Clandestinity of Elsie

could not get into it.

TOO DARK too FRANTIC AND TOO HARD!!!You can barely see anything i get it we need to be traumatized but do it in a different perspective in resident evil style rpg maker game!!!
NOT RECOMMENDED

A short (3-4h) horror adventure with a really good atmosphere. The story is not that special and there is just one weapon in the game but overall it's entertaining if you like these kind of horror games. The only con is that it's sometimes a bit too dark.

Edit: Since the game has gone free now, this is a great pic for anyone who likes Horror RPG-Editor Games but don't expect too much.

Clandestiny of Elsie is a horror themed action adventure game made with RPG Maker, that takes about 4 hours to complete. You play as a war veteran who returns to his wife and has a drinking problem, which causes him to be a bad husband. The game starts with a note from his wife that she has left him, and that he may visit her at a relative's house. He decides to do just that, but finds that the world is filled with strange and dangerous monsters. The unfolding story is a major part of the game, and there are indications throughout that the events happening may be a figment of his imagination. Although the story is prominent, the plot never really develops; it is mostly atmospheric, and serves to create suspense.

Progress is linear, as you travel from area to area. Enemies appear on the map, and rush to attack, if you get too close, or make a noise by stepping on a bush. You have a gun, and must shoot enemies, sometimes numerous times to kill them. This is often a challenge, and you frequently have to use med kits, which are not all that common. You must also reload your gun, which holds only 7 bullets at a time. Bullets are widely found throughout the areas you travel. You may save the game at any time by returning to a safe area. Sometimes there are tasks to complete or items to find before reaching the next area.

The game is a satisfying experience, but nothing spectacular.

Wowsers did I hate that ending. Such a shame, because Clandestinity of Elsie is otherwise a fantastic survival horror game, with genuine scares in the darkness mechanic and what was an engaging story until roughly the last three minutes or so. The "foreshadowing" throughout the game ends up amounting to nothing as the game grinds to a halt with a finale that comes out of nowhere for the sake of shock value, then just...ends. For a game so heavily oriented towards storytelling, the extremely abrupt and deliberately alienating ending just felt like a giant middle finger.

What makes this game interesting is based on its good written story with horrific atmosphere. It's not really terrifying but yeah it sure does give you quite the amount of jumpscares to enjoy. Game is short, with a bit of twist in the end.

Clandestinity of Elsie is a unique horror game made in RPG-maker, with mechanics I haven't seen in other games of its kind. Instead of a classic RPG, where you fight monsters to lvl up in turn based combat, this game has gameplay mechanics similar to Silent Hill, which it's quite obviously inspired from. You do move around like in RPG-maker, but you actually shoot (or evade) the enemies on the map which are usually obscured by darkness, with limited health packs and limited ammunition. The flashlight has a low range, making maps obscured in darkness filled with tension and sometimes annoyance, as enemies will get a free hit on you, if you happen to stumble too close to where they are. The game features 3 types of enemies.

In this game, you play as Hayden Warrick, who is an alcoholic war veteran, struggling to find his wife as he becomes trapped in what appears to be an eternal nightmare. Your goal is to brave this living hell and find your wife.

The premise sounds good, right? You might wonder why I'm not recommending this game?

The reason I'm not recommending this game is that it seems like a big wasted opportunity, when it could have been so much more. The game ends rather abruptly, with no sense of finality after around 2 hours of gameplay. Even though the ending does tie some of the plot up, it was done in a rather disappointing manner. It feels like the developers of this game lost interest and just ended the story there. You only get a single weapon, which is a Revolver, even though this game could definitely have had more weapons implemented into the programming. More enemy types or even a boss or two would have been a welcoming sight.

For example, you could have had a shotgun for close encounters, which would be far more effective in the darker surroundings, since the magnum has a recoil when you shoot, giving enemies that got to you in too close range a free hit. You will encounter many enemies that get free hits at you in the dark maps (the sewer being the worst example, as it had very shallow space to walk in), unless you see them wandering in the darkness, making the flashlight pointless at times.

Ultimately I'm just disappointed with this game, I think if the developers tried to do more with this kind of gameplay and the story, which I think they could have with some more time, I would have adored this game much more.

This is one of the handful of RPG Maker games I like because it focuses on an compelling genre of psychological horror. Since the game follows a similar path of Silent Hill, I was more interested to give this game a try.

There was one major drawback to the game and it involves the combat system. In fairness, the combat system does feel “realistic” in a sense that, it should be harder to see beyond your light until the monsters come close. Also, your gun should take a split second before letting off the next bullet; sadly, realism is thrown out the window due to frustrations of the combat mechanics. Most of the time, it’s difficult to avoid getting hit due to the restrictive movements of the character. The RPG Maker engine only allows you to move up, down, left and right. The character cannot move around freely as in diagonally; although, I have seen other RPG Maker games do that. Running doesn’t help much in the game since the enemies tend to run at you just as fast. In addition, the map layouts are not as open enough to move around with many obstacles in your way, that at times, I find myself bumping into walls or trees. By then, the enemies are already on you. With limited lighting as well, you don’t get many opportunities to take out the enemy at a distance. Again, I think that is how the game is supposed to be. Fortunately, the only remedy in progressing is saving often even if I have to die a lot.


On the plus side, I do enjoy the scavenging since surviving isn’t all that easy. I also thought the story was alright. You kind of know where the story may be leading upon progression but it does stick to its dark roots of a psychological horror game.

I'm glad the developer(s) added controller support. That is a plus for me.

The price tag seems fair. Even though the game is short, it’s not that short like other games that can be completed within the hour and charge for a similar price. On top of that, there is nothing too problematic to dislike about the game other than the challenging combat system. You may like the storyline or feel indifferent about it. This game may not blow people away to a point where I can recommend it but the game is alright and worth a try if you like psychological horror games.

Clandestinity of Elsie is a unique rpgmaker horror game. It’s got a good creepy atmosphere, and good story, and combat was ok. And even those it was short game it felt bigger when playing. Now for not really the bad but could have made better. One more monsters in the game, there are only four tips of monsters, why’ll the ones we got were somewhat unique, just could have used more. Then there are no bosses in the game, I don’t know with story you could have had very unique bosses. You all so only have one weapon in the whole game, and sometimes the game can feel a bit unfair with how the monsters can come out of no were and get you. The game all so hold’s your hand by showing you what you can interact with and the game is short. But with that being said the game is still a good and scary rpgmaker horror game and I would recommended it if you like monsters, creepy atmosphere, a good story, and rpgmaker horror games. This is the game for you.

PROS: Interesting story, you have the ability to shoot, short but sweet.

CONS: short but sweet, wish they would have included more enemy variety and or/ bosses.

B+

This can be a little tough at times, but it's still a pretty sweet game. The story is interesting and it sets a nice atmosphere.

Needs a lot of polish before it can be recommended.

• Choppy movement and responsiveness turned me off right away
  
• "Dark and atmospheric" (you can't see anything - the screen's mostly black)
  
• Awful default control scheme
  
[*]Terribly ugly lighting effects (they're not blended at all - they're literally harsh lines)

I'll admit, I haven't finished this thing yet. I'm not sure if I'm going to. So, to say the story seems a bit predictable may be a bit pre-mature. It certainly feels a bit heavy handed about what's going on. So, I'm hoping at the end there is a "pleasant" surprise. I'm just sort of doubting it.

They have, also admittedly, avoided the over used shtick of the flashlight batteries lasting about two minutes. (They only die on cue for the plot.) So that's a plus.

What really makes me decide against this is the controls. They are so locked onto an invisible grid it almost feels like Pac-Man with a gun at times. That may have been all the rage in the 1980's but it feels really clunky today. If this were a smaller portion of the game then I wouldn't mind so much. But you spend most of your time searching for stuff or fighting with monsters, flash light pointed exclusively forward as you walk in four cardinal directions from one square into another and stuck in the invisible grid.

If Steam would let me I'd give it a two or a two and a half out of five. It's not a terrible game. Maybe they erred a bit to far on the retro side.

...For me at least.

Ah well.

It's not outright terrible, but it's not enjoyable. I've played very little so far, but enough to get really pissed off when I get constantly stopped for the sake of the main character saying something expository and or stupid. Almost every thirty seconds I have to stop for a scripted event to walk me somewhere, or a "cutscene" of more expository text. I can't really skip dialog, so it gets annoying fast.

Further, the stuff that is being said is painfully obvious, or painfully pointless. Sometimes both. For example, being forced to stop for the character to comment on and on about how a situation is weird. It added nothing and made me think nothing but "he's saying this because the creator is not confident enough that the scene itself felt truly weird." Plus, when I accidentally click on a background object that is unimportant, but have to wait three-five seconds for the character to comment on it being unimportant, again, it gets pretty painful.

The game runs well and is competently programmed. Graphics are unremarkable, but by no means bad. I will say the controls could use some work.

Overall, I'd give this 2/5 stars. Dev clearly put effort in, but it is just not an entertaining experience.

Short but Sweet! I have played quite a few RPG Makers and I have to say that this game is whole heartedly unique in terms of gameplay and atmosphere. The feeling of Silent Hill and Resident Evil does come to mind when you commence the game and the uneasy feeling of what can be lurking around the corner is prominent throughout the game. The negative is that it has only taken me less then three hours to complete the game; there should have been many more types of enemies; a few gun options would have elevated the experience; and more characters to interact with may have added to the story.
Notwithstanding the aforementioned, the game was solid and delievered the intentions that the creator set out for. I truly hope the creator of the game ops to deliver another horror/survival game.

Although I really enjoyed this game, I was not sure wether I should recommend it or not.
Not because of the game itself but because of the price: it's a good horror game but it's only 3 hours long.
Honestly, I got it on sale at 0.99 € but I wouldn't have bought it at it's full price.
That being said, if you don't mind the price or if it's on sale, you should buy it.

There is clearly a lot of thought going into "Clandestinity of Elsie". The maps are beautiful and the story seems very engaging if not a little clichéd (this is a personal thought but the angsty white protagonist with alcohol problems is getting a little dulled down). Still this game sure had a team working on it that had a lot of great ideas and over all this should set up for a good experience.

I'm saddened to say though that there are a lot of things weighing this game down. For a first, I know that everyone loves the : "Awesome light" script. I use it myself. But a rule of thumb is to not use this script with enormous maps. This has caused me to have massive lagging whenever I play the game, the only time it runs smooth is in the save room. I will point out my compute can play Skyrim on nice graphical settings without lagging so it is sort of an issue when a little RPG maker game is almost unplayable.

There is also too little damn healing items. I've explored almost everything, since this game takes heavy inspiration from old school horror games where exploration is key. But it has more often than not caused me to get ambushed by enemies and end up with me having to waste whatever health item I find.

Picking up on that last note: the enemies comes out of fucking nowhere at the speed of the road runner and with the mapping it is too damn easy for them to corner you and land at least one hit before your slow gun manages to do any damage at all. This has lead me into a situation where I'm now all out of health items and the enemies gang up on me without me standing a chance to defend myself.

Over all there is a lot of good thoughts going into this game but it is weighted down by the too dark environment and the lagging along with the enemies that come at you at 180 km/h. I would say that this game is worth a play but I can't say that my playing of it was the least bit pleasurable.

Great Job :)

This game is fantastic :)

a game similar to Resident Evil or Silent Hill . Great job , a game I really like , and look forward to more projects with RPG Maker :)

I make myself a big project :)

Its good, nice gameplay and story, but very short and the ending wasn't to my liking, i wont spoil it though, but still i give it a thumbs up.

Things got off to a bit of a bad start with this game, thanks to it taking me ages to work out that SPACE was the way to choose a menu option, rather than - I dunno - left click or Enter, like most NORMAL games? Guess I don't play games of this nature (read: old-school, "retro" RPG) too often. I'm going to put it down to that, though many of the other (unremappable?) keyboard buttons seemed like odd choices also: A to equip gun, S to shoot, D to reload? I also had difficulty trying to work out where DOORS and trivial things like that were, but after not TOO long I got the hang of things enough to concentrate on the GAME, per se (hint: always be on the look-out for doormats and red arrows)! I've also experienced some crashing issues, but it's early days yet for the game's release (so they'll hopefully be fixed), and the save system is fortunately generous enough to render this not TOO huge an issue (once you hit the first save point, you can pretty much save at any time). Anyway, enough about minor technical issues...with no further ado, let's get on with the review...

A few years back, some guy named Jasper Byrne had the perversity to try and emulate the "feel" of a Silent Hill game with a heavily-pixelated, 2D, side-scrolling point-of-view. He was surprisingly successful with this, and despite it not being an instant "classic" or anything, Lone Survivor was certainly a game well worth experiencing for those of us with an interest in seeing the horror gaming genre pushed to its debatable "limits". A couple of years later we got something called Motte Island, which while not as successful, was intriguing in its attempt to use a heavily-pixelated, top-down perspective in a "survival horror" setting. Now someone has thought to make an old-school survival horror game with RPG Maker software, and the results are...well, perhaps not much better than those of (the definitely dumber, but decidedly spookier) Motte Island, but full points for trying one way or another.

There's no denying there's some great IDEAS here, and in my opinion, that's where Clandestinity of Elsie's greatest strengths lie: Ideas and storytelling. And there's obviously nothing "wrong" with that! First of all, there's a very interesting twist on the Silent Hill notion of alternating lighter/darker dimensions, seemingly triggered by the main character's ALCOHOLISM! A very inspired, and thematically valid, idea indeed. And events are set in motion by the protagonist's wife leaving him due to said alcoholism, which again is very sound storytelling logic (a lot of you budding game-makers out there - and not to mention quite a few of the so-called "professionals" - should probably start taking notes). Now, there's also a bit of dodgy logic here and there - apparently our hero "never leaves the house" without a GUN, so I don't know what part of America or what-not he's supposed to be living in, but here in Brisbane, Australia I can walk fifteen minutes to my local gym at ten o'clock at night with just an UMBRELLA to make me feel sufficiently safe! But for the most part, certainly as video games go, this one is intelligently conceived and written, and I'll just give the developer the benefit of the doubt that he lives in a more dangerous part of the world than I do, hence the I'm-just-off-to-the-local-shops-better-take-my-gun mentality (and, in all fairness, our character IS a "mentally damaged alcoholic and war veteran", so I guess the dude's gonna be a little on the "paranoid" side).

Now, I haven't quite reached the end of the game yet, so the jury's still a bit out as regards just how pure and perfect the story will pan out to be. I believe that I can safely say, however, that this project was something of a labour of love for the developer - that, or he's awfully good at covering up the fact that he's just a cynical hack - and given the (perhaps quite realistic) limitations he has set for his debut Steam product, I'm certainly interested to see what he gets up to next, especially if it's made outside the confines of RPG maker (not really the best medium for making a truly "scary" game, it has to be said). As for the purchase price, it's a tad ambitious all things considered, but I'll happily recommend this, on sale, to anyone interested in what possibilities the future might hold for horror gaming. I'm personally yet to see anything as inspired and successful as the "first-person stealth horror" revolution of recent years kicked off by Frictional Games, but at least folks like Cole Neumann are TRYING...and for this I applaud him. There may be hope for our beloved genre yet.

Verdict: 7.5/10.

Has more plot in 1hr than Destiny and all COD games have had in their whole lifespan.

A great psychological horror/thriller even for a person who usually avoids this type of genre.

Game is sort of like a SNES version of Silent Hill. You wake up in a pile of vomit. And struggle with alcoholism at the start of the game. And your wife is missing. you search for your wife everyone in the world seems to be missing.

Check out my Let's Play.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDmvRKSZAl8