With a Serial Killer and a cast full of secrets onboard a closed-off ship, Why Am I Dead At Sea? holds a lot of creepiness despite being a short game with very simple graphics.
- The very opening, which shows the player character being murdered with loud gunshot sound effects.
- Some of the cast members' thoughts can be unnerving, both before and after you find out what they're about. Donovan's thoughts are those of a Knight Templar bent on revenge, who doesn't care who he has to hurt to complete his objective. Ferdinand's thoughts are the only ones the player can't glean anything from, as it's just bouncy (but slightly ominous) music and brightly colored shapes. In context of The Reveal it's disturbing how little an impact his own murders have on his thoughts.
- Also disturbing in the context of the reveal is the fact that Xu can tell that Ferdinand has, among other things, a fork, pliers, and a small vise in his pockets. It's very likely he was using those things on Paulo after Chapter 3.
- The part in the game where Donovan gets shot and seemingly killed by the cloaked figure, implied to be Garv, after he gets too close to the truth. The player character is shaken up by the experience and when they come to, they discover Paulo missing with his room a mess and stained in blood.
- It gets worse when the player finally finds Paulo, and Donovan helpfully describes how he fits the early stages of the Serial Killer's other torture victims—all of his fingers are broken, he's been strangled, and other injuries he refuses to clarify.
- The full scope of the crimes going on in the ship, specifically that Garv had been using it for his human-trafficking ring for who-knows-how long, with all of the crew unwittingly complicit in one way or another. If not for the captain, he would have gotten away with it.
- The "Justice" ending sees Ferdinand getting off the ship with the rest of the survivors. As he's talking to Gwen about how bad he feels for the captain, Paulo, and Donovan, she bluntly tells him that she knows he doesn't really care, and that she can tell he's just as evil as Garv was. Ferdinand only laughs and remarks that that's "all the fun" that he'll get to have with Gwen, and tells her to have a nice life as he prepares to move on. Presumably, to kill again.
- Ferdinand's last words before Donovan shoots him for what he's done.Donovan: You have no remorse or shame, do you? Do you feel anything at all?Ferdinand: I don't know, should I?
- Gwen's Journey to the Center of the Mind sequence, where she believes that the captain is her long-dead sister and that they're in her bedroom, where a dark shadow is standing by the door about to come in—if interacted with, Gwen just begs for it to go away and leave her alone.
