Creepy Tale 2 by Creepy Brothers
In Creepy Tale 2, you play as a boy named Lars. Lars lives with his father and little sister. Not long after the game starts, Lars’s sister gets kidnapped by a mysterious girl with a crown and a strange creature. He then sets off to find her, but in doing so he learns about more children who have disappeared in the area, so Lars takes on the challenge of rescuing his sister and figure out the mystery behind the kidnappings.
Although this is a sequel, it has no relation to the first game, so you can jump right into the self-contained story without getting lost.
Grim, Scary Tales
Like the Grimms’ fairy tales, this adventure is dark and disturbing. Lars encounters strange creatures, magical anthropomorphic beings, cannibals, and spirits. I liked how Creepy Tale 2 doesn’t pull any punches and commits to weaving an unsettling tale. It’s effective and captures that old fairy tale style — along with its tropes — very well.
Creepy Tale 2 plays akin to a point-and-click adventure game: find objects in semi-linear locations, and solve many puzzles along the way. It’s familiar gameplay, but the mystical setting mixes it up to leave it feeling a bit more fresh. Puzzles themselves get increasingly difficult as the game goes on, so if you’re a fan of puzzles, you won’t be disappointed here.
There is also a nice variety when it comes to gameplay. I went from solving sequence puzzles to timed ones, then had instances where I had to sneak to avoid detection. It’s all well-executed and keeps things from getting stale, even feeling a bit more action-focused in some areas.
Don’t Stray from the Path
As far as progression goes, Lars can be picky. The game feels a bit more linear since Lars needs a reason to pick up items. For example, I knew I had to cut a canvas to reveal a secret opening, but I couldn’t until I found a letter detailing that there was a secret opening behind the canvas.
In another instance, I needed fruit from a tree. I interacted with it to cut it off the branch, but the game wouldn’t let me until I interacted with another object first, which then let me get the fruit. It makes the game feel more linear and contextual in this way. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but if you’re like me and like to think a couple of steps ahead, it can make things feel a bit more constrained.
Overall, the game is a nice mix of narrative and puzzle-solving. Yes, it is linear, but there is a great balance of narrative as well as gameplay. It feels like a journey instead of just throwing a bunch of non-narrative-related puzzles at me. Many modern adventure games don’t nail that balance well, but I think Creepy Tales 2 does a good job of having plenty of puzzles with just enough narrative to keep me engaged.
Scary Story to Play in the Dark
Visually the game looks like a storybook come to life. Characters have this flat but detailed look to them, giving off a paper cutout feel. Environments are detailed well to make places feel really atmospheric. Little details, like seeing a creepy face in a woodland tree or the multi-layered backgrounds as I traversed through places, helped to drive home its unsettling tone.
The game also implements effectively eerie music to make its atmosphere more alive. The light ambient violins and piano keys fill most of the music here. From the very quiet violins during a sneaking sequence to the fast drumbeats during a dark boat ride, the music adds so much tension to the game.
Creepy Tale 2 is a disturbing, playable fairy tale that’s full of intrigue and tension to keep me engaged. It has plenty of puzzles and tense action sequences. If you’re looking for something spooky to play, check this one out.
Creepy Tale 2 is available via Steam.
Check out the official trailer for Creepy Tale 2 below:
