Set in 2009, this first-person horror is based on a Turkish urban legend involving two girls who performed a ritual in a top floor apartment. From that night onwards, citizens of the tower block allegedly experienced unexplainable paranormal activity. Over the course of 2-3 hours, you’ll gradually learn how the ritual was performed, and what the girls hoped to achieve – along with the consequences of their actions. It’s a shame the elevator is out, as this journey will take you from the basement to the top floor – with numerous stairs to climb along the way.
Within moments of starting it’s obvious that Apartment No 129 – a follow up to 2025’s Y. Village – The Visitors – was originally made for PC. Both the text-based opening and the subtitled FMV intro, which introduces us to our paranormal fanatic protagonist Emil, feature a small font size that’s not only difficult to read but vanishes far too soon. Another peculiarity is that the analogue sensitivity is on max setting as default. Also while in the menus, it’s worth memorising the not particularly intuitive control scheme – which uses RB to reload, rather than a face button. This led to a messy demise during the first enemy encounter.
One last thing to acquaint oneself with is the lack of manual saving and the sporadic nature of the auto-saves. I played through Apartment No 129 in three one hour sittings, all of which set me back around 20 mins of progress due to how infrequently it auto-saves. In fact, I’m reasonably confident in saying it only saved three times throughout.
With all this in mind, it isn’t much of a surprise to find that my first impressions were rough. Thankfully, it isn’t long until its storyline threads begin to emerge, detailing the preparations the ritual requires while you explore the bottom floor of the apartment block. It’s here you’ll find most of the equipment needed to progress, including several flashlight batteries, a few health packs, and some 300 pistol rounds – more than enough to deal with the few ‘boss’ style adversaries you’ll periodically face, including a demonic butcher. The pistol isn’t particularly satisfying to fire, lacking heft, but it rapidly unloads a full clip. While there’s no ability to ‘aim down sights’ it is possible to zoom in; a modest workaround for aiming headshots.
Soon, the means of progression comes to light. Apartment No 129 is driven by memos – which in some instances are more akin to novel pages. Memos can appear from nowhere, as if placed by an otherworldly force, and essentially provide backstory along with instructions on how to progress, with current objectives then appearing on screen. Objectives largely entail heading to certain apartments, located on different floors, to solve the puzzles within or to obtain an item.
Puzzles don’t amount to much more than figuring out safe combinations, but are effective enough, supplemented by Fallout 4 style lockpicking. A physics engine is in play too, mostly used to grab and stack boxes to leap over obstacles. I’d still hesitate to call it a mechanically rich experience, as most time is spent scouring the various apartments via torchlight while looking for the next memo.
It’s easy to appreciate how lean and focused Apartment No 129 is. It’s driven solely by its story, providing everything you need to progress within its first hour or so. Enemies aren’t faceless clones; each is unique and has a backstory, involved in the ritual in some way. Indeed, the premise is intriguing – the desire to find out what happened to the girls and other residents helps carry the experience from start to end, and themes of religion are woven into its tapestry well. There’s a moral choice to make around the halfway point, and it additionally makes good on its intention to scare, punctuating long spells of silence with blood curdling screams and loud metallic clangs.
A robust experience this isn’t, however. It seems that Dead Witness hasn’t quite got the hang of console optimisation yet, and having to replay large chunks upon exiting and reloading saves left quite a sour taste. Looking at the two side by side, it seems that the PC version has superior visuals, boasting more environmental effects. It would have definitely benefited from somebody from outside the studio playing through it and giving feedback, as it lacks some of the modern sensibilities found in other recent horror experiences.
A well-paced storyline is in place; all it needed was more polish to bring it up to current indie horror standards. Only open the door to Apartment No 129 if you’re willing to contend with lots of disorganised clutter and a slight musty scent.
Dead Witness’ Apartment No 129 is out now on PS5 and Xbox Series. It first launched on PC in 2024.