Objective: SHOOT YOURSELF
The symbol of "return" is associated with The Consuming Shadow
Unmarked spoilers below!
- The monsters, combined with Nothing Is Scarier because you only see them as shadows. It is left to your imagination as to the full horror of their visage. Also, some of them have flies and spiders coming out of them, or puke out chunks while crawling on the ceiling, or are Silent Hill-esque combinations of flesh and mechanical objects.
- As you get more insane, your objectives start changing...Objective: pain pain pain pain pain pain
Objective: die die die die die die die
Objective: it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts - In certain areas, when you finish up, all is well and good, but then the usual "Return to the car" objective appears for a split second, only to be replaced by:Objective: RUN FOR YOUR LIFE
Objective: GET OUT- Of the pursuers that mission objective signifies, by far the creepiest is the Overseer, a head that appears randomly on either side of the room and literally lunges across. If reaches you, he bites — and the protagonist wakes up a couple hours later missing a lot of health and sanity, and with no memory of how s/he got there.
- Another of the possible pursuers is the Fat Man, who somehow manages to be creepy despite being a mere silhouette. He looks like an ordinary overweight individual, but there's maybe something a little off about the way he walks, and then... then he laughs.
- Last, but most certainly not the least, out of all the unique hunter monsters, is... the Tall Man. He cannot be fought; he cannot be harmed; if he touches you, your health will drain at lightspeed. Even just having him in the same room causes sanity effects to occur regardless of how sane you actually are, making it that much harder to flee. Even his in-game notes fail to describe any method of escaping or defeating him, except for:Run. Do not look back.
- Starting a new game. The protagonist gets a feeling of deja vu, as if he's done this before, for over a thousand times. And guess what? You retain experience across successive plays. Have fun!
- One of the text messages The Ministry Man can get is from an Alternate Universe version of him, telling him that he's dead, and the PC!Ministry Man will share his fate. And that he's happy with not being alive.
- As pictured to the right, the suicide sequence that you can get if your sanity is especially low. It's pretty bad as is (just look at it!), but how you get it is also scary. The prompts you can click on randomly switch to "Kill myself", and do so more frequently as your sanity lowers. Imagine trying to click on "Investigate further" only for it to switch to "Kill myself" the moment you click and *BANG*! YOU DIED.
- It's over, you cast the banishment ritual, it was correct, you won. And then, you face the attacking Ancient itself, who decided to take you with him.Objective: Die.
- A minor case, bordering on Fridge Horror: as you get the Golden Ending as the Scholar for the first time, after you quit the end-of-game summary, static appears for a split second, and then you get to see the starting screen for the newly unlocked Ministry Man. His randomized opening narration may suggest the Scholar's dead or missing. Did you really defeat the Ancient or was that just delusions of a dying madman?
- Even the endings are pretty scary;
- Ending G has the player character run out of health and simply die, with the death screen as an "Ending".
- Endings F and E are really similar where the time runs out, with the player character catching sight of the Ancient consuming the world. It gets so bad they kill themself instead of letting the Ancient destroy the world. The difference is F is in a car, but E is in a town. imagine what the people are feeling.
- Ending D has the player banish the wrong god, which causes the Ancient to start consuming the world, now at full power. Combined with Tear Jerker, the player is effectively broken, saying a hate monologue to themselves, before abruptly committing suicide so they won't live in a world inhabited by the consuming shadow.
- Ending C might be the most horrific ending for the player; they successfully banished theAancient, but they run out of health or walk into the shadow; either way, they lose. However, they gave their life to save everyone. Keyword being "lose", as Ending C might end with either death or being stranded in the dimension, for all of eternity.
- Ending B, being a Bittersweet Ending, certainly falls into this trope. This isn't as horrible as endings G, F, E, D, or C, but the player character is Driven to Madness due to a low level of sanity. Just what could they be feeling in the mental hospital?
- Even Ending A, which is like Ending B but with a high level of sanity, has "T" or "E" implying this adventure isn't yet done.
- The Descent mode by both game mechanics and story alone. After getting Ending A, the character sees Stonehenge opens up once again, and curiosity pushes them to investigate. But the thing is, this is an endless mode. Meaning that the player is endless descending the dungeon with only death possibly freeing them.
- What is even worse is after completing each level, the character's personal doubts creep up into questions. Your choice of answer will result in an status effect happening to the character.
- Even the Challenge mode can be have nightmare aspects.
- The Biological Clock challenge gives you the Bleeding Out ailment, except its incurable. This means you have to save the world while keeping both your health and sanity in check.
- The worst one of them all is the Scourge of the Ancients. Not only is it one-hit-kill, but the game jacks all of the difficulties to 11. It's as if the invading Ancient recognizes your efforts and decide to put all stops in ensuring that whoever is trying to stop it is dead.
