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Story:

628 Redwood Drive. That's... where I lived.

This was the only thing that was going through 18 year old Kyle Riverway's mind when he stepped out of the car. While he had no memories of his life before he turned 8, he had lived happily with who he thought were his parents. After trying to do a family genealogy project for a class, however, the truth shocked him down to the core: His entire life is a lie. Who were his real parents? Who was HE?

As he was trying to come to terms with this news, a single, faint memory returned to him: 628 Redwood Drive. After looking up the address, Kyle knew that this was his only lead to discover his past. That night, he stole the keys to his foster parent's car, snuck out of the house, and begun the long journey to his childhood home. He left in search of answers. What he found was a nightmare.

Now, hunted by a psychotic killer with split personalities, Kyle must find the truth and escape with his life. With every step he takes through the dark halls of his former home an invite to the killer, will he learn the truth of his former life? Or will his current life come to a swift end?


Gameplay:

Psychostasis is a story-driven survival adventure game with horror elements. You share the adventure with a split personality killer who can alternate between helpful and harmful at the drop of a hat. There are no scripted encounters with the killer, so each playthrough will carry the same amount of tension as the last.

The gameplay is built around improvising. Due to the unpredictable enemy patterns, you must make use of limited healing items to survive.

Psychostasis was brought from the concept stage to a completed game over the course of 2 months for a school project. As such, it's a rather short game (aiming for around 45 minute playtime). If you like short, story-driven adventure games, then keep an eye on this!

Latest Blog

Psychostasis is now in Spanish!

Of all the things I thought would happen... this was not one of them.

Thanks to the efforts of Sebastián Díaz, Psychostasis now has a Spanish version! which you can get here: http://loqueven.ga/games/psychostasis

Thank you so much for this, Sebastián!
  • Completed
  • Red_Nova
  • RPG Maker VX Ace
  • Adventure
  • 10/14/2014 09:28 PM
  • 05/23/2023 06:45 AM
  • 11/30/2014
  • 69688
  • 28
  • 2315

Posts

Pages: first 12 next last
This seems quite interesting, I would love to play the game once it is out! :D
unity
You're magical to me.
12540
Wow, looks awesome! ^_^ I'll be keeping my eye on this!
Red_Nova
Sir Redd of Novus: He who made Prayer of the Faithless that one time, and that was pretty dang rad! :D
9192
Thanks, you two! Originally I had just thrown together some random ideas so I could pass the class. Then I got a bit carried away. Now this is a project that I'm kinda excited about.

I know horror games are a dime a dozen in RPG Maker, but hopefully I can do enough to make this one stand out a bit!

EDIT: This is also part of the reason why I said this was an ADVENTURE game with horror elements, rather than a horror game.

Now to figure out which heading the comment section is in CSS. I thought I had that taken care of...
Wait what? By Red who?
Insta-subbed.
Red_Nova
Sir Redd of Novus: He who made Prayer of the Faithless that one time, and that was pretty dang rad! :D
9192
Thanks, Urano! I'll try not to disappoint!
Red_Nova
Sir Redd of Novus: He who made Prayer of the Faithless that one time, and that was pretty dang rad! :D
9192
Testing some new CSS. What do you guys think? A little bit easier to see the navigation, yes? Remember to do a hard refresh so all the new edits show up.
omg finally! Among-st my fear for finals, I am playing rpg games
Red_Nova
Sir Redd of Novus: He who made Prayer of the Faithless that one time, and that was pretty dang rad! :D
9192
Well, unfortunately for you, the game is rather short. So it's back to studying for finals when you're done!

Seriously though, I hope you like it. Thanks for checking it out!
For a demo, this game has lots of promise, I have been following it for weeks waiting for the release, anxiously. I'm so happy it's released and within playing it for the first few stages I already love it!
Red_Nova
Sir Redd of Novus: He who made Prayer of the Faithless that one time, and that was pretty dang rad! :D
9192
B-but it's not a demo... It's a completed game.

Thanks for the kind words. I'm so glad you like it!
author=Red_Nova
Thanks, you two! Originally I had just thrown together some random ideas so I could pass the class. Then I got a bit carried away. Now this is a project that I'm kinda excited about.

I know horror games are a dime a dozen in RPG Maker, but hopefully I can do enough to make this one stand out a bit!

EDIT: This is also part of the reason why I said this was an ADVENTURE game with horror elements, rather than a horror game.

Now to figure out which heading the comment section is in CSS. I thought I had that taken care of...
Hi, I 'm Minswel 'm A Translation Of The RPG Facts In English , The Truth Yours Interested Me A Pretty To Translate To Spanish And I Would Like if you could send me , The Project RPG Maker VX Ace

PS: The Project What can send A fcurtis300@gmail.com nwn ) /
Hi, I 'm Minswel 'm A Translation Of The RPG Facts In English , The Truth Yours Interested Me A Pretty To Translate To Spanish And I Would Like if you could send me , The Project RPG Maker VX Ace

PS: The Project What can send A fcurtis300@gmail.com nwn ) /
User was warned for this post
author=Red_Nova
B-but it's not a demo... It's a completed game.


Oh, my bad sorry! I thought I saw demo somewhere in the name, must have been Nightmare of The snow, because I'm following that one closely too. Sorry for my mistake :s Let me re-phrase that, for a newly released and completed game, amazing work!
Red_Nova
Sir Redd of Novus: He who made Prayer of the Faithless that one time, and that was pretty dang rad! :D
9192
It's fine! The fact that someone can actually confuse this with Nightmare of the Snow is a good sign (I think?) as that's a really scary game from what I played. I'm glad to see you liked Psychostasis, though!
First of all I like the bandage animation :)
I really enjoyed the game :D
I tried 6 or 7 times before I finally got to the school and then beat the game from there.
Each time I enter A room and she´s just standing there breathing heavily, I always react like "Nope!" and run back XD

Oh and i think i came across a bug or error, When you are in the bathrrom in the school and Eva comes to talk with you, there is a Ballon Icon that apears in the right top corner, but luckely the game is too good to take damage of such things :P
all in all, Great game and you just got another subscriber!
Red_Nova
Sir Redd of Novus: He who made Prayer of the Faithless that one time, and that was pretty dang rad! :D
9192
I'm glad you liked the bandage animation! I wanted a healing system that you couldn't just hide all nice and safe in the pause menu. Glad to see it worked!

Thanks for reporting that bug. I'll fix that in a future update.
Well, decent game. Nothing amazing, but it has some nice touches.


Adventure with horror elements really suits it better than horror. The vast majority is not scary at all - and the vast majority of the game you are in no danger at all.
Which is actually rather weird as Eva is supposed to not be in full control of herself throughout the entire game. Not just the beginning of it.

The soundtrack is nice overall, although only the basement theme was unsettling. I found the chase music and screams to not help the atmosphere much. But I am not easily scared, either.
It is a shame that even this lingering suspense disappears after you meet Eva in the elementary school.

As for the story .. well, I found it rather straightforward. The moment I found the "SORRY"-note, you could roughly piece it together and all sense of mystery was lost.
And while the background is fairly fascinating, the actual purpose of prolonging/transfering life or consciousness is kept too sketchy to make sense of.
Is Layla both in Eva and herself? Why would they risk their own secure lives to "invade" their children's bodies when they could just outlive theirs first?

And why in the world can Layla only murder people when she is in control? There would much many many more effective and less risky methods to let people not get suspicious or to drive them away.
Why did she never try just running away with Eva's body so she can't stay in the mansion (and thus never reverse the effect)?
Why did she not let Kyle search a bit and then leave? At that point, Kyle wasn't suspicious of her at all. Kyle's groundless symptathy for Eva at least makes sense in retrospect.

But there are some nice details on other ends - the bandage animation was wonderful, as well as the lack of supplies (and infinite health refills .. there is only so much your body can take, even with bandages)
The save mirror is a really, really stylish and atmospheric feature.

The maps were also easily recognizeable - you could easily remember the important doors and thus navigate easily.

As a sidenote - Kyle and Layla makes this game awesome already.
And it is really, really weird to have him whine about his parents getting mad because he took his car and THEN, 2 minutes later, having him investigate his parents.
Please do mention being an orphan or real parents, or biological parents or anything somewhere.


... welp. With all that I've written, I could easily write a review.

Random note: Eva looks really old. A little bit confusing at first.
Red_Nova
Sir Redd of Novus: He who made Prayer of the Faithless that one time, and that was pretty dang rad! :D
9192
Thanks for the thoughts! I certainly agree with most of what you said, like further clarification on Kyle's parents. I had just assumed that players would read the game description and be up to date. Responding to most of the plot points you mentioned would be delving into spoiler territory, so I'll just say that most of the plot questions you brought up (where Layla is and why she can murder people when she's in control, for instance) actually were answered in the game in little tidbits, specifically during the return trip to the residence and the exploration of the last area. Sounds like I need to make those story tidbits a bit more defined, huh? Developer knowledge getting in the way. But with such a short game, making lots of text for the player to read would destroy the immersion. It's a difficult problem to overcome.

I appreciate the comment on the mirror as well, since that was something I was almost sure would piss people off.

Overall, I'm just glad it wasn't anything horribly offensive!

EDIT: It's Layla, by the way. Not Lyla.

EDIT 2: Oh, I see you've already submitted a review. Well, I'll just hang around and wait for that before saying anything else.
Glad you appreciate it!

I love that mirror. It's awesome!
I actually wasn't sure about Layla, but didn't bother to look it up. It still is a nice coincidence

Some answers are vaguely answered, and that's okay. But there are a few too many for my tastes.

I'm very picky with the genre, but I rate it higher than I initially feel like because of that .. I hope that is enough to even it out.
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