Ellen

The story was surprisingly pretty good and well done, although most of it is through things such as notes and pictures. While not entirely a fan of stories told via items that are found during gameplay, I think it was done well enough in Ellen. Also, the main parts of the story are unmissable, which is good, but trying to find all the items definitely give a better scope of the story. I really enjoyed the ending. The graphics were really great, and I loved that there were foreground graphics (and that crawling bug, a nice and hated addition for sure). There were a few jumpscares in the game but nothing overally annoying or unnecessary. The puzzles were decent enough and nothing hard enough where I got stuck or confused. The monsters were easy enough if you didn't rush through it like I did and thus kept dying to the same monster in the same spot because of being impatience! The game autosaves, which is nice enough, but in some spots (such as in the ending) it can really really suck because if you die (like I kept doing), you have to start all the way in the beginning of that area. A manual save would have been a very nice addition to the game. Some of the textboxes get caught off …

Creepy, surrealistic pixel-horror here from newer developer Red Mount, Ellen puts you in the shoes of P.I. James who travels to an abandon old house on the fringe of White Hill in order to find clues and solve the case of a murdered family. In his attempt to sneak in, he ends up falling through the floor; starting his journey in the house's basement. It doesn't take long for him to figure out that things are more than a little f'ed up... Ellen's not a reinvention of this genre within a genre but an exercise in trying to cull and display the best elements of the style. You'll be moving left to right, scouring every nook and cranny for items to unlock progression while reading notes, listening to tapes and doing your best to dig up the dirt that nobody's been able to excavate thus far. Things aren't as simple as you hoped; a couple of neatly designed, weird-out monsters stalk the various areas you'll explore and you're going to need to run or hide from 'em...lest you want to face a one hit death. All of the mechanics work well-enough (I especially enjoyed the quick access inventory you can store possibly necessary items in for speedy use) and the general cycle of gameplay kept …

Pretty good, the usual side-scrolling horror game. Visually stunning, some effects and animations were very good, but that's about everything "[i]outstanding[/i]" this game has to offer. The story, music, and gameplay were okay, but nothing striking in my opinion. What I do dislike about the game is that it is unnecessarily slow. When you're injured, you're unbearably slow, and even if uninjured, the stamina runs out constantly and takes ages to refill. Which I still don't understand the use for, since there's hardly anything to escape from, excluding the scenes where you actually run from something and get infinite stamina. The autosave could be more generous in some places, considering the movement speed. Overall it's a fun experience, and I can see some hard work went into it.

I've known about this game for a while now and although I haven't played it much on this account, I would totally recommend this game. Ellen brings a whole new level to the table of pixel games. This is a beautiful, well thought out game. This game is totally worth the money. If you want a game that will really "speak" to you, this is it. It's fun, challenging, and will keep you hooked.

Solid side scrolling pixel horror game and takes a few hours to complete. This game is up there with The Last Door, Claire, The Long Reach etc..... Really nice music and atmosphere, good little story about revenge and grief. The side notes, drawings and cassettes add to the story if you search for them. There are a few downsides including not being able to skip the logos and disclaimers at the beginning, the rough translation at times and horrible stamina (main character is a smoker, I get it). Solid game regardless

it was a good game but i do have some slight critizims 1 put more batteries in the house or make it more apparent that you only need the flashlight for EXTREMELY dark rooms, i had to restart the game because i couldn't progress without the light 2 consider putting in the warning that this game does contain mentions and depictions of s*icide even though it is a pixelated game. beyond that i bought this at a discount and thought it was worth the price, the atmosphere is spooky and disconserning as hell and the story was great. would love a sequel