Never underestimate the extremes social media gurus will go for extra views. After breaking into an abandoned house, the 17-year-old Vlogger protagonist of this first-person adventure finds instructions on how to perform a satanic ritual conveniently lying around. This, somewhat unsurprisingly, summons a demonic spirit. What ensues is a struggle to appease a tormented schoolgirl who pulls out all the stops to terrify our young content creator. And no, we don’t mean by unsubscribing from their channel.
What we have here is a short (1-2 hour) combat free horror developed by an indie studio residing in Kazakhstan. It appears to have been created with the Switch in mind while gaining an Xbox One conversion, releasing on both formats simultaneously. While not an ugly game, it’s definitely a generation behind the times, falling short of current genre standards and bearing some distorted lighting effects to contend with. The voice acting isn’t great either, but more excusable given that all discoverable voice recordings are meant to sound childlike – and were presumably provided by someone very young.
Five chapters feature, each lasting around twenty minutes – with the brief premise establishing prologue being the exception. The game’s first half takes place in the aforementioned abandoned (yet still fully furnished) property, featuring a dozen rooms to explore and a handful of puzzles to solve, one of which involves playing ‘noughts and crosses’ with the childlike spirit.

A reminder of your current objective can be brought up at any time, and the controls are intuitive. Then again, being a combat free experience it’s simple mechanically, with just a night vision camera and a torch to flick between. It’s possible to duck and lean both left and right, but outside of ducking to open draws these actions are largely redundant.
The story’s second half then shifts to a far larger school that features an open quest to find three body parts scattered around the premises, each requiring a puzzle to be solved. There are a few jump scares, and the school halls are littered with not-particularly scary mannequins. Then after making a choice that impacts the storyline, Dreamless is over – with no reason to return other to see the alternative ending.
While not an unpleasurable experience – in fact, it’s suitably unpleasant at times – Dreamless is definitely a derivative example of the genre, with only the childlike nature of the tormenting spirit leaving a lasting impression. The storyline doesn’t really go anywhere, our hero doesn’t exactly have a charismatic personality, and the two locations aren’t largely enticing to explore. The handful of puzzles present are adequate in terms of their complexity, although one safe cracking puzzle has incorrect button prompts, and there are a couple that feel drawn out including a ball maze with stiff controls, and a chore-like quest to light a dozen candles in a single room.

It’s also worth mentioning that Dreamless isn’t an entirely new game. I swore I had played something similar recently, eventually twigging that it reuses assets from 2023’s Anthology of Fear – the second half of which was set in an abandoned house; the very same present here, right down to the faux game console found in the living room. That game came from an entirely different developer, so I’m at a loss as to what has occurred and don’t want to start making accusations. It did however leave a bit of a sour taste.
Dreamless is a game that’s merely okay, offering a handful of engaging puzzles, a couple of well-timed jump scares, and a very short inconsequential story to take in; parts of which are open to interpretation. The fact that it only lasts around an hour swings things either way; if you’re in the mood for something brief and not too complex, this will suffice. It’s doubtful it’ll resonate for long, and expectations should still be set low. If you’re expecting something rich with interesting mechanics, such as combat and stealth, you’ll likely be disappointed. Either way, last Halloween saw a glut of horror games hit the digital storefronts, including a handful that didn’t gain much press coverage. It’s worth seeing if there’s anything you’ve possibly overlooked because chances are they’re better than this.
17Studio’s Dreamless out now on Xbox One, Xbox Series and Switch.