The portal to the beast opens at midnight...
A depressed giraffe named Giraffe sits on the couch day and night, discouraged by his deformity; his slippery hooves which make it hard to walk, or even stand. His only joy in life is his "girlfriend", a giraffe pop star named Love whom he's never even met in any capacity. When Love announces that she'll be free to meet fans on the other side of town, our protagonist sets off on a quest to finally see her for the first time. Unfortunately, things don't exactly go as planned... and they only get much worse from there...
Giraffe Town is a Surreal Humor horror game by indie developer Samer Khatib, creator of Potato Thriller. You play as Giraffe, whose slippery feet make controlling him very difficult, especially in the game's challenging platforming sections. It's a rather short game by means of narrative, but unless you're a very skilled player, the challenges you'll face will ensure you get more than your money's worth.
The game is only available on Steam
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Giraffe Town provides example:
- All for Nothing: It turns out Giraffe was chasing a ghost in his quest to find Love. When he gets to "her house" he meets a creepy old man wearing her skin, and is murdered after all the shit he's been through. Thankfully, Tunnelz sends Giraffe back in time to the start of the game (along with the shoes), though it creates another timeline, as shown by the Wanted Man's house on the Otherside, where Giraffe's headless corpse is still on the couch.
- Ambiguous Situation: We never learn whether Love was just some puppet the serial killer used to lure giraffes to his house, or if she was a real giraffe who was murdered and skinned by him to make a disgusting giraffe mask.
- Big Good: Big Dog is the defender of the town. At first, it seems like an empty boast, but late gameplay and lore reveals that he's a competent detective and he can hold his own in a fight.
- Bittersweet Ending: The town is no longer plagued by the demons that were killing the town and weakening the sun, but at the cost of Big Dog's life. He passes on his role as guardian to Giraffe and they confide in each other that they both did a good job, before Big Dog passes away. Giraffe makes a simple yet heartfelt memorial to him at his doghouse, and walks on with a new sense of purpose.
- Canis Major: Big Dog has the ability to make himself bigger. Downplayed (and also played for laughs) in that he really only becomes a little bit bigger than the protagonist.
- Character Development: By the end of the game, Giraffe has overcome his disability with the shoes Tunnelz gave him and learns to value himself, gets over Love, and wields a gun as the new guardian of his town thanks to Big Dog.
- Chekhov's Gun: In the first half of the game, Giraffe meets some weird guy (possibly Samer Khatib's Author Avatar) who can do facial expressions and is waiting at the bus to go to a friend's wedding, and leaves after said bus hits Giraffe. The same bus comes back later after the Beast mortally wounds Big Dog, running down the Beast and finishing it off.
- Creepy Good: To be frank, both Big Dog and Tunnelz the Clown look just as unsettling as every single other thing in the game, but they both unambiguously care about Giraffe and help him succeed.
- Dead All Along: Love, who claims to be on the other Side of Town, is nowhere publicly to be found, and returns visually only as a taxidermist mask used by The Wanted Man. After making it to the Otherworld, you find her head on a stand, which will turn towards Giraffe when not in view of the camera and yell in agony when Giraffe tries to interact with it, which itself has upsetting implications...
- Heroic Sacrifice: RIP Big Dog. He deserved so much better.
- Killed Offscreen: The original timeline version of the Scuba Agents were shot dead by Big Dog, according to the latter's diary.
- Nothing Is Scarier: Much of the game has an uncomfortable amount of pausing, silence and ambiance that the world itself feels dead and disquieting, even when silly things are going on. Turns out it's that way because the sun is dying, and the reason THAT is happening is because a demon only known as The Beast is killing it while being thwarted by sacrifices. Even with all this being revealed, very precious few details are only explained from an outsiders perspective, with the rest being pure speculation. Such examples are the questions of why The Beast itself looks like a disfigured giraffe, who are the Scuba Agents and what exactly happened to Love.
- Paper-Thin Disguise: The Wanted Man's disguise is a poorly made giraffe head with obvious seams, graft staples, and wall eyes. In addition he has no costume to go with it, leaving his very much human body exposed. Giraffe buys that it's Love completely in spite of it, but pieces it together as he thinks about it... but by then it's far too late. It's implied he was in denial after everything he went through.
- Shout-Out:
- The first half of the game takes place within a town with heavy fog and white falling flakes while the second half takes place in a parallel world of dilapidated and rusted, metallic interior, a clear reference to Silent Hill.
- Late in the game, Giraffe carries around a very large key on his back for a short amount of time and defeating the final boss results in the game becoming blurry and slow motion, referencing Kingdom Hearts.
- A Billboard that giraffe explores states "A Simple Room: coming soon" as the developers black and white face shifts between two poses reminiscent of Tommy Wiseau's infamous film The Room (2003).
- Stating the Simple Solution: When Giraffe explains his plight to Tunnelz the Clown, the odd character mulls it over for a second before asking Giraffe if he ever tried wearing shoes before. Lo and behold, the pair of clown shoes provide Giraffe the means to give himself traction and balance, and he has them for the rest of the game, negating the ice physics he has.
- Stylistic Suck: The game has a cheap look to it, many character animations are either simple or stock mocap files, textures are low-rez or simple, the gameplay is limited, the dialog is awkwardly paced, the objectives can be hard to understand, and the gameplay is so tough due to the physics and jankiness that it's what gives it its longevity. However the game is completely aware of its low budget, poking fun at itself constantly for from the intro onwards.
- Well-Intentioned Extremist: The Wanted Man seen on all the posters leading up to his home seems genuinely sorry he seemingly has to trick and murder Giraffe as a sacrifice, going as far as apologizing for using a fork to kill him instead of using a cleaner knife. It seems to be a necessary sacrifice to temporarily keep the demon killing the sun appeased. By the same logic the Scuba Agents also want the beast to be appeased, but at the very least won't murder Giraffe if he follows their instructions, though considering what that leads to, it may be worse...
- What Happened to the Mouse?: The Wanted Man is the only character who doesn't appear again after their initial appearance - which is unusual considering you go through the Otherworld version of his house to fight the Beast and Big Dog's diary explicitly states that he's still around.
