T.W.I.R.L. Review – All Through The House | GameObserver Recommends

You’re nine years old and it’s 3 am. The house is so silent that you could hear a pin drop. Across the hall is your sister’s room. You gingerly make your way through the house, quietly so as not to wake anyone. Every sound is amplified by the noiseless void around you, bouncing off the walls. Each door creaks no matter how slowly you open it, echoing throughout the house. You enter your sister’s bedroom. She’s sound asleep. You enter her closet, and T.W.I.R.L. 

T.W.I.R.L. is a short narrative horror game by Genie Boy Games of around an hour long. At nine years old, you committed a “sin”. You saw it first on television, then it came to you in a dream. Now, four years later, it has become your ritual – sneaking through your religious household, risking it all. 

Dripping in atmosphere, T.W.I.R.L. uses its silence to create vulnerability. You’re unnerved by it, but at the same time your guard is dropped, making even the slightest sound immensely more effective: a dog barking, that agonised, slow creak as each door opens, the shuffle of the carpet as you move past your parents’ bedroom.

The low-poly art style furthers this. It’s pitch black in our home during the middle of the night, so our eye is drawn to every sliver of light that the game serves up. Its most visually striking element is the purple night sky outside, the moonlight bathing the house in a cool glow, lighting our path. 

The atmosphere drives T.W.I.R.L.‘s horror – the tension of being a child again, sneaking through our house at night, terrified of facing the repercussions of waking our parents up. But it’s not just that; this character’s actions will haunt them, literally, and there are plenty of creative ways the developer shows this, finding every tactic to creep the player out during such a short amount of time and in a fairly limited environment too. For the most part, the horror is subtle, but I did encounter a jump scare which I really wish hadn’t been used, as I felt like it cheapened the experience somewhat. 

At only an hour long, I’ve said enough about the story without spoiling it. The game works in a loop, as we start each night and make the journey to our sister’s closet. The nightly ritual spans over years as we witness how it affects us and our family.  T.W.I.R.L is very hard-hitting for the short time that we have with it. The voice cast does an all-around superb performance especially, which helps carry the weight of T.W.I.R.L.‘s emotion. This game is heartbreaking, and definitely an experience best played in one sitting. 

I did encounter several technical issues during my short time with T.W.I.R.L. Going against my own advice, I did hop off the game midway through and learned that it doesn’t do a very good job of saving progress. So I had to restart it again. After restarting the game and this time being able to breeze up to where I had left off, the game crashed, and I was unable to load back up that previous save. So, I started it again. There was also a short chase sequence, which I wasn’t prepared for, and because I didn’t immediately spot where the game was directing me to go, I ended up trapped. Strangely, the AI didn’t seem well-equipped for the event that the player didn’t know where to go, and immediately started getting stuck in the walls and doors. 

That being said, T.W.I.R.L. is a short enough game that having to restart it twice wasn’t a big enough issue for me to not recommend it. This is a heart-touching story that especially speaks volumes when put into context with ongoing discussions and politics. While it can be completed in one sitting, this is a game that you’ll be thinking of long after.

Jess reviewed T.W.I.R.L. on PC with a provided review code. This review is based on the version of the game that was available at the time of writing, and our score will not be changed.