Video Game / Dark Deception

The clock is ticking.

Dark Deception is a Pac-Man inspired horror game developed by Glowstick Entertainment.

You play as a faceless protagonist who apparently has met their end. Rather than go to the great beyond, you find yourself face to face with a woman named Bierce who offers you a chance to live again in exchange for a few small... tasks. Namely, heading into a few portals and collecting a few gems. Seems simple enough, save for the fact that the places she sends you to are nightmare realms patrolled by some very ghastly beings who aren't afraid to rip you apart on sight. Bierce offers a little aid, but for the most part, you're on your own with nothing but your wits to survive. Plus there might be the tiny little fact that Bierce might not be on the up and up...

A demo for the game featuring the first level was released in 2014, while the finished Chapter 1 (containing said level from the demo) was released in September 2018. Chapter 2 was released in January 2019, and Chapter 3 was released in June that same year. Chapter 4 was released in September 2021, with Chapter 5 releasing at an unknown date. Alongside Chapter 4's release was a massive Enhanced update that came with a variety of visual improvements and updated level design, including a set of secrets describing a mysterious person only known as "E" and their travels through this purgatory.

A multiplayer-based spinoff known as Dark Deception: Monsters & Mortals was released in November 2020. It is a four-player game where players compete in mazes to collect the most shards while avoiding being killed by one another. It also received various crossover DLCs based on different IPs, consisting of at least one playable mortal and monster and a new level.

No relation to Tecmo's Deception series.

---

Dark Deception contains examples of:

• Absurdly Spacious Sewer: The fourth level, "Stranger Sewers", occurs in a sewer system with plenty of space for Doug to run from the larger Dread Duckies.
• Abusive Parents:
  • Doug wasn't a very loving father to his daughter Tammy, calling her "a defective child" for being autistic and inheriting her mother's bipolar disorder.
  • Some secret documents in "Bearly Buried" indicate that Doug's mother was also this to her son, as she admits she sees the young Doug as nothing but a burden and reminder of her horrible husband, while admitting she took delight in hearing him "beg" when she locked him up in the dark on one occasion. Doug's wife also notes that Doug does not want to visit her again when the question is brought up.
  • Mama Bear is one to her Trigger Teddies, which makes sense considering she is an amalgamation of the souls of abusive mothers. While she does care for them to some extent, a lot of the time, she orders them around instead. More often than not, she will outright have them do her dirty work, despite knowing full well that they will die doing so. She's quite willing to just replace said babies once that happens. It's also implied in her Makeship description that she only loves them because they're incapable of either rebelling or failing her, viewing children who do either as disappointments.
    Makeship Description: "Need an overprotective parent? Dark Deception's Mama Bear is here and ready to adopt you as one of her "babies"! With Mama Bear around, there's no such thing as personal privacy. You can feel her disapproving parental stare from anywhere in your home or office! Definitely don't talk back and remember that mother always knows best."
• Acid Pool: The caves of "Bearly Buried" have these in certain areas, and they all have a Sickly Green Glow to them. Mama Bear is able to dive into these pools and transform into a far more powerful version of herself.
• Affably Evil: While most of the monsters you will meet are Ax-Crazy and Evilly Affable, some of them are actually genuinely nice when under the right circumstances.
  • The Reaper Nurses are this, but it only applies to women. According to E's secret note, they genuinely welcomed her into their hospital and had no intention of harming her, even after she refused their offer to make her a Reaper Nurse. E was free to stay and explore the hospital as much as she wanted as long as she didn’t disrupt their activities or enter the restricted areas. Sure enough, they only became hostile toward E when she entered a restricted area.
  • The Joy Joy Gang obviously qualify, as they all believe Happiness Is Mandatory. However, don't let this fool you as they will squee in excitement at the first opportunity of making you suffer.
  • While Mama Bear is an amalgam of the souls of various abusive mothers, she always talks in a calm, motherly tone and it has been shown that she is quite endearing to her babies, Malak, and even Doug in her own twisted and creepy way. Justifed as each soul that comprises Mama Bear's current personality is very likely different in personality and viewpoint.
• All for Nothing: The Joy Joy Gang are the only monsters to successfully capture Doug for Malak in "Mascot Mayhem". However in "Bearly Buried", due to the blue orb's intervention and Malak's tendency to again underestimate Doug and also hide the ring pieces at Mama Bears' level, their efforts became for naught as Doug manages to get back all the ring pieces including the new one and escape.
• Alliterative Name: The Murder Monkeys, Dread Duckies, Doom Ducky, and Trigger Teddies.
• Alliterative Title: The game's title, as well as various levels, such as "Elementary Evil" and "Deadly Decadence". The only exception so far is the first level, "Monkey Business".
• Amusement Park of Doom: The seventh level, "Mascot Mayhem", takes place in one initially, and it's apparently run by a gang of demonic animatronics.
• And I Must Scream: Bierce hints at this since the shards are made up of human souls, presumably screaming in agony. This is also seen in "Bearly Buried", revealing that anyone sent by Malak here to be executed are incorporated into the cave walls, apparently as agonized faces.
• Anti-Frustration Features: If the player runs out of lives, they are given an option to use the last checkpoint, allowing the player to start where they left off previously. The catch is that you can't get S-rank anymore once you use it.
• Apocalyptic Log: Two of these exist. The first are Bierce's Diaries, which examines Bierce's life prior to meeting Doug. The second are notes of a person named E, the last person who entered the nightmares prior to Doug's arrival, and the notes detail her use of an artifact she found to travel between nightmares.
• Armor-Piercing Question: Malak delivers one to Bierce after she claims she will become powerful enough to fulfill Doug's every wish. Not only is it a major Wham Line, but it also causes Bierce to look away in ashamed silence.
  Malak: "Bierce, why not tell him what fate befell the last person that trusted you, hmm?"
• Asymmetric Multiplayer: The main mode of Monsters & Mortals pits three mortals against one monster, the former trying to collect shards and summon a portal to escape, the latter trying to kill them all.
• Aura Vision: Telepathy is a power that allows the user to see an enemy's fog-like aura through any obstructions and walls. It's especially useful when trying to distinguish the real Dread Duckies from the fake ones in "Stranger Sewers".
• Banana Peel: In Monsters & Mortals, the trap for the hotel level is actually this, which makes sense considering the fact that monkeys often like to eat bananas. However, these peels won't kill you, but instead stun you for a short while. They are also one of the few traps that can be destroyed.
• Battle Amongst the Flames: After Bierce is flabbergasted by how Malak was able to invade her ballroom and bring a good portion of his allies with him, she then finds herself being ambushed by Agatha who then proceeds to stab Bierce In the Back with her fingers.
• Bear Trap: Several of these are found in the cave system and will kill anything that steps on them. Fortunately, it is possible to avoid them by scooting around them or by triggering them with Primal Fear.
• Bedlam House: While the hospital of "Torment Therapy" is quite clean and nice looking at first, it later shows that deep within it lies a gruesome underbelly. The intensive therapy unit is by every means an asylum. But not the one where patients recover from a psychological disorder, oh no, this place is a torture facility. A place where suffering is the only form of medicine with mercy never truly being an option. The place is filled with all types of traps that will give you a painful demise.
• Big Damn Heroes:
  • In "Elementary Evil", Bierce unlocks the gym doors when Agatha traps Doug within them, allowing him to escape at the last moment, much to Agatha's chagrin.
  • In "Bearly Buried", Tammy appears out of nowhere in soul form to rescue Doug from Mama Bear's clutches, doing so by electrocuting the Trigger Teddies escorting him. She saves him two more times after that, one from Malak's marking using the ring pieces, and at the very end from Mama Bear by opening the portal.
• Big Fancy House: The second half of "Deadly Decadence" takes place in a giant mansion made of gold and other riches.
• Bilingual Bonus: A Chinese onomatopoeia for laughter 哈哈(hā hā) can be seen on one of the walls in the Funhouse in "Crazy Carnevil".
• Body Horror: A lot of the monsters you will encounter can have a chance of having pretty disturbing anatomy.
  • Agatha has Creepy Long Arms with Creepy Long Fingers that are clawed and burned. Her face on the other hand is not any better as she has both Black Eyes of Evil and a Glasgow Grin. What's worse, blood marks will begin to appear near the edges of her scars once she goes into a frenzy.
  • Both versions of the Watchers are capable of moving their faces, but doing so causes their faces to crack and distort.
  • The Dread Duckies have misshapen empty eyeholes, a cracked forehead, have smaller heads in their mouths, and their legs are not only human-like but shriveled too.
  • And just like the Dread Duckies, the Doom Ducky also has grey and shriveled limbs. Except they aren't legs, they're arms. Dozens of them. All of these emerge from the many holes on it's hunched back, with one of them acting as its neck to support its nail-cracked head.
  • Underneath their bear masks, the Trigger Teddies actually have doll heads that resemble a mummified baby skull with a missing eye.
  • And somehow despite us never seeing her true face, Mama Bear is even worse than her babies when it comes to monstrous body features. For starters, she has a large unstitched tear in her stomach which is filled with pink stuffing that gives the illusion of entrails, and her babies will actually emerge from this fluffy horror. But don't worry, it gets worse. Once she mutates by diving into a pool of chemicals, her stuffing is completely replaced with a cluster of Trigger Teddies, her arms become elongated and bulbous to the point that they resemble the segments of a centipede, and one of her hands has been replaced with an organic toothy maw with ears.
• Booby Trap: Many of the nightmares have traps that can kill the player if they aren't careful. Each trap is unique and will vary depending on the level.
• Bottomless Pit: The hanging rock platform where the cave's ring alter is located hangs over a vast chasm. Malak gives Doug some pretty terrible advice about using it to kill himself.
  Malak: "That looks pretty deep, imagine if you fell in. Why not just throw yourself into the pit and get it over with?"
• Brought Down to Badass: Doug is stripped of all of the ring pieces at the end of "Mascot Mayhem" with all of his power-ups and is left to die in the Cave. Doesn't stop him from getting all of them back and evading dozen of Trigger Teddies and Mama Bear.
• Black-and-Gray Morality: Aside from the game’s Evil Versus Evil conflict with Bierce and Malak, this trope definitely seems to be the main conflict of the game. Let’s just see here, on one hand you have a demon that collects people's souls and is trying to kill the protagonist, Ax-Crazy monsters, more affable but just as bad monsters, and on the other hand you have the main protagonist who thinks he deserves to go to hell for what he’s done to his family according to his admission, and A Lighter Shade of Black who is implied to be using the protagonist for her own motives and murdered a child in the past.
• Car Meets House: For some reason, near the beginning of the school, there is a bus that had crashed through a wall. And it is never explained how it got there...
• Cat Scare: The very first jumpscare you receive... is in the form of a cutout of a bellhop ape falling over.
• The Chase: Every level usually ends with a major chase to the exit portal.
• Chekhov's Gun: Zone 3 of "Mascot Mayhem" reveals a set of crusher pistons around the beginning. These are later used to defeat the frenzied Joy Joy Gang, as well as subduing Joy Kill later on.
• Circus of Fear: "Crazy Carnevil", home to the Clown Gremlins.
• Collision Damage: Using Vanish makes you hidden from view, not invulnerable. Touch an enemy in this state and they'll find you instantly.
• Creepy Cave: Most of "Bearly Buried" takes place in a foreboding cave system. And the deeper you go, the more disturbing it becomes.
• Creepy Child: Agatha and the Trigger Teddies.
• Creepy Doll: The Trigger Teddies' true form is this. Presumably, the same with Mama Bear since she's wearing a costume.
• Crossover: Monsters & Mortals has received several DLC chapters based on other IPs, bringing at least one playable mortal and monster and a new level to the game.
  • The Monstrum chapter brought the Brute and Fiend from the first game as playable monsters and a level based off the cargo ship from the first game. The chapter's only playable survivor, Prisoner Borisov, is a character unique to the DLC and not the game it is based off.
  • The Silent Hill chapter has Heather Mason and Cybil Bennet as playable mortals while having the Nurse and Robbie the Rabbit as playable monsters. The level accompanying the chapter is based off the area of Silent Hill seen in the first game.
  • The Yandere Simulator chapter has Senpai, Info Chan and Hanako appear as mortals while Ayano appears as the sole monster of the DLC. The level is the school from the game. Because of the allegations against YandereDev, the DLC isn't available to purchase anymore, though people who bought the DLC before can still access its content.
  • "Poppy Playtime Panic" brings in Kissy Missy as a mortal. It's set inside the Playtime Co. toy factory, where Huggy Wuggy can spawn as the boss.
• Cutscene Incompetence: A bizarre case considering it comes shortly after a case of Cutscene Power to the Max: At the end of "Mascot Mayhem", Joy Kill suddenly drops between Doug and the exit portal. However, unlike when Doug got cornered at the end of "Torment Therapy", Doug makes no attempt to use his abilities to get past the monster, and ends up getting subdued.
• Cutscene Power to the Max: Downplayed, but pops up with the cutscene at the end of "Torment Therapy". Doug's usage of "Teleport" and "Primal Fear" is consistent with their normal uses, but attempting to use "Speed Boost" to push a Nurse across the hallway would not end well in normal gameplay, and that's assuming it was actually "Speed Boost" and not Doug pulling a new ability out of nowhere.
• Cymbal-Banging Monkey: The Murder Monkeys and the Chef Monkeys seem to be based on this type of toy.
• Dark and Troubled Past: Secret rooms within the nightmares indicate, and the game later confirms, that the protagonist has one, and it involves letting his family perish.
• Descending Ceiling: After being knocked out by a Reaper Nurse, she then thanks Doug for coming to the Intensive Therapy unit by himself and then proceeds to lock him in a cell and then decides to do some acupuncture procedure. However, her idea of acupuncture isn't just a few needles in the skin, but rather a Death Trap in which the ceiling is covered in several large needles that begin to slowly get lower and lower to the ground. Needless to say, this is a very fatal procedure.
• Didn't See That Coming: This is how the Trigger Teddies react when Tammy stops them from killing her father.
• Dismantled Macguffin: The Riddle of Heaven, which contains Malak's power, was split up long ago and placed in eldritch locations guarded by monsters. Now Bierce wants you to help her reassemble it.
• Do with Him as You Will: A villanous example. It's revealed that this is how Malak dispatches his rivals, specifically by sending them to Mama Bear and her Trigger Teddies to eat or torture them at their leisure. He nearly does this to Doug too had a certain magical orb not saved him.
• Down the Drain: "Stranger Sewers" takes place in a strange sewer.
• Early-Bird Cameo: This happens quite a bit, usually with some of the enemies:
  • Malak could potentially count since we do see him in door form in the ballroom, albeit inactively. Other than that, his humanoid form makes a cameo twice in two levels before it becomes prominent.
  • In "Monkey Business", we see a cardboard cutout of a Murder Monkey with chef clothing in the kitchen. The Chef Monkeys would appear in that location later on.
  • In "Deadly Decadence", a larger stone version of the Gold Watchers appears inactive at the beginning. At the end, said watcher reappears behind the portal as a Titan Watcher.
  • In "Stranger Sewers", the Doom Ducky appears several times prior to their boss fight, such as attacking the player in a hole at the start, roaring before you enter zone 2, and staring at the player through sewer grates.
  • In "Crazy Carnevil", all four of the Goliath Clowns appear in a cloudy red room, laughing at us while we ride the roller coaster.
  • All four of the end chapter screens show an enemy related to the preceding chapter. This includes Agatha (Chapter 2), the Dread Duckies (Chapter 3), the Matron (Chapter 4), and the Mannequins (Chapter 5).
• Eaten Alive: What seemingly becomes of the player if caught by certain monsters, and this presumably happened to others beforehand.
• Eldritch Location: The game so far has two types of this trope:
  • Bierce's Ballroom, which is the main room, is pretty much a piece of ballroom floating in the middle of nowhere, surrounded on two sides by nightmare portals. The top of the stairway also leads to Malak, who is in door form and guards an as of yet unknown location.
  • The nightmares are pocket dimensions vaguely reminiscent of real-world locations and filled with dead spirits. These locations range from as simple as buildings with repetitive rooms to a network of smaller dimensions connected to one another.
  • As it turns out, both of the aforementioned locations are found in some sort of "dark dimension." Not much is really known about it, but according to Malak it's a place where all evil souls gather, slowly fighting one another to become the "ultimate evil."
• Egopolis: The school that Agatha resides in is known as, Agatha Elementary. Welp, if she is going to be The Aloner, she might as well take advantage of it...
• Evil Laugh: Plenty of offenders: Malak, Bierce, Agatha, the Watchers, the Clowns, the Reaper Nurses, the Joy Joy Gang, and Mama Bear all do this to varying extents. Hell, even the Duckies do this, albeit in the form of repeated quacking.
• Evil vs. Evil: While Malak is quite clearly the Big Bad of the game, Bierce herself is also hinted to be using the protagonist for her own sinister purposes. While she usually has a quick retort to Malak's threats, she responds with silence when Malak points out she's not being entirely sincere with the protagonist, asking her if she told them about all the people she used in the past.
• Expecting Someone Taller: When the protagonist first interacts with Bierce, she states that she thought you would be bigger. Considering that you are eye-level with her chest, that probably means that she's quite tall herself.
• Eyeless Face: Subverted with both the Gold Watchers and the Dread Duckies. While they normally have dark hollow sockets, they latter gain glowing red pupils in their frenzy forms that will always follow the player no matter where they stand.
• Fate Worse than Death: Discussed. When Bierce introduces the player to how the nightmares work, she makes it very clear that failure is not an option.
  Bierce: "Fail, and you'll find there are fates far worse than death awaiting you here."
• Featureless Protagonist: In the main game, we never see what the protagonist looks like nor do we hear his voice, though he does get a model in Monsters & Mortals, averting this trope. Further averted when Malak invades the ballroom, where a weakened Doug is shown lying on the floor in the background.
• Fission Mailed: The "Mascot Mayhem" level is this. Even if you manage to return to the portal to finish the level, the Joy Joy Gang will always catch you at the end. There is even a fake game over screen, before the game proceeds to a cutscene.
• Flash Step: The Teleportation power allows them to quickly move past enemies and traps if they were to ever find themselves cornered.
• Foreshadowing:
  • Lucky claims that he never loses. Joy Kill also claims that it isn't over after his apparent defeat. Unfortunately, that's exactly how it goes, as Lucky and his gang manage to incapacitate Doug and leave him at Malak's mercy.
  • In the hospital, a poster depicting the stages of lung cancer is on display in the examination area. Later on, when Malak invades Doug's thoughts, it is revealed he is dying of cancer, possibly lung cancer as he's seen hooked up to a respirator.
• Foul Ball Pit: In certain rooms of the fun house, you can actually find ball pits in them which can slow you down just like the sewer water. Normally, they aren't that dangerous, well, unless there is a monster in the room with you that is.
• Foul Waterfowl: Doom Ducky and the Dread Duckies.
• Gameplay Grading: At the end of every level, you get graded up to an S based on how you did.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation: In "Torment Therapy", one of the cutscenes involves a weighing scale that triggers fire to shoot from the ceiling. After the cutscene is over, going on the weighing scale again does nothing.
• Giant Medical Syringe: The Reaper Nurses from "Torment Therapy" wield giant syringes as their main weapons.
• Glowing Eyes of Doom: While this is a given during their nightmare mode, some enemies naturally have them. This includes the Murder Monkeys, Clown Gremlins, Mama Bear, and most of the bosses.
• Gotta Catch Them All: The gameplay revolves around collecting 100+ soul shards in each level to obtain one of the 9 Ring Pieces.
• Hall of Mirrors: A strange example as in the funhouse, while there is a mirror maze, it doesn't seem to have any mirrors.
• Hazardous Water: As stated in some warning graffiti, the waters of the sewers will greatly slow down your movements.
• Hedge Maze: The first half of "Deadly Decadence" takes place in one.
• Hellgate: The ballroom has 10 of these around it, and Bierce uses them to help connect to Malak's realm, which isn't exactly hell but might as well be.
• Hell Hotel: The first level, "Monkey Business", takes place in one where you're chased by killer monkeys dressed as bellhops and where you can be served free breakfast and murder until 10 AM.
• Hoist by Their Own Petard: A lot of enemies have strategies that they use to help them kill the player. However, the player can actually turn some of their own tactics against them.
  • Much like Agatha, the Nurses can hear Doug whenever he opens one of the many doors in the hospital. However, the doors also give away their position while they’re cloaked. Then in the Matron boss fight, the nurses must be beaten back with their giant syringes, which they drop when stunned.
  • Using Primal Fear will blow up the teddies. This can kill you if you're too close.
  • During Mama Bears's first boss fight, she will throw rocks at you. You need to grab these rocks and throw them back at her head to win. You’ll also need to blow up her Trigger Teddies while she’s standing on them to knock her back into the acid pit in her final boss fight.
• Horned Humanoid: Malak, he is a demon after all.
• Hostile Animatronics: Penny the Chicken, Lucky the Rabbit, and Hangry the Pig are this. The Murder Monkeys and Chef Monkeys also seem to be animatronics too.
• Hub Level: Bierce's Ballroom contains portals to every level in the game.
• Human Sacrifice: In Bierce's Diary, she states that she sacrificed the maid's daughter to summon Malak and make a deal with him. Said sacrifice is implied to be Agatha.
• I'm a Doctor, Not a Placeholder: After giving Doug telekinesis, Bierce tells him that if he starts to feel dizzy or starts to smell colors, she advises him to take deep breaths and wait for it to go away. She then tells him to stop complaining if it doesn't work and states that "I'm a movie star, not a brain surgeon!"
• Invisibility: The Reaper Nurses have the unique ability to turn themselves completely invisible. They will use this trick to sneak up on the player and catch them off guard.
  • Likewise, after beating them, the player is granted their final power, vanish. This power will allow the player to completely cloak themselves and make them unnoticeable to most enemies. You will know if the power is activated by a purple aura that fades around the screen.
• Instant-Win Condition: During some maze segments, getting all the soul shards instantly despawns the enemies in the area. Doesn't matter if a monster was right on your heels, you're safe as soon as it's in your hands.
• I Shall Taunt You: Many of the monsters love to do this to you.
  • While being chased by Agatha, you can actually hide from her inside the bathrooms. While she won't be able to get inside, she will then out of nowhere whisper in your ear, "Do you feel safe in there?" Give it enough time, and she will eventually teleport to you and trap you inside the stall.
  • The Dread Duckies take great pleasure in taunting their victims, especially when they are at their mercy. And in one of their kill animations, they even mock Doug by dancing and chuckling at him before curb stomping on his face.
  • The Reaper Nurses will constantly mock and insult Doug while they are trying to kill him.
• Ironic Name:
  • The ring that we are trying to forge has a name and origin that contradicts each other. Bierce describes the situation best herself.
    Bierce: "The ring is called the Riddle of Heaven. An ironic name, don't you think? A demon's power is contained inside it: the creature of infinite cruelty that you just met. Malak."
  • Malak's name actually means angel in Arabic. And yet again, he is very much a demon.
  • Agatha's name means to be both good and honorable. She is neither good nor is she honorable.
• Jump Scare: If you get caught, the monster will get all up in your face and kill you.
• Killer Teddy Bear: Both Mama Bear and her Trigger Teddies are this... at first.
• Killing Intent: Primal Fear is a special power that can create a red shockwave that can stun all enemies in the direct vicinity, making it ideal to deal with large groups of them. It can also destroy certain enemies instantly such as the Clown Gremlins and Trigger Teddies.
• Lava Pit: The factory hidden deep under Joy Joy Land has a large pool of molten steel.
• Living Statue: The Gold Watchers are golden statues animated by the ring that only move when you are not looking at them. Even if the walls are blocking your view, they will stay dormant as long as they remain within your cone of vision. The same goes for the Titan Watchers who are far larger and can move even when you are staring directly at them.
• Legions of Hell: Malak's whole army can be viewed as this.
• Living Toys:
  • The Dread Duckies and Doom Ducky are living rubber duckies. Mama Bear and the Trigger Teddies are also living teddy bears encountered later in the story.
  • The Murder Monkeys and Chef Monkeys are clearly based on creepy cymbal monkeys, however, they are far more organic looking than both the Duckies and the Teddies.
• The Lost Woods: Downplayed, and ultimately subverted in the eighth level. It seems that this nightmare that Malak has dragged you into would seem to take place in a forest right? Nope, it is actually most of the time underground in a vast cave system. There is a reason why it is called, "Bearly Buried".
• Lured into a Trap: After following the Clown Car, Doug finds a strength tester and scores perfectly on it. However, the audience starts to boo him. He then realizes he was tricked as the game poofs into thin air and a cage drops on him. Then the same Clown Car he was been following drifts around the cage only to stop and release a squad of Clown Gremlins who try to break inside. Luckily, Doug is able to Curb Stomp them by poofing them with Primal Fear.
• Magical Defibrillator: Inverted in "Torment Therapy". The giant defibrillators are the most common trap in torment therapy and they will burn anything that gets caught between them.
• Maniac Monkeys: The Murder Monkeys and Chef Monkeys.
• The Many Deaths of You: For every world you enter, a slew of ways to die await you, whether it's by monsters, traps, or even the environment itself. Expect to get stabbed (quickly or otherwise), decapitated, eaten, strangled, blown up, ripped apart, impaled, beaten to a bloody pulp, electrocuted, disintegrate, and so on.
• The Maze: Every level takes place in a differently-themed maze.
• Menagerie of Misery: A few Murder Monkeys and a single Dread Ducky can be seen locked up inside of some cages in the circus and are most likely there in the first place as punishment for failing to capture and kill the protagonist.
• A Molten Date with Death: Joy Kill is defeated the first time, by being pushed into the factory's large pool of molten steel. Unfortunately for the player, they soon discover that Joy Kill is actually Immune to Fire.
• Monkey Morality Pose: A painting in "Monkey Business" shows the enemies of said level doing this.
• Monster Clown: The Clown Gremlins and the Goliath Clowns.
• Monster of the Week: Each level contains a new and unique monster.
• Mook Chivalry: Happens twice:
  • The Dread Duckies will take their time to do a dance when they stun you, giving you time to break out of the trance.
  • Penny the Chicken will do her joy joy dance when one of her eggs hit you, giving you time to escape.
  • Averted with the Reaper Nurses, who waste absolutely no time to dispatch you when you're stunned.
• Multi-Armed and Dangerous: There are a few enemies that have extra arms. Joy Kill has two small arms on one side and one large one on the other, and Doom Ducky has dozens of arms emerging from their back,
• Mythology Gag:
  • In lieu of the more common handle of "Pyramid Head", the Silent Hill DLC refers to the famous demon from 2 as "Red Pyramid Thing", which is how James referenced it.
  • One of the dead-ends in "Monkey Business" has graffiti that reads "Evans was here". This is referencing Detective Evans, who was the original protagonist of the 2014 demo of the game and also appears as one of the mortals in Monsters & Mortals. Interacting with the graffiti replaces the music with that of the 2014 demo.
  • The Chef Monkeys appearing in the kitchen after the player collects all the shards can be seen as a callback to a much earlier version of the "Monkey Business" level. Back then they could be seen in the kitchen but they never chased the player like they do in the enhanced version.
• Nested Mouths: The Dread Duckies have a cuckoo clock like mechanism in their mouths with a fanged duck head that allows them to stun their prey.
  • Similarly, the Doom Ducky also has one, albeit in the form of a gross, elongated arm.
• Nightmare Face: Putting aside their already nightmarish faces, most of the enemies' frenzy forms tend to have these in the form of Red and Black and Evil All Over. In addition, several enemies are able to naturally make them:
  • Both the Gold Watchers and the Titan Watchers have the ability to twist their faces into gaping, cracked, angry faces, the former doing so when they catch you.
  • The Joy Joy Gang's frenzy forms basically expose some of the endoskeletons underneath them, making them look like animal versions of the Terminator.
  • The Trigger Teddies have withered doll heads underneath their normal bear heads, making them look like undead babies.
• Nightmare Fuel Coloring Book: In "Elementary Evil", there is a secret room containing a whiteboard with a disturbing drawing on it. The child who drew it is in the back of a car that is on fire and sinking into a body of water. Mommy is in the front of the car, presumably dead. Daddy is watching this happen from a distance and smiling. Considering the writing on the walls, it makes for some disturbing implications about the protagonist.
• Nightmarish Factory: The third zone of "Mascot Mayhem" takes place in an automatic factory where overhead conveyor lines carry clones of the Hostile Animatronics trio.
• No-Gear Level: "Bearly Buried" starts Doug having no powers, due to Malak having cut Doug off from Bierce and stolen the ring pieces, the source of the powers.
• Noodle Incident:
  • Noted twice in both Apocalyptic Logs. In E's notes, she notes to have visited nightmares outside the ones seen like a dollhouse and a cathedral.
  • In the Bierce Diaries, Bierce mentions having attempted to get the ring pieces herself, but encountered monsters like giant spiders, rats, and Edgar only in his goat mask and a diaper.
• Old School Building: "Elementary Evil" is set in a creepy and almost abandoned school. We say almost because there is at least one person inhabiting it, and she is not friendly.
• Orcus on His Throne: Downplayed. Malak makes his first appearance in "Elementary Evil". From then onward, he only shows up after you have stolen the ring piece from that level.
  • Somewhat justified; at the start of "Bearly Buried", he reveals that there is a war going on to become "the ultimate evil", and by the sounds of it, Malak is a contender for that title. With a war to deal with, he simply doesn't have time to drop everything every time some wayward soul winds up in one of his realms.
  • Further justification: the soul shards. The shards are the remains of souls that met their ends in that respective realm. Considering that each realm contains 100+ shards, it's safe to assume that the mooks have been taking care of intruders just fine up until now.
• Pendulum of Death: A trap that is exclusive to the manor itself is a swinging pendulum blade that appears to be made out of solid gold. It is best not to try and touch it.
• Pet the Dog: Implied. Malak seems to genuinely care about Agatha, who he seems to have adopted.
• Pink Is Erotic: The entrance to the hospital in "Torment Therapy" is lit up by pink signs, the hospital itself has a pink and red interior, and the level enemies are seductive nurses. This level is designed to represent Doug's lust for other women and sexual misconduct.
• Power-Up: The "Enemies Revealed" and "Enemies Stunned" shards in each maze, as well as the power you get at the start of nearly every level.
• Power-Up Magnet:Telekinesis is a power that when activated will create a blue shockwave around you that will then proceed to drag all nearby soul shards toward you. This is very useful when trying to collect shards in areas that are quite dangerous.
• Psychosexual Horror: In "Torment Therapy", the level is designed to represent Doug's lust for other women and sexual misconduct as it's a hospital merged with a strip club and the enemies are nurses dressed in nurse fetish outfits.
• Purple Is Powerful: Besides red, one of the most recurring colors in Dark Deception is purple. The soul shards just so happen to be purple in color themselves and are the remains of the fallen souls who have perished in the Nightmares. The same also goes for the ring pieces, which can grant those who wield their immense power.
• Red and Black and Evil All Over: A lot of the monsters you will face will tend to have this type of design.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: Once you collect all the soul shards and the ring piece in a level, the enemies gain these. Malak can also gain this whenever he transforms into his phantom form.
• Red Filter of Doom: When entering the third zone of the cave, the players discover that the cave not only looks demonic but it also is illuminated with a unnatural pinkish red glow.
• Red Sky, Take Warning: The Circus's sky is completely mahogany, it is definitely not caused by light pollution.
• Ribcage Ridge: The ribcage of some giant beast can be found in the last tunnel that you use to go back up the cabin.
• Room Full of Crazy: Used on several levels.
  • "Elementary Evil" has a secret room featuring the phrases "They trusted you" and "No Forgiveness".
  • "Deadly Decadence" has a secret room with numerous phrases, including "THEY HELD YOU BACK", "YOU DESERVE BETTER", and "DON'T CHANGE ANYTHING".
  • The fun house in "Crazy Carnevil" is full of these, with messages like "Who's Laughing Now?" and "Times Up!"
  • In "Torment Therapy", the Therapy Unit is filled with graffiti that seems to be written by the Reapers to vent their rage. This varies from simple taunts like "LIAR, LIAR", to vulgar threats like "MEN ARE PIGS".
  • In "Mascot Mayhem", some of the walls in the outside section of Joy Joy Land have the word "JOY" written over and over again.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: Inverted. After Malak shattered the Riddle of Heaven, Bierce used one of the remaining ring pieces to seal herself in a ballroom, now trapped in the middle of nowhere and forced to call lost souls to help her escape. Then again, her innocence is ambiguous anyways.
• Scary Jack-in-the-Box: One of the traps in "Crazy Carnevil" is that of a large Jack in the box that will wind itself up to the tune of pop goes the weasel. Once it is done, it will lunge out of the box and will devour anything in front of it.
• Schmuck Bait:
  • In "Crazy Carnevil", a clown car leads Doug to a strength tester in a circus tent. It's obviously some sort of trap, but Doug hits it anyways out of Bierce's "request"... only to get trapped in a cage and is forced to escape it alongside several Clown Gremlins that ambush him.
  • Certain Trigger Teddies in the cabin will stand idle rather than chase Doug, instead making hug gestures while saying "Mama". Cue explosion upon touch.
• Shout-Out: As Dark Deception is meant to be a celebration of the horror genre, all sorts of shout-outs to other horror media (among other things) can be seen in the levels:
  • Some of the paintings seen in "Monkey Business" are clearly nods to famous paintings, such as Three Wise Monkeys.
  • There's a secret location in "Elementary Evil" that reveals Agatha's hiding place, a dirty well. The achievement for finding it even shows her coming out of it.
  • The whole theme of the Gold Watchers being statues that only move if you don't look at them is a clear nod to the Weeping Angels (although Word of God confirmed that they're also based on the mechanics of Boo the Ghost.
  • One of the Dread Duckies' jumpscares is launching its second head at Doug, not much different from another creature with a nested mouth.
  • One of the secrets seen in "Stranger Sewers" has graffiti depicting a red balloon saying, "Float On." No points for guessing this one. One of Bierce's death quotes adds to this as well:
  Bierce: "Yes, your corpse will float too."
  • In Zone 2 of "Crazy Carnevil", at least one of the wall graffiti bears a resemblance to the clowns from Killer Klowns from Outer Space.
  • The Therapy Center (a.k.a Zone 2 of "Torment Therapy") is a dirty prison walled up with bricks and has messages scribbled all over the walls. This brings to mind certain parts of the asylum from Outlast.
  • Assuming that the Joy Joy Gang's frenzy forms didn't make it obvious, one of the achievements for defeating their respective boss, Joy Kill, is called, "Terminated."
  • Lucky the Rabbit's last line in "Mascot Mayhem" is, "Goodnight, sweet prince," after Malak orders the Joy Joy Gang to send Doug to the portal, a small nod to Shakespeare's Hamlet.
  • The large runes seen in Zone 3 of "Bearly Buried" resemble the markers from Dead Space.
  • The masses of faces making up the walls looks oddly familiar to the walls of faces that appear during the Eclipse in Berserk. That or Giygas from Mother.
• Soul Jar: The soul shards are these. They are essentially the fragments of a soul that had been shattered into several pieces. If one were to collect enough of them, they would be rewarded with a ring piece.
• Sickly Green Glow:
  • The sewer is illuminated with dull green lighting. Fitting since Green Is Gross.
  • The toxic pools of "Bearly Buried" are more bright and vibrantly green compared to the sewers.
• Speed Blitz: Speed Boost, the first power you get in the game, allows you to do this to escape enemies and other threats more easily.
  • Later on, Lucky the Rabbit uses his own speed boost to help catch up with Doug.
• Spikes of Doom: By far the most common trap one will encounter has to be the spike trap which can be either tall or small. But regardless of which, stepping on it will hurt. Luckily, you will be able to hear when they activate and thus can time it just right.
• Soundtrack Dissonance: At the end of "Mascot Mayhem", the Joy Joy Ditty plays while the Joy Joy Gang is beating the shit out of you.
• Source Music: This happens consistently at the start of all Chapter 4 levels, with two tracks being played in an area while one is played by the characters.
  • An implied example. Zone 3 of "Bearly Buried" reveals that thousands of souls make up the outer walls of the cave, and it's possible that they are voicing their agony through the level's tracks.
• Super-Deformed: A few of the more cartoonish-looking monsters such as the Monkeys and the Clowns have heads that are far larger than their own bodies.
• Temporary Online Content: Both the Silent Hill and House of Ashes expansions for Monsters & Mortals have been delisted.
• Tempting Fate: During the second part of "Mascot Mayhem", Bierce hopes that you don't have to deal with the other animatronics after meeting Hangry. Cue Doug running into Lucky seconds later.
• "Test Your Strength" Game: You find one inside the main tent of the Fun Murder Circus. By ringing the bell, you are rewarded with being locked in a cage.
• This Way to Certain Death: After collecting all the soul shards, the player then proceeds to head to the final passageway that has a giant hole in the center. Once at the bottom, we soon quickly discover that the floor and walls are littered with the bones of Mama Bear's victims. If this doesn't look like a bad sign, then Malak will definitely paint it as one.
  Malak: "Are you sure you want to go that way?"
  (Doug falls into the hole)
  Malak: "Bad choice, mortal."
• To Serve Man: There are a lot of monsters who are more then willing to eat their victims.
• Tulpa: All the monsters seem to be symbolic of some kind of sin or thought.
• Turns Red: Enemies in their "nightmare forms" become a lot more aggressive and are slightly faster in speed. Plus, they quite literally turn red, be it their eyes or their clothes.
• Underground Level: Most of "Bearly Buried" takes place in a vast cave system.
• The Underworld: This exists as a zone in "Bearly Buried". It turns out that the very depths of Mama Bear's realm consist of thousands of souls from the people she killed. The only way around is through a maze that looks like its floating in the sky.
• Video-Game Lives: You start out with 3 lives to collect every shard, and you can unlock more starting lives and restore lost lives by doing well in the mazes.
• Villainous Breakdown: Agatha eventually goes through one by the end of her stage after Bierce lets Doug free.
  Agatha: Bierce! STAY OUT OF MY ROOM! YOU'RE BOTH CHEATING!
• Voice with an Internet Connection: Bierce takes this role throughout the game, with the exception of "Bearly Buried" where Malak steals the role.
• Warm Place, Warm Lighting: After Malak summons his minions, the entire ballroom is engulfed in flames that seems to give everything a orangish filter.
• Was Once a Man: Nearly every monster (that we know of) were once humans who, after their death, had their souls twisted into new forms based on the sins they committed while they were alive. For example, the Dread Duckies were deceitful, the Gold Watchers were greedy, and the Murder Monkeys were murderers.
• Wham Episode: "Mascot Mayhem" ends with Doug being caught by the Joy Joy Gang and Mind Raped by Malak, revealing his Dark and Troubled Past and allowing Malak and the Nightmare monsters to invade the Ballroom. Bierce is able to drive them out, but not before she is wounded and all the ring pieces are stolen. Despite this, Malak is still able to drag the now powerless Doug into "Bearly Buried", where he's left to be murdered by Mama Bear and her Trigger Teddies... if not for a mysterious blue sphere of light, who is actually Tammy, Doug's deceased daughter.
• Yellow Lightning, Blue Lightning: The Defibrillator Paddles which will only activate if the player gets too close to them will release a discharge of red electricity in an attempt to fry the player.
• You Shall Not Evade Me:
  • Dread Duckies reel in the player like a fish on a hook with their mechanical inner mouth in one of their death scenes.
  • During the second half of "Torment Therapy", the Nurses gain the ability to throw pills that stun Doug much like the Dread Duckies can with their extendable duck heads. Unlike the Dread Duckies, however, the Nurses will immediately go in for the kill instead of taunting.

---

"You are dead."

"Ahahahahaha!"