Silenced: The House

It's a fairly short experience but with such a low price point that's not a deal breaker. That the devs updated it 6 years after release with a little more content is what gets it over the line to a thumbs up.

I want to recommend this game but I honestly can't. Visuals, music and general feel are all there, but the overall story just didn't grab me like it should have.

It was a fun game that let me read and experience abit of story telling of the characters. Especially Ashley, just wish I knew the reason why some of the characters killed like Llyod, Ella, Grace and Kate.

Looking at my play time, I'd have to be blunt in saying that Silenced: The House is pretty unreadable, unfortunately. I have a poor tolerance for quite a few elements that can be found in this story, those elements being: poorly edited and/or translated text and really annoying characters.

Speaking on the translation, I can overlook some of these mistakes. However, some of the comparisons and literary devices used just don't make sense, and the story-telling is lacking in getting the reader to care about any of the characters. Especially with the general d*ckery and unnecessarily sexual comments that the characters make, as well as the unclear foundation of how they're even friends in the first place. It just reads as poor character building imo.

The main narrator, Ashly, herself is quite... unlikable to say the least, even if some of her trauma can help provide insight into her character and some of her decisions. However, there's the point to be made that her Edgy(tm) dialogue/character is more enjoyable compared to the outright nuisances that are her "friends". Such a distinction can possibily help the reader enjoy what happens further in the story. Much like with similar character dynamics from classic slasher films and other horror media, I suppose.

Some of the main pros of buying this game would have to be the art designs, as well as the interesting monster designs. The sound effects seemed to work effectively for the events taking place, however, the writing really impacted the readability and general atmosphere of the story. The work that went into the designs and compositions (as well as the clear attempt at translation/writing) leads me to recommend this visual novel, especially given the price that Graven Visual Novels listed it for.

Such level of attention to design and attempt to establish a plot-line, as well as a general world building is commendable. More so, some individuals may find such characters and plot lines to be more enjoyable than I did, so it'd be fair to uplift the artistic aspect, but criticize the writing. Publishing a visual novel as an independent can come with it's challenges and downfalls, however, I think there's still room to grow in these areas.

The story feels like a disjointed collection of things that happen because potatoes. It means nothing, amounts to less, and the whole thing just comes off as wildly pretentious. It wants to be something decent but doesn't have to heart or soul or brains to be anything worth remembering.

Even for two bucks, this is trash.

The various endings in this game keep you playing for hours. I enjoyed the story lines and had alot of fun!

Not a terribly difficult game. Got the ending I liked the most, the one truest to me, in the first five minutes. The rest is just achievement hunting.

All characters don't have personality and appearence. Their appearences focus on making them to look cool, but they don't show their personalities. Most of the time, i found myself thinking: "Who was this character again?"

The visuals were pretty ugly. The drawing isn't so bad, but game being yellow made the experience to be very bad. Also, it made it harder for us to differ the characters, since they don't have their own color pallete.

And the worst part is the history. It's a cliché horror history with nothing to add to the genre. It's also very tiring to read the history, because there are a lot of unnecessary comments and talks.

I can't recommend Silenced: The House for its storytelling or the ridiculous pseudo-poetic writing, which was probably caused by the poor attempt to translate this Visual Novel to English. Regarding the plot, you get the typical a bunch of teenagers enter a house and die kind of story, just add a ritual, a few scary-looking beings, and gruesome deaths to it, and you are probably able to imagine how the story plays out. If you are generally sensitive to horror and gore, then you might enjoy the story nevertheless, but horror veterans, like myself, will most likely end up bored and unsatisfied.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1475240141

Maybe, just maybe, I'd have liked the story more if the translation were better because I can see that the developer tried to create an enjoyable experience. I'm very curious about the Russian version of the game. I'd love to hear the opinion of a native speaker, and whether they liked the story, or not.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1470649292

To be completely honest with you, I was going to write a short negative review at first, however, I just can't do that for merely one reason, which is the artwork. Silenced: The House is such a cheap game, that probably lacks everything you could ask of a horror/mystery game, whether it be engaging and evolving storytelling or character development in some way or another, but it provides superb sepia artwork. The CGs are so artistic and detailed, that I couldn't bring myself to give it a thumbs down. Don't get me wrong; the whole game is still kind of terrible in my opinion, but I also think that 1,79€, or 0,49€ when it's on sale, is totally worth it for so many well-drawn and detailed illustrations. Some of them are in contradiction to the story pretty disturbing.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1473595398

I can recommend Silenced: The House for art purposes and perhaps for a few scenes that aren't as badly translated as the majority of the story, but if the visuals alone don't pique your interest, you may want to skip this one.

[quote]𝐅𝐨𝐥𝐥𝐨𝐰 𝐎𝐭𝐨𝐦𝐞 𝐒𝐞𝐤𝐚𝐢'𝐬 𝐂𝐮𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐨𝐫 𝐏𝐚𝐠𝐞 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐕𝐢𝐬𝐮𝐚𝐥 𝐍𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐥 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐉𝐑𝐏𝐆 𝐑𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐞𝐰𝐬[/quote]

Silenced: The House is short visual novel that pretty much delivers on every aspect it promises. It's a horror/gore novel that falls short on writing, but visually comes through and almost makes up for its weak points off art and audio alone. While it's not difficult to get all the achievements/endings in less than an hour, I feel like this visual novel has a story and a good supporting art style that it would have benefitted a lot from having more content in it.

The story of Silenced: The House - as the title suggests - takes place in an abandoned house in the woods with a group of high school teenagers. You follow Ashley, who lures her friends into the house to act out a ritual, intent on meeting and interacting with the dead that inhabit the place. Little do they know what the house and the ghosts they've summoned have in store for them. Pick all the good options and you can escape the house, even if it's not the "best" outcome. Pick one wrong option, and you're trapped in the house forever.

While I feel like the story could've been great, even if slightly cliched with the "high schoolers in an abandoned house" theme, Silenced: The House falls short overall because of one big issue: the writing. I'm not sure if it's a translation issue or just the writing in general, but the story feels very rushed and choppy all at the same time. Most of what you read is an information dump that has you lost and confused surrounding the overarching plotline. You're aware some of these ghosts died most likely at the hands of Ashley's friends but what they did and why is mixed in with no real context or explaination. It happened, we sort-of get to know how by small side notes, but not really anything with context or detail. There's no development of the characters or the plot. You're thrown into the story when it feels like more should've come before, or more should be explained to you as you read.

The story as it is now is why I strongly believe this visual novel would have benefitted highly from having a longer run time, and more options to fully flesh out the entire story. A novel like this one, especially one meant to be scary, works much better when you have all the details - even if you have to piece together some by yourself or are left to create the missing links on your own. It's nearly impossible to do this when some of the details are just thrown at you with no creativity behind them whatsoever.

What the story lacks is made up a lot by the art. Everything is dull, brown, muted tones that make the gore stand out even more when it does happen, and I love the style that was taken to do this. Parts of the art feel cartoony and typical of a visual novel, then others feel very visceral and realistic when it comes to the ghosts/monsters and the gorey scenes. It's certainly one of the best art styles in a visual novel I've ever seen for the genre it's in, and is definitely one of my favorite art styles yet. If the art was backed by better writing, I could see this visual novel being so much more.

I have very mixed feelings about recommending Silenced: The House. The story has a lot going for it, but could use improvements to the delivery and polish on the writing. For as much criticism as I'm giving the writing, it's still mostly understandable and does deliver a lot of tension and unease. A lot of where the writing lacks is made up for by the art, and if you want a quick horror/gore read it's not half bad.

If you're a fan of horror and want a quick and spooky read with some gore sprinkled in, Silenced: The House may be to your liking. If poor writing turns you away, you may want to pass this one up. I'm giving it my recommendation purely because I have so much love for the art style, and it's worth the cheaper price point for that alone. I do feel as though the developer can do much more in the future, and this is just a rocky starting point for them.

I'm a bit sad to give this game a negative recommendation, because there was quite a lot in it that I liked. It had all the foundations to be a bit trashy, but really enjoyable experience and ultimately failed to deliver. The general idea, basically playing as a villain, luring a group of teenagers into a death trap and making sure they don't leave the titular house/mansion alive, is quite an unusual and fun one and even the basic structure of the plot is fairly good, with every character having a dark secret that, quite literally, comes to haunt them. The art is simple, but well-stylized and incredibly varied, with CGs for pretty much every major event within the game. Music is repetitious and maybe a bit overdramatic, but generally works fine. The characters aren't all bad, the protagonist being both a killer and a victim in the whole intrigue, while the people she targets have their own skeletons in their closets and enough personality to make the whole experience interesting. Even the gore was pretty well-implemented, showing in appropriate moments and being quite gruesome - the authors seemed to aim at genuine horror climate rather than just casually throwing rivers of blood and piles of severed limbs around.

Where's the problem then? It's the writing. Some of it might be connected to the game being originally in Russian, but I don't even think it's all that - the obnoxious dialogue at the beginning of the story, neverending streams of pseudo-poetic metaphors, lines contrived to the point of being barely comprehensible.. . Some of it is definitely poor translation, but much more is simply poor writing. While the general ideas behind the story were good, the execution is simply not fun to read - getting a bit better as the story picks up the pace, but still painfully weak all the way through. The game is also pretty clunky from the technical standpoint, with auto-play barely functional and no way to skip only the already read text. Thankfully, there's not much branching - there are only a few choices, most only leading to dead ends, but it's still something I consider a core feature of every VN.

I think this project came from a right place and nearly turned into something really interesting, but the way it is now, I still advise you to skip it - it's priced maybe even below the amount of content it offered, but if you're going to play the English version, it's simply not worth your time.

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I love horror vns, but I can’t recommend this one. You meet Ashley and a group of friends hanging out at an abandoned house. The characters are uninteresting with no development. The plot wasn’t executed well due to the lack of explanations. I encounter lots of awkward sentences and terrible metaphors. Here's a couple of examples:

The cold wind touched their skin, squeezing their organs, and making the cry burst from their throats.

The sharp and cold knife of the truth was about to cut their world into pieces and they would step into the new reality of madness.

The writing must be edited. Without having a proper description, the tension fails. The soundtrack and the character design isn’t going to save an awful translation. At least not for me. The save feature was rather buggy sometimes. It can be frustrating when you can't load the save file and have to start over. I bought the game on sale for less than a dollar. Highly not recommended. Well there are easy achievements if you want to get 100% on it. Otherwise look somewhere else....

Creepy visual novels are my favorite genre, but I honestly can't recommend this game, even at the low price. There's just not enough to it to justify a purchase.

Pros
+ the art style. it's so good! one reason I wanted to like this so much is how much I like the aesthetic
+ music and sound are good for a visual novel as well

Cons
- the story made very little, if any, sense. I got that it was trying to be creepy, but you're very thrown into the plot and not much is explained--instead, the very basic and scattered plot seems more like a vehicle for getting to use the visuals than for actually telling a story.
- it's very short and the endings don't differ much. one of the "bad endings" literally has the same final scene as the "good ending"
- not any elements to figure out--no puzzles, only a few choices to make (which lead you to different achievements after a point)--but there's just not much to this

PROs
- Simple, yet good graphics.
- Soundtrack.
- Different story unlike other novels on steam.
- Actually allows you to have "fun".
- Bad ending can be considered as good ending

CONs
- Short (well, look at price).
- Starts as any "trash" American horror film: party, people obsessed by sex jokes, something goes wrong.
- At some point events are going too damn fast.

At current price I can recommend this game, but don't expect a lot from it. If there's a sale going on — then absolutely grab this one.

The sepia tone visuals to this VN were what originally attracted me to this game after it was recommended by Feena.

Overall, the story is a debut Horror VN by Graven Visual Novels and it has its pros and cons :-

Cons

Broken English throughout which, considering this is a VN, can impact the experience BUT if you can overlook this then it does have a spooky plot.
The choices are minimal in that it offers a quick ending for a wrong choice when it would've been more enjoyable if all the choices had extra paths.
All of Ashley's friends were stereotypical and reminded me of those cliche characters you see in movies like Final Destination!!

Pros

The death scenes were gruesomely fun to see for Horror fans - I especially loved seeing Lloyd's end
The dark themes weren't too exaggerated which adds to the thrill of being drawn into reading more of the VN
Save option and skip are invaluable saving any unwanted dragged out replaying from the start.
The dark plot & beautiful artwork helps this stand out among the many VNs here in STEAM.
Ashley's character is the most enjoyable of this VN which was important considering most of the other characters lacked depth.

For a debut VN Graven Visual Novels have started off reasonably well having more postives than negatives also there is potential for back stories especially for Ashley!
I recommend this to players who want a quickfix of lowkey horror and the completionists who will find this one easy to gain achievements.

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Silenced: The House is a gruesome, modern-day visual novel by Graven Visual Novels. I was looking on Steam for a game to play one Saturday night and Silenced immediately caught my eye. It wasn’t the promise of horror, because I have fallen for empty promises before. It was the image of the raggedy doll with only one eye and the quote “Her button eyes pierced us through, as if staring at our souls” that drew me in, wanting to see more.

As with many typical horror stories, a group of teens head to an abandoned house to hang out. There are the stereotypical hormonally charged males, sassy females, and your character, Ashly, who is troubled, brooding, and mysterious. Ashly is a vigilante of sorts, sacrificing the sinners to the trapped, tortured souls in order to atone for her undisclosed sins. She is guided by a maniacal, unnamed spirit, only referenced to as “Her.” With each turn of the page you start to learn the dark pasts of each teen, realizing none of them are who they seemed to be.

Although there are multiple outcomes, I only experienced two, and the prompts to make decisions are minimal. The game should have had more opportunities to influence the narrative or perhaps given control over the order in which each teen is sacrificed. The soundtrack is haunting and I really enjoyed the harder “rock” feel in some segments of the game, but you’ll notice the songs looping quite a bit. Additionally, the transitions from one segment of the game to another is a little jarring.

None of these technical imperfections prevent me from recommending this game. The storyline is solid and genuinely creeped me out more than any horror film or game experience in quite some time. The sins and deaths of each character are described in horrific detail, and the reveal at the end of my gameplay was quite a shock to me. If you want to be creeped out and have the chance to bring justice to the world in a disturbing way, then you need to check this game out.

https://thegamingoutsider.com/2018/03/29/silenced-house-pc-review/

I wanted to like this visual novel because of its art and style, even with lightly fetishized girl characters. The music was decent. The idea of the plot wasn't bad, but the execution was wonky and not enjoyable for me. The story made very little sense and the characters were shallow, with info dumps of their backstories coming out of nowhere. Every sentence was “spoopy” so there was no build-up of tension. Translation issues made for awkward reading and made it tedious to get through the story e.g., “The ones that were sleeping woke up and showed extended their fire tongues". I realize this was inexpensive and while it had potential, it didn’t live up to it.

I'm gonna recommend this with a buuuuuunch of caveats:
- the English is quite broken and doesn't make this an easy read.
- the use of metaphores was really goofy most ot the time.
- there is very little character build up. A lot of the time the player will have a bunch of information just dumped on them out of the blue, which makes it harder to get invested in what's going on
- the Save system is fairly broken. Sometimes it allows you to save, sometimes it doesn't. The bug seems to thankfully reset everytime you get to make a choice, but that still meant I had to alt-tab the game for a day or so, if I wanted to get back to where I was.

So why do I recommend it still? Well, if you can get past that, you get a few hours of cheese with decent visuals and an interesting array of ghosts and gore. For 2 bucks, it can be an okay, cheesy distraction. But I can see a lot of people not wanting to put up with the game's flaws just for that.

This game is really really good!
The vibe is very nice and interesting and the idea is very cool.You can save your progress all the time.
And if you forgot to save your progress there is a skip button.
I did enjoy playing it!

I really loved the art in this VN and the story was not bad either. I actually wanted to read it and unfold the story! Most VN's ive started bore me within 5 minutes and i skip through just to 100%.

The endings were not very tricky to get through either. Unlike some other VN i have played that are all twisted and intertwined and repetitive. After my first play through yesterday I could easily skip to the choice and take the opposite route to a new ending.

Also +1 for having a raggedy doll that i hope *fingers crossed* turns into a trading card wallpaper for my profile!