One of the many obscure pop culture icons not glimpsed in either the book or movie version of Ready Player One is the 1993 computer horror game, The 7th Guest. (Take that, Wade Watts!) It was a fantastic, if at times frustrating, first-person puzzle/adventure game that had an incredible sense of atmosphere and a rather perilous storyline that plagued the guests of the Stauf mansion, including the player themselves. Being one of first computer games ever released on CD-ROM and containing quite a bit of adult content, rather unusual at the time, The 7th Guest sold millions of copies and boosted the burgeoning CD-ROM game business. The game's franchise had a rather rocky history over the 25 years or so that followed, including the less successful sequel release, The 11th Hour. Now, after a few failed attempts at launching a third installment, the new, still-in-development title The 13th Doll is available for pre-order!
As BC reports, the first announcement trailer for the fan-made, Kickstarted video game The 13th Doll is now here. At first blush it looks to capture all the creepy vibes that made the original game such a joy to play while also updating the playing experience for modern gamers who likely wouldn't have the patience of the simplistic point-and-click approach. It also expands upon and deepens the franchise's mythology and asks some mind-bending questions along the way. Consider me excited for the planned October 31st release!
Check out the announcement trailer for The 13th Doll below:
Return to The 7th Guest's Stauf Mansion this Halloween in The 13th Doll: A Fan Game Of The 7th Guest! A licensed game made by fans of the original series! Featuring 26 new puzzles, 2 playable characters and 5 unique endings!
Here's the official game description, courtesy of BC, but I'd advise skipping if you don't want spoilers from the 25-year-old original game:
The 13th Doll ties in with the events of The 7th Guest. A decade after Tad managed to escape the mansion, he is still haunted by the souls, dolls, and Stauf’s victims he left behind. So haunted, in fact, that the young man now resides in a mental institution – misunderstood, plagued by guilt and obsessed with one idea: to escape the dreary padded walls of his asylum cell, return to the mansion – the site of his innermost fears – to rescue those he left behind and defeat Stauf once and for all!
Soon, a new doctor by the name of Richmond arrives in the asylum. Naïve to the legacy of Henry Stauf, and equally bewildered and intrigued by the fantastic legend, the staunch rationalist plans to take Tad on a cathartic trip back to the mansion.
This unconventional therapy attempt rapidly turns into a fateful journey, unravelling Tad and Richmond’s contrasting worldviews and leading the unlikely duo straight into a horrifying vortex of lies, illusions, lunacy and death. And soon a blood-curdling question arises: Have the two visitors really made their way to Stauf’s harrowing home on their own accord or are they mere pawns in a much grander, inescapable scheme?
And, just for fun, here's the original intro sequence (completely with creepified music) for The 7th Guest: