Ellen (Switch) review "As usual, the best way to deal with murderous demons is to hide behind things purchased at IKEA."

I've always loved horror stories that throw logic and explanations out the window. This genre isn't always supposed to make sense or be rational. I mean, we're talking about a category that features blood-sucking humanoids that sparkle crumble in sunlight, dead bodies that walk and eat flesh despite their occasional lack of a digestive tract, people who turn into animals when just the right amount of sun bounces off the moon, and inanimate objects that murder hapless victims. Needless to say, sometimes horror is ridiculous. To be fair, though, making sense of plots and content isn't important. It's what lies beneath the tale that matters...

Scary stories take our abstract or irrational fears and put them on display for our own benefit. They might, say, take the silly things that scare us and parade them around as campy tales to show us how ludicrous a worst case scenario could be. Or they take legitimate concerns and give them shape so we can at least see what we're dealing with. In some cases, the writer is merely trying to say, “I know you're suffering and/or afraid, but so am I,” and it's nice to know someone else shares your personal frights.

In other words, horror stories are home-brewed nightmares, and the game Ellen at least exemplifies that notion. At one point, you grab a medkit to fix a wounded leg. Later on, that same package reappears for no apparent reason. The protagonist even says, “Didn't I already use this kit?” However, that seems like a strange thing to question when you're being chased by angry spirits that mutilate anyone who comes within six feet of them, walking corpses that only appear at the most inconvenient times, and a carnivorous plant beast.



For clarity, this game revolves around a double-murder suicide that occurred in a mansion somewhere in the UK. A man apparently went mad, a la “The Shining,” offed his wife and son, then took his own life. His daughter, the titular Ellen, vanished without a trace. Investigators searched tirelessly for her, but ruled her deceased in absentia. Three years later, an upstart detective decides he's going to locate the missing kid by breaking into the family's house. What's the worst that can happen? Plenty of other authorities have been all over the house without incident.

Unlike those before him, the protagonist enters the domicile and instantly regrets it. He not only injures his leg—which sucks for the player because he temporarily trudges along at a pace-killing speed—and stumbles upon a ghostly child who immediately mutates into a shadowy, demonic rabbit monster. Yeah, you read that correctly: complete with cute, floppy ears and tremendous, flesh-puncturing teeth. In fact, everywhere this investigator goes in the house, he comes across something vaguely hellish, murderous, or surreal, including a spider-like apparition clutching a bunch of kitchen knives, all of which viciously fly into the man's body if the thing spots him.

You see, Ellen is another one of those 2D adventure games cut from the Clock Tower cloth. You venture through a huge house, check out rooms for event items or bits of evidence that fill in the backstory (e.g. old notes, Polaroid photos, etc.), unlock new pathways, and solve puzzles, all in an attempt to locate the girl. Our hero makes startling discoveries along the way, some of which come in the form of peculiar imagery. He watches scenes from the past play out, witnessing people fall from lofty heights, ghosts serve him questionable meals, or wights creep out of tight spaces in the walls. Worse, the aforementioned monsters randomly patrol portions of the home, forcing him to occasionally hide behind furniture until they pass by.



You never know where the campaign is going to take you, even though this is mostly a “scary old house” affair. One portion sends you through the woods and into a graveyard, where the bunny beast awaits. Since the thing is both humongous and quick, you don't stand a chance going toe-to-toe with it, so you have to look for a way around him. Later on, you enter a portal to another realm, where the origins of the murderers come to light, not to mention their motives and connection to the lost girl...

I'll be honest, though: Ellen's story and content was mostly what got me through the title. Everything else was mediocre at best...

Any time you traverse the hallways, the game crawls. At first, the slowness helps build tension, especially when paired with dark, interior set pieces. Unfortunately, moseying from one point to another grows daunting, especially when you toss foes into the mix. You best bet at avoiding death involves examining the creatures' patrolling routines, then hiding. Sadly, that rigmarole robs them of their punch because all you have to do to evade a painful, gruesome end is get out of sight for a few seconds, then literally walk away when the coast is clear.

This is assuming you aren't ambushed by the opposition. One point of irritation comes when you trot along a corridor, then immediately get killed by a creature right as it appears on the screen. You aggro these foes almost the moment they pop up, giving you little time to react and forcing you to advance slowly and tediously. You find yourself pausing every few feet to make sure you aren't about to march headlong into your enemy's line of sight, and even then they sometimes catch you unawares.

Sadly, there area a few worse flaws as well. For one thing, you sometimes can't exit the inventory screen properly. The screen sometimes forces you to hit the cancel button, which then activates your flashlight. Did I mention that the light's battery is finite, and that there are only a couple of batteries in the house? So yeah, you could end up wearing down your torch all because of a response issue. On top of that, the inventory screen screws up while you're reading notes. While scrolling down, the cursor sometimes moves off the message itself and onto the side bar, unable to return to the page. You then have to annoyingly exit the screen and re-enter to get back to the text.



Just to further annoy you, the game refuses to outright name items you pick up. At one point, you nab a bottle of vinegar, which looks like one of numerous other bottles you obtain. Your inventory won't tell you what any of your items are, so you occasionally must guess as to how they're used. Luckily, I figured out the bottle I picked up was vinegar by reading a note pinned to a fridge telling me how to make plant killer—you know, to get rid of the previously discussed man-eating weed.

I appreciate Ellen because it's a downbeat game that isn't afraid to laugh in the face of logic. To hell with making any sense because it's a supernatural ride into dysfunctional families and delusion. The story leaves you questioning if it all really happened or if the protagonist was just losing it, like the lead in an Algernon Blackwood story. It's just a shame the adventure sometimes proves arduous, because it would have otherwise be a killer scare piece.

Staff review by Joseph Shaffer (October 21, 2023) Rumor has it that Joe is not actually a man, but a machine that likes video games, horror movies, and long walks on the beach. His/Its first contribution to HonestGamers was a review of Breath of Fire III.