner didnt inform your neighbours and they thought you were tresspassing only to see you were a gardener
Edit: so many likes yet so little replies
lmao
This makes sense, but I feel the neighbors would have already seen you gardening
Jesus loves you ❤
@Hxkknaw21aww that’s sweet. tell him i miss him. he showed me a GREAT time last night 😘 💅🏻
Nah im judas iscariot i mogged him
The way I play Stardew Valley turns the game into a Cosy Horror because I'm rushing around trying to cram everything in before 2am because I'm terrible at time management 😂
Play Graveyard Keeper. Couldn't do Star Dew, but people suggested Graveyard Keeper and I have beaten it twice and play it to relax. No real time constraints.
@gigilee1302Thanks for the suggestion 🙂
It's a great game and I've only played the first few hours of Graveyard Keeper but I really want to finish it. The mortuary mechanic is a lot of fun.
As a non Stardew Valley player, this is a legitimate question: why the 2am time-limit?
@BritReadsBritAuthors your character becomes too tired no matter what and you pass out
@BritReadsBritAuthorstechnically there's no real time limit of the game as you can take however many years you need, but people may feel pressured to be productive in a day because it's a video game
2:15 not really? seems like a reasonable boundary for an employer to have
yeah. just bcuz i dont invite my coworkers to my house doesnt make me "secretive" lmaoo
that's the point, the fact the note had to reiterate it so bluntly is what's concerning
I think it’s because it goes without saying. So mentioning it is what makes it strange. And the way it’s emphasized is also strange.
@Tunac1ty It really just implies that people have tried or succeeded in going into their house before. It really isn't that concerning.
@mortarion9813it implies that just as much as it implies something nefarious
I didn't know MetroidBrainia was a thing, and honestly? That's the best way to describe using previous experience to find shortcuts or cut corners in a game.
Calls to mind games like Prey Mooncrash, Deathloop, and Outer Wilds
people coined the term for Animal Well because it plays like a metroidvania, but without combat. It's just all puzzles.
Tunic’s another big game that falls under this description
Noita
Makes me think of Blue Prince too
1:20 I lived in NL for 4 years, not being able to understand the locals is just in character
Dutch communicating with Frisians be like:
I don't think NorthernLion would have liked that
Sounds pretty normal to me never understanding them
Their language is a cruel joke
Accurate depiction of the Netherlands
10:04 "Are you the strongest because you're Satoru Gojo or are you Satoru Gojo because you're the strongest?" ahh question
I’m sorry, the jjk brainrot is terminal
I like kfc man better why gojo have yutastein kill kfc man 😢
9:29 as someone who has lived in Groningen (province, not city) my entire life, i can confirm that is how it works up here. Unfamiliar people will take main roads and ways around, but there's usually 10 ways to get to the place you're going and the locals always know the fastest one (and the one with the least speed bumps)
Er gaat niks boven Groningen ❤
True of any area, really. The locals always know the fastest and most convenient routes, and which ones avoid the out-of-towners :P
I’ve always wanted to make a power wash simulator like game, but after doing a handful of jobs, you start cleaning what you realize is an already suspicious clean job, but rather then just being short, there’s small hints that imply something is very wrong.
You hear whispers, extra footsteps that aren’t your own, and starting seeing showdowns. Eventually it shifts fully from relaxing to horror survival as you do your best to clean houses while being stalked and having to balancing warding off ghosts and demons while cleaning up their remains, and breaking into lived in houses to clean up stuff like ectoplasm. Taking them down to a specialist who burns their remains and offers you items to purify the house. But there’s no bar saying “100% done” and if you miss something the ghost will refuse to leave and gets more and more aggressive from house to house till it either kills you or you go back and finish the job. BUT going back makes it much harder as you must sneak around the house and secretly clean it up or get sued to shit.
If you get caught with too little cash, you get caught and possessed by the ghosts who murders the household and forcing you to start over, implying “you” caused the death of household all over again.
The end goal would be to clear all houses of gore (from recent murders), clean up any ectoplasm from old murders never properly cleansed, and avoid being fined so heavily that you’re locked away or possessed. Both resulting in death.
I'd play it!
Hold up.
This sounds fire.
PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLAESE PLAESE MAKE IT IN THE FUTURE I BEG YOUU
@mortarion9813 wadda heck is this ketchup doin here
Every time I play house flipper I imagine how cool it’d be if it had a horror twist, and this sounds so much like that. I think there’s a lot of potential there
14:45 Well shit
Lol
If only someone let us in earlier !!!
I think there's an art to combining cozy stuff with horror. This aesthetic has become increasingly popular recently, and there are definitely games that do it wrong and right.
1. Don't make a hard pivot from coziness to horror. Don't put me in a happy sunshine world where everything is fine and then suddenly show everyone screaming and dying with blood everywhere, ease me into it. Give me the impression that something isn't quite right with this world, and gradually reveal the horrors beneath the surface the more I dig into it.
2. Don't completely separate the cozy and horror parts of the game, try and integrate them into each other. Don't go from a completely cozy and relaxing game to a completely scary game with no way back, maybe do something like give me a relaxing task to do, then reveal something scary to me, then make me return to the job that isn't quite as relaxing now that I have knowledge of the scary thing.
3. A happy cozy world that becomes scary is okay, but what's much scarier is a happy cozy world where the scary stuff was there all along, you just learned to be able to see it.
From the video it seems like Grunn succeeds at all of these.
Creature Kitchen does this really well as well! Short cooking sim experience with creepy aesthetic and vibes that also feels like a really cozy place to stay even with the tension
Have you tried Grimshire? It's not what I'd call scary but the horror of the setting is superb
Bonnie's Bakery
Honestly is a good example of that honestly
the second one is literally freddy fazbear's pizzaria simulator because the theme keeps going back and forth with the relaxing tycoon sectşln of the game and the uneasy office section of the game
*Omori has entered the chat*
Im pretty sure theres a much more secret ending behind the house. You have to talk to the worms or something when putting all the idols in the church
Voices of The Void is the coziest horror game I've ever played. With the abilities to decorate your base mixed in with spookyness, its great. Although I do gotta say, cleaning up the base on a new playthrough is soul sucking.
IIRC there is an option to start with a clean base, though that way you lose the best early game source of money and crafting materials -- trash, duh. Honestly don't know how you can craft... stuff without that, I mean you CAN get metal, plastic and whatnot from the point shop but that would take a LOT of money
@aanakkThat's why its soul sucking, yes, I can clean it all up with a click of a button, but like... I gotta get O-Kerfur as fast as possible, so I need that trash, whether I want to or not. So even though I want all of it gone, I have to reluctantly pick up EVERY DAMN PIECE, turn it all into scrap and sell the garbage I can't turn into scrap and it just takes sooooo damn long, and while I'm doing that, I have to do my damn job whilst getting harassed by aliens and the paranormal. I'm making this sound like its the most horrible thing ever, and yes it is soul sucking, but honestly, I wouldn't have it any other way.
@Sunnycanoe87743you don't have to REALLY do your job when you do the initial cleaning tbh, just the bare minimum for daily tasks since it's unupgraded and you're getting 2 signals per day at most, and events don't harass you relentlessly at first. I just don't upgrade speed of signal catching and focus on cleaning for the first two days -- drag around a container with a bunch of trashbags, put everything in it including full bags, drag it to the garage and sell off all full trash bags from base, get metal from the pile at one of the transformers as needed. Afterwards you have a lot of points so you can just buy buckets for metal if there's somehow not enough, works for me. Maybe that's the issue for you -- you're trying to do everything at once instead of focusing on cleaning
This almost nails what I'm looking for in these types of games. The games still has at least a mysterious atmosphere throughout. Also The horror part of the experience is kneecapped because it's advertised as having horror. I would like a game that has that "Cozy" aesthetic and vibes and may even can be played as one. The horror only revealed if the player digs underneath the surface of the game.
I'd definitely recommend Outer Wilds ::D It's mostly got some psychological/existential horror stuff, although it does have some more traditional scary elements in a few places (I won't elaborate further, you just gotta experience it yourself)
Would love that too but it's pretty hard to pull off for a decent amount of time since people who have finished the game will just spread the fact that it's secretly a horror game anyway
There are quite a few games like that, I just can't name them.
I personally like more the existential dread kind of horror and the "fuck these people are messed up" kind of horror. I do not like the "something is behind me" kind of horror.
@dryelene Having the game exposed as a secret horror game through word of mouth is more than fine. That's how good video game secrets work. It kinda goes back to video game rumors of old where spread.
Most normal moment in Groningen: the game.
Groningen mentioned.
The game mentioned, if anyone reads this you lost but so did I
1:46 i like how you said this
Bro did a little rhyme
Lyrical genius
When I think of horror games that pretend to be cozy, I think of Doki Doki, The Bunny Graveyard, and Bugsnax.
Doki doki is a good game!
As a dutch person. from Groningen.
You do nut understand how infuriating it was to hear the description of the North of the country. thinking to myself ''haha, ofcourse Groningen is haunted''
only for you to then later drop the title explanation and it clicking in place.
I am so mad, so impressed, but so incredibly mad.
11:10 The reason why you struggle with understanding people up there is that people in the northeast speak Low Saxon (Low German) a fully separate language to Dutch! Grunn is the local Low Saxon name for the city/province! The first time I saw the name of that game I immediately recognized the name and was very pleased to see that the game actually takes place there
The moment I heard "Dutch" I knew it was gonna be goddamn terrifying
Why? I'm genuinely curious. This is my first time seeing dutch horror game.is there any other? maybe i can try
You should watch the movie Speak No Evil (the original 2022 version, not the 2024 one), it's a Danish movie about the horrors of a meek Danish family visiting a Dutch family they met on vacation.
5:31 "CAN I PET DAT DAWGGG?" Ahh death 😭
9:39 "metroid brainia" 😂🧠
When I realized what doing repetitive motions that show incremental progress do to my brain, it really made me happy to know "Oh this is a normal feeling and an already established genre! Cool!"
Home owner : "But, please my house is off limits." Player: "Let's enter and see what he's hiding!"
Home Owner: "My wife is off-limits too" Player: "Let's enter and see what he's hiding!"
I love this genre of horror games because it lulls you into a nice calm and safe feeling and then when something crazy happens it gets you really ramped up. It’s like you forget you’re playing a horror game and then suddenly are reminded that you are playing a horror game.
0:57 MARCUS???
Right?! Robert help….
Robert? I don't like this rock. It's pissing me off
This guy knows ball
Damn Doki Doki literature club still linger in my mind to this day
16:05 me looking at SIGNALIS, who's only missing the cozy aspect of it...
Peak mentioned ❤
@LizrdWizrd2 We literally need it put in MUSEUMS, because SIGNALIS is Contemporary ART at this point from how ILLUSTRIOUS it has become for a whole generation
A world on vrchat called “get lost” did the same thing it was sunny and I was in the tower listening to country road and the something squealed in the distance really loud and I got chills it went from so cosy to horrifying in literally 2 seconds
Oh, yeah. Thats the wendigo.
@toasterhavingabath6980yeah after I got my self together I rejoined and this was before the ai was released so it was just the scream but at the time I didn’t know if there was actually something there just thinking about it freaks me out
I really the other end of this as well! Creature kitchen has a horror vibe, but nothing is out to get you and its actually safe and cozy
"Cozy Horror" made me think of Omori at first, but honestly that doesn't fit as well as this because Omori is mostly alternating between cozy and horror, not doing both at the same time
I was thinking this exact same thing. But the switch between fun cozy gameplay and possible horror switch at any moment put me so on edge playing it lol
I feel like some one should make a game where it looks like a horror game then slowly transforms into a kid game
Could be some kind of dementia/other kind of decline allegory; at the beginning it's super complex and scary and there's so much you have to do, but you keep losing capabilities until it's like. a cozy point-and-click adventure you never get to finish, or something.
@RowanYampol you’re onto something that’s a great idea
Duck Season VR is a TERRIFYING example of a cozy horror game. So much so that if you play it a certain way you’d never even know it. But if you play it wrong…
Peak season mentioned
1:14 Right before this part i got a burger king ad where it says "when words don't make out,you know its real."😭
I feel like dredge is one of the best examples of cozy horror.
Yes, love it! It’s the only cosy horror I’ve played so far but makes me want to find others
6:00 So it's basically re:zero
Looks like Subaru managed to get back to his own world as a gardener (?)
stair aura
Oh man i thought it will be multiple games and its only Grunn, since its on my wishlist i will sadly skipping this video. Dropping a like cause i love these kinds of videos
Cozy Horror and Cozy Dark works are great and still pretty untapped in potential
The moment you said outer wilds I paused the video. I now must play this! Thank you!!! 🙏
Cozy horror is my favorite and you convinced me to try out Grunn right now
Not finished the video yet. The best cozy game that I thought would have made a great for horror, was The Witness. Everything was so serene but there was tension and unease especially in the village and underground areas that you weren't alone. When I unlocked the first video in the theater room under the windmill it jump scared me.
13:10 I WAS NOT EXPECTING THAT LMFAO 😭😭😭😭
1:45 Rhymes! 😂❤
BARS 🗣️
1:47
6:24 and every grass you’ve cut, have all grown back.
All the grass you have cut has grown back.
Just correcting your grammar :))
Had to pause the video at 6:14 to buy the game. I’ll be back in a couple days ✌️✌️
Didya get it?
hello basil from the hit indie game omori
Have you got all the endings?
One of those properties which i class as "trust me" games etc.
Where even knowing the genre/ basic story pitch is like a spoiler.
It's a paradox where there's a super interesting piece of media, but what makes it interesting.. is that it's a subversion/ twist, but since that's the stand out thing.. you can never *really* experience it.
I've stumbled on many movies, shows, games etc like this. But i just always wish someone (or my future self) could just say "Watch/play this thing, don't look into it at all, trust me"
The key is to have something interesting enough without the twist. Good enough in its initial genre that the twist is meaningful. I think of Twilight Town from KH2, There is No Game, or Totono. It has to stand on its own before it lays it down.
2:12 Well typically I don't want a stranger who's here to trim my lawn, which is outside, inside my house.
11:11 kwou al zeggen. als brabander zijnde, het engste aan dit spel is dat het plaats vindt in groningen 💀
11:17 for the record, this is gibberish, not actual Gronings
I saw this on steam, my brain immediately went to Groningen (also known as Grunningen, idk I never managed to learn Gronings despite being Gronings) now that I know it takes place in the Netherlands it makes more sense
2:28 So the “yardwork simulator” that the Simpsons predicted years ago has finally come to fruition 😂
Easy delivery co. Isn’t very scary, but it’s cozy and has some pretty spooky things.
I have a "RE4 inventory sorting " video in my favorites, and I'm sure I watched it over 100 times by now.
The art style reminds me of Jack stauber
Another cozy horror game I've stumbled across recently is Grimshire. From what I've seen it's basically Stardew Valley/Animal Crossing set in the backdrop of a global rabies epidemic, and honestly the way the game portrays this amidst the cutesy backdrop is *haunting.*
I think I played the game too well. On the hard mode, I went through the whole first year with zero deaths aside from scripted ones. I definitely enjoyed it, but it kinda just felt like a stressful stardew, rather than something that was gonna make me make hard choices. On the other hand, it being impossible to succeed would have cheapened it, so I'm not opposed to the way it operates.
Another example would be: We harvest shadows.
Me tryina make my essay longer:
Yes while also including ChatGPT as your co-author. The script is exactly what an AI would generate tbh.
For real! This is so obviously AI.
I love when people make videos about horror games bc they always have the sickest lore and visuals but i have some real shitty paranoia and anxiety and playing these games get me real fucked up, so thank you for your content!!!!! I love the format of your videos and your voice is just perfect for the vibe! The way you explain also makes it perfect for my autism brain to understand everything even without the visuals (which i learned by watching it as i paint and craft) and speaking of visuals the editing is just top notch!
12:05 is exactly what I'd do if I was in that situation
Literally exactly my energy. Fucked up things presented in a chill fashion.
Just like that one song from foster the people...
I respect the fact that the game allows you the option to take the rest of the weekend off and leave on Monday morning. Very realistic tbh
What is the game at 0:17?
Same please I gotta know
Eclipsium
Naruto
@CeriousssThanks 🫶
@blkbeltmage 😒
This game reminds me of 'Tunic' All the shortcuts you open are shockingly all available to you from the beginning, but only locked behind 'Knowledge'.
pumpkin panic was a game i'd call cozy horror, its a little farming sim with monsters
I was gonna say!! I love Pumpkin Panic. So cute and cozy while still giving me heart attacks.
I FINALLY FOUND IT AFTER A WHOLE YEAR.. You don't know how desperately I been trying to find this.
I can't be the only one that thinks this script is fully made with AI
Its pretty common for people whom have English as their second, third, or fourth language to talk or type like this, which is why AI talks and types like that.
no,he doent spell words perfectly or in a glitchy way
@notfantarealthe script, not the voice
It's like your house,you know the ways around because you been there a million times but when something changed like a missing object or weird placements of things it becomes unsettling because you know your ways around the house and its your home,but it has betrayed you.
I have a category in my Steam library for "cozy indie eldritch horrors." It includes Dredge, GONE Fishing, Rusty Lake Paradise, Strange Horticulture (and the sequel Strange Antiquities, but I don't have that one yet), and Inscryption (which is a bit of stretch genre-wise but it has calm gameplay.) Always looking for more to add to the list, especially because I hate jumpscares and these kinds of games tend not to have them.
Thanks for list. I’ll look some of them up as love that category.
Berry bury berry is a good example of this!!!
Funny! Grunn is nickname for Groningen. A city in north of the Netherlands.
He mentions this at 11:00
The way the person spying on you looks like reminds me of the game "House". which is also a Time loop game focused on learning how things work.
“And honestly, I’m vibing.” God this game is great but this script is so unbelievably AI.
what? a common phrase screams ai to you, despite the script being way more coherent that AI could ever be?
“I’m vibing” is not a common phrase, a human would maybe say they’re “vibing with” but mostly likely would only use it as a noun, i.e. “vibes”. “And honestly, _____” in a smug advertiser-friendly tone is a huge AI phrase.
You’re making a comment in bad faith, as if a script written by AI would say “this was written by AI”. It’s not that everyone should be able to tell something was AI-made, it’s that enough people should be to show that it is. You couldn’t tell, but enough people can.
@hatwallet I think assuming that it's AI is more bad faith. You plus seven guys is not "enough people" for me to be convinced. On the other hand the "Thanks for not selling out to AI" comment has 12k likes so I'm going to believe those people for now.
Dredge is another great example of this, a cozy fishing game where you slowly uncover the lovecraftian horrors hidden in the depths.
As a Belgian understanding people from the Netherlands is kinda hard for me sometimes cuz they got a crazy accent even tho we speak the same language
Presumably you are the one with the crazy accent since it is their language?
Can't wait for the thousand year history lesson as to why that is wrong and I am ignorant about the regions there though lol
@mattymerr701 Yeah that is kinda right tho lol, but like in belgian dutch you pronounce the words more clean so it kinda sounds for me like Netherlands Dutch has an accent while it's actually the opposite lol
I 100% this game around when it came out. Honestly one of my favorite indie games I’ve played. I highly recommend playing it.
The gpt script makes it hurt to watch
Finally, a documentary about regular life in Winschoten.
This almost reminds me of that golf game where you try to play golf while playing silent statues with a killer on the course. I might get this! (I think the game is called “greener grass awaits”
I assume you watch Jacob Geller?
When I saw the environment I already knew it was going to be a horror game
I am here to recommend Welcome to Elderfield, best explained (in shorthand) with saying Junji Ito and Stardew Valley. PEAK vibes.
Have to second this, got hooked on the demo and it's quality work!
2:52-3:21 Nah. My lazy ass wishes it would work like that. No dopamine hit for me. XD
"and honestly I am still vibing" pack it up bigGPT
After half of tge video ya the script is ai cmon get your lazy bum up and write buddy
3:41 someone is watching you
Wish you had mentioned the outer wilds thing sooner. Now i'm gonna play it without watching the rest of the video until i'm done
Same, I mean I know it's obvious that a video about a game will have spoilers about it, but I wish the video made it a bit more clear
when I think of cozy horror I think of dredge
0:22 soooooo basically a bait and switch type game???
I'm obsessed now of psychological horror games.
Bro this deadass feels like a chatgpt script even if you say you didnt use AI. You keep repeating the same things it gets old. Its being sold as a horror game so whats the point in trying to persuade us its a cozy game when it clearly looks like a horror game from the first second
3:17 "bumbling through the brush my botanical escapade continues" 😭😭😭
3:00 chaos…to order..? s-splatoon reference? SPLATOON REFERENCE 🔥🔥🔥🔥