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In General
- Everyone Is a Suspect: You don't know who killed Doctor Dekker, but most of the characters could conceivably have done it. The killer is chosen at random at the beginning of the game, and some scenes are different depending on who did it.
- Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: Do your patients truly have supernatural powers, or are they delusional and only think they do?
- Sanity Meter: Each of your recurring patients has one, as do you.
- Sanity Slippage: Can happen to characters as the game progresses. Including you.
- Through the Eyes of Madness: Some of the patients describe seeing things that... aren't right. Sometimes you do, too.
- Whatever Happened to the Mouse?: We get to see what happens to the five main patients but not the minor ones like Scarlett and Professor Warwick.
- "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue: At the end, depending on how the patients have been treated, you'll get to see what happened to them after the game.
Staff
The Player
- Featureless Protagonist: The game plays out almost entirely from the player character's point of view and we never find out anything about them, including their gender (There are hints that the doctor is male, given Marianna's flirtatious behavior. However, even that isn’t complete confirmation, as Marianna has admitted to seducing women as well as men).
- Text Parser: How you interact with your patients.
- Video Game Caring Potential: You're a therapist after all, and trying to actually help your patients can be very rewarding, since the ending will show what happened next.
- Video Game Cruelty Potential: Alternatively, you can be a giant dick to all your patients.
Doctor Dekker
- The Alcoholic: Doctor Dekker himself, who kept vodka in his desk.
- Hospital Hottie: Doctor Dekker may be this trope, due to the fact that he may have been dating certain patients.
- Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: You learn later in the game that Doctor Dekker was stabbed through the heart with a paper spike on his desk.
- Infectious Insanity: Practically name-dropped in the title. Some characters even believe their sessions with Dr. Dekker only made their symptoms worse, since they feel he had characteristics of a Psycho Psychologist.
- Never Found the Body: At one point, Dr. Dekker's body went missing.
- Plot-Triggering Death: If Dr. Dekker hadn't died, you wouldn't be interviewing his clients.
- Posthumous Character: Our titular doctor.
- Psycho Psychologist: Some of the patients seem to think Doctor Dekker became this as he only made their problems worse.
- Really 700 Years Old: We see a photo of a grave that says Dr. Dekker was born in 1875 but this is most likely a delusion.
- Slipping a Mickey: It appears Doctor Dekker was this victim of this.
Jaya
- Jump Scare: A couple, mostly caused by Jaya breaking into your conversation to provide information.
- Only Sane Woman: Jaya seems to be the only character to have a firm grasp of reality. Unless she turns out to be the killer, that is. It also becomes obvious she's not telling you everything, killer or not.
- Who Watches the Watchmen?: Your assistant Jaya stresses the need to keep an eye on you as you work with the patients.
Patients
Bryce Hemmings
- Secret Test of Character: Bryce believes that the "hooded figure" is putting him through these.
- Stalker with a Crush: To a certain extent. He takes naked photos of his neighbor Jennifer without her knowledge, though he later repents.
- Time Stands Still: Bryce describes experiencing this for one hour every night and he calls it the "Midnight Hour".
- The Unreveal: Bryce says he can sometimes see a girl standing behind us and speculates that it might be a relative of ours. This is never brought up again and is ultimately left unexplained. It's conceivable that the girl is Molly but since Bryce has no connection to her (unlike Nathan), it's not clear why he'd be able to see her.
Claire Castleford
- Animate Dead: Claire considers herself to be something of a necromancer.
- Insanity Defense: This trope can come into play with Claire for her crime of killing her husband. It's even mentioned that it would be quite convenient if her sanity was put in doubt.
- Mercy Kill: It can be argued that if Claire killed David a second time, it would be this.
- Off with His Head!: Claire beheads the reanimated David with an axe.
Elin
- Doom Magnet: Regarded as such as many of her patients die not long after coming into her care, albeit this is due to her obliviously poisoning them with herbal supplements. And she can
be reassigned to the children's ward in the ending... - The Cutie: Absolutely. She'll even give you cookies! And you can ask if they're poisoned, which may seem dickish but considering what you find out...
- Hospital Hottie: Elin works as a nurse and is also quite pretty.
- Kindhearted Cat Lover: Elin has a cat called Church and she is indeed quite kind.
- May–December Romance: 25-year-old Elin dates Max, one of her former patients who is 77.
- Never My Fault: She is incapable of understanding that whatever herbal nonsense she's giving to her patients has been killing them, not to mention that she sees nothing wrong with giving it to them without the consent of them or their doctor, in complete violation of everything one is taught in med school.
- Shapeshifting: Elin claims to be able to do this in certain circumstances.
- Voluntary Shapeshifting: Elin claims to be able to "shift" into her patients' relatives. She does not seem to realize how this can be manipulative.
Glyn
- Take That!: Glyn took his date to see Zoolander 2 and says he doesn't recommend it.
Marianna
- Mythical Motifs: Due to her tendency to draw people to her, and for herself to be drawn to the sea, Marianna is compared to a siren.
- Rape as Drama: Comes up during a possible conversation with a patient as Marianna can accuse you of this, making reference to you "getting inside her" and it hurting. If you press her further, she goes into more detail. She says she strips naked while your face turns into worms that get inside her. She then accuses you of being the "sick one".
- Recurring Dreams: She later tells you of these. Complete with an Eldritch Abomination and Meat Moss!
- Reluctant Fanservice Girl: Marianna has blackouts that end with her being found naked on the beach. This results in unwanted attention from the police and her Uber driver. Though she does enjoy dancing in her underwear (or less).
- Stalker with a Crush: Marianna seems to attract a LOT of these. Possibly including you.
- The Tease: Marianna acts like this to others, including you. She often flirts with the player, though hopefully you won't reciprocate.
Nathan Peel
- "Groundhog Day" Loop: Nathan believes he is stuck in one. At one point, you get stuck alongside him.
- It's All My Fault: Nathan blames himself for the truck driver's suicide, after sending him an accusing letter.
- Mental Time Travel: Nathan says he experienced this. It's one of the reasons why he's a patient.
Scarlett
- Dream Walker: She claims to be one of these, and it seems to hurt her relationships with other people due to what she sees in these dreams.
Minor Characters
David Castleford
- Call-Forward: David is mentioned in the prequel. Eve goes to see him and he determines that her optic nerve is severed, which means she should be blind.
- Came Back Wrong: After being murdered David came back as an unintelligent hunter, if Claire is to be believed.
- Empty Shell: After Claire had killed her husband for cheating, David came back as this.
- Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: David qualifies as this, due to the fact that Claire stabbed him with a steak knife.
- Mercy Kill: It can be argued that David's second death, if he experienced it at all, is this.
- Off with His Head!: Claire beheads the reanimated David with an axe.
- Would Hurt a Child: The reanimated David kills Anoushka if you tell Claire to let him live.
Hannah
- The Lost Lenore: This trope applies as Hannah was Nathan's fiancée and has died some years back.
Iris
- Punny Name: Iris just so happened to be the assistant to David the optician. Claire lampshades it as being incredibly on the nose.
Molly
- Creepy Child: A little girl named Molly sometimes shows up that invokes this.
- Death of a Child: Molly's father committed suicide and took her with him.
- Foreshadowing: The opening sequence consists of clips from Dr. Dekker's therapy sessions including one with a girl called Molly who says her father is trying to hurt her. We later find out that her father committed suicide and took her with him.
- Offing the Offspring: Molly's father kills both her and himself via carbon monoxide poisoning.
- Would Hurt a Child: Molly's father commits suicide by carbon monoxide poisoning while both of them are in the car.
Professor Warwick
- Professional Gambler: Professor Warwick tried to become one.
