I labored on the telephones after I was in pension admin, years in the past, and I fielded some bizarre ones, however nothing fairly as bizarre because the calls in Residence Security Hotline. It is, technically, I suppose, a horror sport about manning a name line by a 90s CRT-screen PC, the place individuals will likely be like “my kitchen is filled with droppings that appear to be espresso grounds, what do?”. You look by your checklist of potential family hazards and choose the precise one, so your caller will get despatched the information on coping with cockroaches. Besides as your week at HSH goes on, your calls begin to be much less roaches, extra “my home smells like demise and my canine is appearing unusually” or “I can see somebody trying by my window at evening and listen to them respiration closely.”
Spoiler warning: Residence Security Hotline is a type of video games that modifications as you play, however it’s type of unimaginable to put in writing about it with out discussing that, so if you wish to go in chilly then it’s best to cease studying.
And I say it is technically a horror sport as a result of one of many issues I like most about Residence Security Hotline it’s that I did begin enjoying it like I used to be manning a hotline. For higher or for worse, I discovered the entries on Spriggans and Kobolds and the self-generating heaps of trash referred to as The Horde to be type of charming, so by the tip I used to be listening to frantic calls and type of spiritually open-mouth chewing a sandwich and slurping espresso, leaning again in my chair. “Ah yeah, that is yer commonplace Mattress Enamel you’ve got received there mate,” form of vibe. I solely wished I might have requested callers for extra particulars – “Would you say the injury to your partitions are extra base-level cracks or holes?” – as a result of your index has a number of additional info and generally you simply need to make a punt.
A lot of the enjoyment of HSH is within the index entries. In the event you get issues incorrect, generally individuals name again screaming at you (RIP to the child who vanished into the wardrobe). The collision of magical beasts, creepy photos, and dry, company textbook within the writing model describing mentioned beasts is fairly glorious – particularly when the recommendation is principally “you’ll be able to’t do something” – and one can not help however admire those which have audio samples. Typically, particularly early on, the hazard is in assuming somebody’s home is infested with a kind of little monster once they even have one thing extra mundane like termites. It additionally very successfully captures having to interpret what a member of the general public phoning a service is definitely saying, sifting by it for private info. It is easy to make a mistake, however recognizing that the heating not working isn’t as vital a element as a baby haivng braces provides one the satisfaction of a job effectively completed.
Remembering all of your index data turns into an acute problem on some calls the place the system goes down. Usually you’ll be able to hearken to a name, put them on maintain after which browse at your leisure, however when the community breaks you need to make your greatest guess based mostly on what you keep in mind. It is a neat trick to make you really learn the index and listen, so you’ll be able to’t go full name centre drone mode. This reminiscence take a look at can be a part of the end-game problem for promotion, which made me jealous of my participant character to be trustworthy, and I will not spoil it, however it does type of tie in with my essential disappointment. Early on Residence Security Hotline reveals indicators that it will get correctly creepy, with unlogged calls from distored voices, determined warning emails from a former worker, and a few creepy infomercial movies turning up in your desktop. However this stuff, whereas cool, all appear to simply… go away.
The previous worker is caught. The bizarre caller is discovered and lower out of the system. I do not essentially need Residence Security Hotline to be the really horrifying type of horror sport, and in reality I actually like model of the world the place trolls are probably harmful however you simply need to deal with them just like the type of mundane annoyance represented by black mould. It is not an accident that the sport is named Residence Security Hotline and the creatures are all from homely folks tales.
However the unresolved threads really feel much less like different unexplained mysteries on this planet and extra like, effectively, unresolved threads. Residence Security Hotline is unquestionably within the Daniel Mullins vein of sport concepts, the place a sport begins as one thing and turns into one thing else, and whereas Residence Security Hotline could be very considerate and has a superb framing, it by no means totally reworked. Which is probably ironic, given the ending.
