Artifacts and Antiquity is a short first-person horror game created by Zed_Technician
Gracie has not had the best of luck lately. The computer company she worked for went under after it turned out they used extremely volatile materials for their products. However, after 38 rejections from various jobs, she was hired at Stahl & Co. Shipping Company, and things finally seemed to be looking up...
...at least until an Egyptian goddess came out of one of the artifacts warning Gracie and her co-workers, the fairy Faye and the shadowman Mike, that several important artifacts they received were stolen from her fellow deities, and they were angry.
Now, the trio need the goddess, who introduces herself as Nameless, to find the stolen artifacts and return them to the gods before the mortal world is destroyed by their wrath. To accomplish this task, Gracie will need to receive visions from Nameless to find the artifacts while using the cameras to guide Faye and Mike to their locations, dodging the servants of the gods and avoiding divine traps.
This game contains examples of:
- And Now for Someone Completely Different: If Faye and Mike both die, the POV changes to Nameless while Gracie handles artifact collection.
- A Lizard Named "Liz": Faye the fae.
- Benevolent Boss: The Stahl brothers may not be the most moral individuals (Faye points out how they deal in things "nobody else wants to deal with" and run a moonshine racket on weekends), but they care for their workers, and one of the bad endings mentions them hunting down the people who gave them the stolen artifacts and endangered their employees.
- Big Bad Duumvirate: Thoth and Sekhmet are the deities who are the most determined to bring the end of humankind, and the ones directly attempting to stop the protagonists.
- Big Beautiful Woman: Played straight with Gracie, Nameless, and Faye, but averted with Sekhmet.
- Call-Back:
- At the start of the game, Gracie receives a call from Nurse Morton about a computer her company made while holding a mug from Bartleby's Bakery, where Mama Rabbit works.
- Mike is a shadowman and the narration on his death references the shadow people's immigration that caused that game's conflict.
- Disproportionate Retribution: Discussed. Multiple characters (including the narrator if time runs out) point out how it seems like an overreaction to destroy all of humanity over the theft, and Nameless decides to help the workers because she agrees with this line of thinking.
- If nobody dies, Thoth tells Gracie his and Sekhmet's motive: pushing up the schedule on creating a new world. They've done it quite a few times, apparently.
Thoth: Why, indeed! What a silly question! The sooner we bring about the end of mankind, the sooner we get to remake it! Have you ever created anything? It's quite fun. - Easy-Mode Mockery: If you lose both Faye and Mike, you get to play as Nameless, who has unique abilities that remove some of the game's challenge. The problem is that if you reached this point, your only possible ending is the worst one.
- Gameplay and Story Integration: While controlling Nameless, her power to detect the artifacts will cause the camera they're on to sparkle, and she will be able to see the Priest without using the ankh.
- Interface Screw: In-universe. When Sekhmet enters the warehouse, she'll interfere with your camera feed, necessitating the Ankh to restore the signal.
- Invisible to Normals: The Priest cannot be seen by Gracie without the help of Nameless's ankh.
- Multiple Endings: What happens when all seven artifacts are collected depends on who is alive at the time.
- If everyone is alive, Sekhmet attempts one last attack, but Nameless combines the artifacts to create The Protector, who easily defeats Sekhmet's servants. Thoth and Sekhmet appear to taunt the workers, but ultimately withdraw from the conflict. Nameless and The Protector hang around, becoming Vitriolic Best Buds and the company's top security guard respectively.
- If anyone dies, Nameless simply returns the artifacts to the gods, appeasing them and preventing humanity's destruction before leaving, while the survivors mourn the losses caused by the ordeal.
- If everyone dies or time runs out, the army of the ancients is unleashed, bringing the end of the world.
- One-Man Army: The Protector can one-shot The Sentinel, The Assassin, and The Priest. Even Thoth and Sekhmet, gods, Know When to Fold 'Em from his presence.
- Timed Mission: The trio only has until dawn to return the artifacts before the gods send their army to destroy humanity. This is exacerbated by Thoth, who set eye traps that elapse a little time in the warehouse containers that don't contain an artifact and will eventually slip into your office to directly manipulate the hourglass himself.
- The Password Is Always "Swordfish": Exaggerated. Faye points out how the security system will accept whatever gibberish Gracie puts in as a password.
- Viler New Villain: Thoth and Sekhmet are easily the most dangerous villains ever created by Zed_Technician so far. While Jeremiah Vermander from the previous game was particularly vile, even he wasn't an Omnicidal Maniac.
