There's A Game Releasing This Year That's Influenced By Alan Wake 2, House of Leaves, and Power Wash Simulator

Moving Houses has a pretty wild list of influences, and I'm already hooked before it's out.

By Hannah Adkins

Developer Gordon Little is publishing a new game on Steam on October 1st this year, and by first glance at the logo Moving Houses may look like a cutesy moving simulator – but the trailer, the game's Steam page, and a list of influences shared by Little are an absolutely surreal collection to look at. With tags on Steam noting psychological horror and simulation, the description reads, "Moving Houses is a silly little physics-based game about moving on... or is it? Be neat, be careful, or be a chaos goblin. The choice is yours. But be warned, not all is as it seems in this quiet little house.

"'It's time to leave my house,' is something everyone says at some time in their life. Now it's your time, whether you want to leave or not. Enjoy this silly physics-based first-person game about moving on as you pack up your house, pack up your life while immersed in casual comfy gameplay and the instant gratification of task-based gamification of house based packing chores."

The description is intriguing enough as it is for me, but what grabebed my attention was a collection of influences Little shared on his social media earlier this week, listing Mark Z. Danielewski's debut novel House of Leaves, developer Veddge's Doom 2 mod My House, FuturLab's Power Wash Simulator, and Remedy's Alan Wake 2. These four things combined with the description have my head spinning with the possibilities here, and then seeing Little share that the pitch for the game stated, "We want fans to tell their friends to play this and when asked 'Why?' just say 'The less you know going into this, the better.'"

Related:

There's also a great list of features shared on Steam that further helps to give some idea of the game: 

  • A fun physics-based first-person experience
  • Pickup household objects and try to pack them neatly into boxes
  • Give up, that's too much work
  • Just throw stuff around the house
  • Ok, get back to it
  • The satisfaction of checking items off a list
  • Laughter
  • Confusion
  • Crying
  • Horror
  • Wait, horror? Isn't this a cute casual game for the young at heart?
  • Sorry, you heard me, horror.
  • Oh. Can a kid play this?
  • Maybe. It gets kind of spooky. And weird. There's a little blood.
  • Whose blood?
  • ...
  • WHOSE BLOOD?
  • . . .

I also appreciate anything with a content warning that reads, "This game is not suitable for unsupervised children or those who are easily disturbed. Contains some psychological horror that may be disturbing to some." Moving Houses sounds like the perfect game to play during Halloween month, so I'm really looking forward to this one on October 1st. It's available to wishlist on Steam now, if it's got your attention too!

Trending Now: