Sorry We’re Closed is a retro survival horror-inspired game about escaping the clutches of an overly horny demon who desperately wants your heart. As someone who isn’t often interested in the “story” behind things and prefers to just shoot and ask questions later, I found myself actually asking those questions. I wanted to know why I had become the target of such carnal eroticism. I wanted to learn more about my character’s relationships. How angels fit into the picture. And why a lot of demons seem really laid back.
But when it came to actually surviving – the moment I thought I would enjoy the most – I came away a bit disappointed. Exploration is fine, it’s just that combat is often too habitual and too often annoying. Eventually, I became more afraid of the action than the atmosphere.
You play as Michelle, a saleswoman who has little time for the assholes (mainly a guy named Darrel) who habitual the store in a dreary, dead-end part of town. She’s having a strenuous time after breaking up with her girlfriend, whom she’s certainly still in love with. As she was about to fall asleep one evening, she was visited by the equivalent of a sleep paralysis demon, if the sleep paralysis demon was a Victoria’s Secret model dipped in glow juice or a pink balloon smeared with Sharpy. They know you’re lonely and so are they Really so about you. This is the first warning sign that something is wrong.
Later, you are visited by a plump crow who shuffles you through a strange library. As you move around the space, which can be described as A Little Deadly Place, you gain a sense of how exploration works, with the game’s camera observing you from a constant angle. In typical Resident Evil fashion, it feels like you’re traveling through rooms equipped with tons of CCTV cameras. Sometimes it’s top down, sometimes it’s far away, sometimes it follows you like an aerial drone. So when you’re looking through books and talking to a strange crow, it’s terrifying when he discovers that he eats dreams and wants you dead, and you have to run through the halls and can’t see what awaits you. This is the second warning sign that something is wrong.
I’m a massive fan of the social side of the game as you get to know the insufferable carnivore that is Darrel and his outlaw Clarissa, a dancer who used to work at his bar but can no longer do so. Lucy doesn’t talk much and seems a bit suspicious. And then you have the reliable Robyn, who seems to be very familiar with the occult. They are all well written and deal with believable romantic themes. Some of the conversations are surprisingly detailed, with interwoven demands that take you to different endings depending on the decisions you make.
For example, Clarissa misses Darrel’s fall and asks you for assist. Say yes and you’ll want to attack whenever the opportunity arises, such as when Darrel asks you to deliver a rat, which he thinks is a pet hamster, to his boyfriend Oakley. It so happens that Oakley has housekeeping inspectors checking out their bingo restaurant. Given the choice of waiting for the officials to leave or presenting them with a rodent, you show off the rat, knowing Clarissa’s desires. Oakley immediately doesn’t give a shit, Darrel also goes crazy with Oakley, and Clarissa is joyful with you. It all seems natural to find and initiate, with a lot of humor.
What’s earnest, however, is that your third eye was given to you by the Duchess (a pink demon who, it turns out, is extremely powerful and desperately wants people’s hearts because, well, she wants to love again and the broken heart of demons can’t changes). With a snap of your fingers, this extra eye casts a beam around you that reveals a parallel world of demons in real time. And on the social front, it adds a really fun extra layer by allowing you to interact with the quirky demons and demonic personalities of the people you visit. thought you knew. Like serene Lucy, exuding the confidence of a two-headed operator who makes a deal with you: put an end to the Duchess.
To do this, you must track down the Duchess’ victims and collect their third eye. You will do this by going to the dungeons and using your own third eye to see the memories of people who were not as lucky as you. This is where the chatter stops and you can explore amazing aquariums and spiral crypts, all full of demons and little puzzles where you have to turn things and collect keys to open locked doors.
I quite like the retro style of exploration as it’s quite unsettling when the camera robs you of your view so you have to pre-screen the halls not knowing what’s going to happen. And in the way paths are laid out, which requires switching lands in real time to, for example, cross a vine-covered path.
The job is actually fighting demons, which makes me sorrowful because idea is good. You basically have three weapons: an axe, a pistol, and a shotgun. But they all work in the same way. Enemies will come closer to you and you will right-click, which will take you to first-person mode (very cold). Here you have two options: either shoot them and damage them until they fall over and die, or activate your third eye, highlighting the shiny heart embedded in their bodies. Shoot the heart and the demon will either take hefty damage, die, or play a sequence of hearts which you will have to shoot one by one – until they finally die too. This is neat! And it adds a kind of rhythmic layer to the fights, where accuracy and speed create a satisfying sequence of blah blah blah.
The disappointment comes in how complicated the combat is. I understand that clumsiness plays a part in the scares of retro-horror movies, in the headache of getting ready to shoot something and then making every shot count. Except that “Sorry We’re Closed” develops a tendency to throw a lot of demons at you, when the entire set-up routine (third person to first person, third eye, shooting hearts) is a surefire way to get hit passersby. Sometimes these little larvae crawl so close to you that you can’t hit their exposed heart. So you have to awkwardly step back, reposition yourself, do the whole third eye surgery again, take a few hits, and, god, it’s annoying.
To be straightforward, I was starting to hate most of the fights. On the other hand, I think that some of you will have more patience than me and will be able to deal with them. That doesn’t mean I wouldn’t recommend Sorry, We’re Closed as a whole, though, as I think its strange universe, cast of oddballs, and wealthy relationships are worth pursuing. There’s a lot of depth behind this quirky, cheerful surface, and I really enjoyed pulling out the fragile human strands from the seemingly intricate, impenetrable evil. Emotions driving the duchess. The reason why demons exist. An explanation of how an angel and a demon can strive for love but never achieve it. And how Michelle learned to transcend complacency and comfort, all represented by that bastard crow. Grit your teeth, accept the fight for what it is, and you’ll get a great story.
