Quickly Ending Nightmare

Neverending Nightmares was a very enjoyable 80 minutes.

Whilst I prepared to volley verbal shots at the game for its short duration, I realized it was pretty much exactly what it should have been. As much as I enjoy a good scare now and again, the fact of the matter is that a good horror game, that does its job correctly, is stress inducing. And Neverending Nightmares does do its job correctly with an atmosphere of dread, a soundtrack composed of frightening ambiance mixed with the screams of unseen tormented souls, and startling and gruesome imagery served up from beginning to end. From the very beginning I felt the desire to make Thomas run through rooms and hallways of the various environments, but with such a small amount of run stamina I felt compelled to slowly trod through the gloom, saving my stamina for the times I would actually need it.

The game had a good mix of disturbing imagery, a hallmark of quality horror in my eyes, and the sporadic boo or jump scare. The boo scare is an important tool in horror that is often overused. Lesser quality horror equates, or even defines, the boo scare with horror. Thankfully, NN does not suffer from this problem, and uses suspense and startles in a tasteful way that didn't leave me in a constant state of stress the entire game, but able to look at and enjoy the creepy environment filled with items such as dolls with shattered faces, paintings of a persons shoes through various stages of a hanging, or dead animals spilling their entrails on the ground. :)

What NN doesn't excel at quite as well is variety. About 20 minutes into the game, after the first big change in environment I found myself mostly trying to game the run stamina to get though rooms and hallways as fast as possible. Not driven by fear, but a bit of tedium. The middle, and to some extant the end, of the game suffers from many long hallways that look an awful lot like the previous 3 hallways you just jogged through with little going on and a very limited variety of the same handful of props scattered throughout.

All in all I was happy with the game, spending my 14 dollars on more of an emotional experience than a video game. I purchased the opportunity to be made uncomfortable, stressed, and slightly repulsed, which is why I enjoy horror games in the first place. And I got a little thrill at the end when, after the credits rolled, the game showed me that a small amount of branching pathways and alternate endings exist. However, this revelation was somewhat soured by the fact that I have no idea what influences these alternate pathways. Are they random? Does selecting a different door lead to different paths? Would I have gotten a different ending if the psycho with his eyes sewn shut had torn my throat out less often? I suppose a subsequent play through might help clear this up, but having just finished the game I do not get a strong feeling that replay-ability will be one of Neverending Nightmares strong suits.