Paranormal HK (2020)

Paranormal HK is a game that is pretty much what it sounds like: a horror game involving the paranormal taking place in Hong Kong. The start of the game finds you filming some kind of supernatural ghost investigation feature during the Hungry Ghost festival in a spooky sector of Kowloon Walled City at night with the beautiful—but often awkwardly animated—Kathy Chan. Based on some of the awkward Steam Community posts (which are a bad way to learn about games, but I never hesitate to browse it anyway), I kinda thought this was some weird cross between waifu sim and horror game all about Kathy because the posts were obsessed with her. Since I initially found out about the game because of its Hong Kong origins and setting, I thought it might be at least a funny game to play on stream. But while it was definitely silly at times, Paranormal HK is surprisingly pretty solid for an indie horror game.

The game this most reminds me of is easily Home Sweet Home, a Thai game I just recently played. That proximity of it being a recent play could have something to do with my interpretation, but I'd go so far as to say that this game looks partially inspired by it (and it did release 3 years later). The game structurally and mechanically is extremely similar. While there's not a ton of variation on these Haunted House Simulator type games, the likeness was often uncanny. You are pursued by a monstrous woman much of the game, though the monsters take on a few forms throughout the game, often with callbacks to certain urban legends, at least one of which we found online, meaning it wasn't just made up for the game. There's an emphasis on stealth to sneak past these monsters and if you're spotted, your only respite is to hide in a closet. The different legends and myths you deal with are often explained through a handful of lore pamphlets that crop up at the appropriate time to ensure you're all up to speed as you chase after the ever-fleeing image of your significant other. Much of the above description could go for either game.

Ultimately, I think I liked this game better in a lot of ways than Home Sweet Home. For one, the graphics in Paranormal HK are much better and are generally quite strong. This goes especially for the sections on the streets of Kowloon Walled City; you could take a screenshot at any given moment while walking through and get an evocative picture. The look of the environments is immersive, realistic, and appealing, if creepy. This game also has a much greater focus on puzzles than stealth, which in my opinion is a good thing as one of my complaints with Home Sweet Home was that some of the stealth segments felt overly long and complicated. But the stealth segments in this game are fairly few and not too long. The AI is also very stupid (and therefore forgiving) and will watch you climb into a closet and then act like it has no idea you're there (I didn't test this much but from what I could tell, you're safe if you get inside before they grab you, even if they were RIGHT behind you and should know you're in there). Instead, much of the gameplay is found in solving puzzles, of which there are a good 15 or so in this short game. Personally, I love puzzles in horror games and if it's not a game where you can fight the monsters, I much prefer the focus to be on puzzles over hide and seek. The puzzles I also found pretty good, some are super easy, some are quite challenging, though one I did run into a glitch that required a reload and I only confirmed I needed to reload (rather than that I was just doing something wrong) after looking it up online, which I of course stubbornly refused to do for a while, so that was a little annoying. On balance though, there are good puzzles, some familiar, and some quite different from the usual. I will also say the game's scares make good use of in-your-face sound design. Sure, jump scares are kind of cheap, but I don't mind them much in these short Haunted House Simulators where it's difficult to evoke long-term atmosphere and the game uses a lot of sudden noise effectively to heighten tension throughout the game, without overdoing it.

The game does feature some rough edges. As I said, some of the character models at times look a little uncanny or off in their animation and modeling. At times this is intentional, but as is somewhat common with these indie games, the environments manage to look so much better than the character and monster models graphically to the point some of the monsters and such end up looking a little more silly than scary. The story, while okay, is a little hard to follow at times, even if I liked it on balance. The English localization is not great and is littered with bad grammar, typos, and weird word choice. For instance, if you want to quit, you hit esc and the options are 'Continue' or 'Back,' the latter of which actually means 'Quit' and then you are asked if you're sure and the choices are 'cancel' or 'apply.' Generally there wasn't anything that prevented me from playing the game, so I was fine with it, but it was often hard to parse as an English-speaker, especially as the game booted in Chinese and it was difficult to find the language options at first.

But that said, another reason I don't mind the localization being bad is that the game feels very immersive, both for the story and for the setting. It never feels hand-holdy for a Western audience and I like that, regardless of any struggles I had with the menu initially. I'll gladly deal with any such struggles if it makes for a more authentic experience and Paranormal HK delivers on this. My expectations were somewhat low going in, but I ended up getting pretty much exactly what I wanted out of the game and recommend it for fans of indie horror interested in trying a game from Hong Kong.

At a couple points in the game when you're supposed to be live streaming, you can see the stream chat float by the screen, which was a nice amusing touch.

For such a short, simple, indie game, Paranormal HK found ways to surprise me with several puzzles that weren't just the same stock puzzles all these games have. It's only about 3.5 hours and can be finished in a dedicated evening (which I suggest if possible, it kind of feels like a long movie). The visuals are great and the story is immersive and interesting, if a bit subtle at times. I'm not sure these Haunted House Simulators are ever really 5 star fave games for me, they're more simple games I play to unwind with a short story that I'll hopefully enjoy some; I never expect to be blown away. And admittedly, this is probably still on the low end of 4 stars for me, but for those purposes, Paranormal HK is a really strong indie title.