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ECHO NIGHT

while I'd expected more of an explicit Horror Thing from '98 fromsoft this is much softer and gentler than their usual fare, more interested in using its Noble Blue Stone vs. Evil Red Stone setup to springboard a series of quiet ghost stories than anything shocking or needling. the spirits are (as spirits are) in need of compassionate resolution above all else and linger rather than haunt like inkstains on the timeline

much of it's spent rooting around in first person with the lurching king's field controls and cloistered fov that makes every room feel a little too small, solving point-n-click puzzles by pawing at every drawer, shelf, and cupboard to find the right formula for Empathic Reprieve. often airy, maybe dainty; glancing at gears and ersatz birds and listening to old records you could almost forget that poltergeists skulk and any given four walls reverberate some form of loss. it's only when it plays the Fucked Up Grandparent or Incomprehensible Texturing cards that it reminds you that its restraint's strictly voluntary and that even a shapeshifter as keen as naotoshi zin's fromsoft had a common form beneath the costuming. I imagine it as something like a very strange bug