Fear the Spotlight is a short puzzle-based horror game developed by a team of two people. The game evokes PS1-era graphics and is marketed as a "cozy" horror experience. These days, I often find these old school horror games a weirdly comforting genre for me (even when that's certainly not intended), so I was immediately intrigued when I heard about the game, though its intended scale did have me going in with low-ish expectations.

The story follows two girls, Vivian and Amy, as they sneak around their school late at night to play with an ouija board, which naturally leads to some kind of supernatural happenings that separate the two and push us to explore the school, sneaking past a stalking monster, spotting creepy figures in the shadows, solving puzzles, and finding keys to open new areas. The story is pretty simple as it progresses, focusing on uncovering the mystery of the school's history including the deaths and disappearances of a few of its students, mostly through notes found on your way to reuniting with your friend. But I did appreciate the defined scope that kept the focus on relatively few characters and events, foreshadowing themes relevant to them rather than covering too much for the game's limited playtime.

The game's simplistic structure we've seen in many other horror games by now, but it's done pretty well for the short length and small scope. I rarely felt too stuck, but progression is still satisfying. The gameplay could be a little jank and at times I felt like I took damage a little unfairly, but it was mostly functional. I appreciated the use of amusing replacements for horror game tropes to fit the less violent cute school setting. For instance, instead of first aid kits, Vivian gets panicked when she takes "damage" and to recover needs to find and use an inhaler. As well, most of the damage you take in the game is when spotlights shine on you, which causes a kind of burning screen effect, but nothing especially violent or graphic.

My only real complaint with the game is one I won't get into too much since it involves spoilers, but I will just say that despite all the cozy marketing, there is still some fairly dark stuff you uncover throughout the game. Nothing is too graphic or explicit so I don't dock this too much but I will admit that though it's obvious people died in the story, I was admittedly expecting something a bit sillier or light-hearted for the game's mystery premise, but perhaps that was my mistake.

All in all, Fear the Spotlight isn't aiming to be some grand horror game that revolutionizes the genre. It's offering a familiar but fresh take on a nostalgic genre that I personally enjoy quite a lot. While I've got quite a few such games to choose from at this point to scratch that itch, I really appreciate having this one that kind of lampshades what a comfort genre it is for me. That said, while I mostly only have positive things to say about the game, most of that is in the context of its intended scope. Even aside from its simplistic gameplay, the game only takes about 3 hours to complete (though there are two campaigns), so there's also just not that much to it. My 3-star rating is thus less to represent anything the game does poorly but more just to acknowledge that while I enjoyed it, this isn't some knockout title either. I wouldn't highly recommend it to just anyone, but it's definitely nice for a night's playthrough as a change of pace.