Midnight Special - Early Access Impressions
Midnight Special is a blast from the 16-bit horror past.
Midnight Special. Scared Stupid Inc. / Yahaha Studios
Yahaha Studios has released Midnight Special into Early Access on Steam. Developed by Scared Stupid, the game is a throwback to 16-bit horror adventure classics like the recently remade Clock Tower. The Early Access release includes the first of four planned episodes.
From Steam:
Midnight Special is a point-and-click survival horror experience that echoes the spirit of '90s classics like Clock Tower and Resident Evil. Set in the late '80s at Boyd Manor, you step into the shoes of Sarah, a babysitter tasked with watching over Jon and Ellie Boyd for the night.
What begins as an ordinary evening takes a sinister turn. The power goes out, plunging the house into pitch-black darkness. With each step, reality twists into something far more disturbing.
Bizarre phone calls, a deranged stalker perhaps? Unpleasant odors seeping up from the floorboards. Objects moving on their own as if possessed. A life-sized plastic dinosaur that seems... alive. Has Sarah lost her mind? Or has something far more sinister taken root?
Midnight Special. Scared Stupid Inc. / Yahaha Studios
The game controls like a typical point-and-click adventure, where you click to move, talk to characters, and interact with and examine objects. You can combine objects in your inventory and use them in the environment. Currently, the game has no controller support.
Like its biggest inspiration, Clock Tower, Midnight Special features 16-bit graphics depicting side-scrolling environments with limited depth, complete with an optional CRT scanline filter. The atmosphere is dripping with giallo vibes, which I love to see; Midnight Special wears its love for that brand of horror on its sleeve. Even in 16-bit, the game succeeds at being exceedingly creepy, especially when Sarah begins having visions.
Currently, the game is a little rough around the edges, though the developers are making strides with updates. My biggest pet peeve was an unintuitive save system that left me with far too much to replay when I died; this is something on the menu for a patch coming soon. I’d love to see controller support, or at least key remapping. Load times when moving to a different room are also just a smidge too long. Also, the game has an unnecessarily clunky UI. It’s fine to draw inspiration from a long-past era of gaming, but there’s no reason to exclude modern quality of life (QOL) improvements.
Midnight Special. Scared Stupid Inc. / Yahaha Studios
I’ll watch Midnight Special closely as the developer releases updates and look forward to playing all four chapters when they’re available! Even with just one episode complete, the game is worth checking out if its style is to your liking, especially once the revamped save system is live.
Midnight Special is available now on Steam Early Access.
