Signed Mary
Moț Andrei Laurențiu · 2024 · Visual Novel, Psychological Horror, Female Protagonist, Philosophical, Story Rich
PC
Positive86% · 22
Compare prices in Official Stores
Screenshots
About Signed Mary
Introduction
“Signed Mary” is the first visual novel I have fully completed. It is a narrative experience that delves into the psyche of the main character, a 25-year-old woman troubled by her past. The story features elements specific to the 'psychological horror' genre, with a narrative thread designed to be dissected. Symbolism and storytelling methods are used to match the layered and ambiguous nature of the story, allowing for multiple playthroughs, as there are three endings based on the choices the player makes throughout the game. It contains a multitude of carefully chosen details, encouraging thorough analysis, as nothing was selected and included without a specific purpose, all facilitating the presentation of a complex character study. The development process for this project took approximately five months, including concept creation, script writing, and the production of graphical, musical, aesthetic, and interface materials, followed by coding.
Premise:
Loraine is a 25-year-old young woman pursuing an unpredictable modeling career. She struggles with her adult life and the loss of her parents from seven years ago, an event that drastically steers the life she wishes to live. Loraine has chosen to completely forget her past to cope with the present, but she is forced to remember it when she receives a phone call from her deceased parents and finds a letter signed with a familiar name, 'Mary,' calling her back to her hometown. This journey becomes a pretext to visit her parents after seven years from their death, but her plans are disrupted by a car accident. Now, Loraine roams the deserted streets of her hometown seeking help, and the only person left who can assist her is the enigmatic Mary. However, both are threatened by a morbid presence. To save herself and Mary, Loraine must remember and accept her past before it is too late.
This visual novel is a personal project, crafted with love and dedication, in which I’ve handled the character art, story, script, coding, and music composition by myself.
Step into Nostalgia
Experience a visual novel that feels like a lost game from the past. With its unique 900x900 resolution, this game brings back the charm of retro visual novels from the early 2000s, reminiscent of the stories you’d find on beloved consoles like the PS2. It’s as if you’ve uncovered a forgotten classic and are playing it on an emulator, giving it that authentic, old-school feel.
Designed specifically to evoke the nostalgia of classic visual novels, every aspect of the game—from the art style to the user interface—captures the simplicity and atmosphere of those timeless experiences.
This game is crafted as a love letter for the early 2000s horror games, and as such, references to this era of games are to be found for lovers of this genre.
Rediscover the magic of playing a forgotten visual novel from a different era, now on your PC, as if you’ve found an old favorite you never knew you missed.
Themes:
Taking inspiration from famous titles such as “Silent Hill 2”, “The Babadook”, “Black Swan”, “P.T.”, the psychological horror experience, entitled “Signed Mary”, uses its dark vague narrative to explore the desire for maturity and independence but, at the same time, the fear of change that comes along with such desire. It explores the fear of uncertainty, addressing the question of whether or not we can live up to the expectations of our future, making us question if we can really predict it. How would we react if our future self would be the complete opposite of what we thought it would be? What if we ended up disappointing our past self? It challenges our ability of foreseeing the future, and marks the question if it’s worth trying. Such themes are explored in a setting which allows the past and the future to be conjoined, their barrier of time becoming thinner as night falls, symbolizing the inevitable arrival of change in our lives.
Other themes addressed are the effects of trauma and how they can manifest in a lonely environment, specifically losing the ones close to you. It toggles different forms of unhealthy coping mechanisms with the goal of making us acknowledge them. It’s a lesson of how to live with ourselves at peace and cultivate self love in a healthy way. It’s about self acceptance and forgiveness, all under the mark of horror coming from our concerning unhealed subconsciousness.
Trigger Warning:
This game contains content that may be disturbing to some players, including:
• Themes of Death and Suicide
• Deep Psychological Themes
• Flashing Lights
• Loud Noises
Player discretion is advised. If you are sensitive to any of these topics, please proceed with caution or consider not playing this game.
This visual novel is a work of fiction. Any references to real-world brands, including Vivienne Westwood, are purely for narrative purposes and are not intended to imply any official endorsement, affiliation, or sponsorship. The inclusion of these references is solely for character development and setting the scene, and does not indicate any connection between the creator of this visual novel and the mentioned brands. All trademarks, logos, and brand names are the property of their respective owners.
“Signed Mary” is the first visual novel I have fully completed. It is a narrative experience that delves into the psyche of the main character, a 25-year-old woman troubled by her past. The story features elements specific to the 'psychological horror' genre, with a narrative thread designed to be dissected. Symbolism and storytelling methods are used to match the layered and ambiguous nature of the story, allowing for multiple playthroughs, as there are three endings based on the choices the player makes throughout the game. It contains a multitude of carefully chosen details, encouraging thorough analysis, as nothing was selected and included without a specific purpose, all facilitating the presentation of a complex character study. The development process for this project took approximately five months, including concept creation, script writing, and the production of graphical, musical, aesthetic, and interface materials, followed by coding.
Premise:
Loraine is a 25-year-old young woman pursuing an unpredictable modeling career. She struggles with her adult life and the loss of her parents from seven years ago, an event that drastically steers the life she wishes to live. Loraine has chosen to completely forget her past to cope with the present, but she is forced to remember it when she receives a phone call from her deceased parents and finds a letter signed with a familiar name, 'Mary,' calling her back to her hometown. This journey becomes a pretext to visit her parents after seven years from their death, but her plans are disrupted by a car accident. Now, Loraine roams the deserted streets of her hometown seeking help, and the only person left who can assist her is the enigmatic Mary. However, both are threatened by a morbid presence. To save herself and Mary, Loraine must remember and accept her past before it is too late.
This visual novel is a personal project, crafted with love and dedication, in which I’ve handled the character art, story, script, coding, and music composition by myself.
Step into Nostalgia
Experience a visual novel that feels like a lost game from the past. With its unique 900x900 resolution, this game brings back the charm of retro visual novels from the early 2000s, reminiscent of the stories you’d find on beloved consoles like the PS2. It’s as if you’ve uncovered a forgotten classic and are playing it on an emulator, giving it that authentic, old-school feel.
Designed specifically to evoke the nostalgia of classic visual novels, every aspect of the game—from the art style to the user interface—captures the simplicity and atmosphere of those timeless experiences.
This game is crafted as a love letter for the early 2000s horror games, and as such, references to this era of games are to be found for lovers of this genre.
Rediscover the magic of playing a forgotten visual novel from a different era, now on your PC, as if you’ve found an old favorite you never knew you missed.
Themes:
Taking inspiration from famous titles such as “Silent Hill 2”, “The Babadook”, “Black Swan”, “P.T.”, the psychological horror experience, entitled “Signed Mary”, uses its dark vague narrative to explore the desire for maturity and independence but, at the same time, the fear of change that comes along with such desire. It explores the fear of uncertainty, addressing the question of whether or not we can live up to the expectations of our future, making us question if we can really predict it. How would we react if our future self would be the complete opposite of what we thought it would be? What if we ended up disappointing our past self? It challenges our ability of foreseeing the future, and marks the question if it’s worth trying. Such themes are explored in a setting which allows the past and the future to be conjoined, their barrier of time becoming thinner as night falls, symbolizing the inevitable arrival of change in our lives.
Other themes addressed are the effects of trauma and how they can manifest in a lonely environment, specifically losing the ones close to you. It toggles different forms of unhealthy coping mechanisms with the goal of making us acknowledge them. It’s a lesson of how to live with ourselves at peace and cultivate self love in a healthy way. It’s about self acceptance and forgiveness, all under the mark of horror coming from our concerning unhealed subconsciousness.
Trigger Warning:
This game contains content that may be disturbing to some players, including:
• Themes of Death and Suicide
• Deep Psychological Themes
• Flashing Lights
• Loud Noises
Player discretion is advised. If you are sensitive to any of these topics, please proceed with caution or consider not playing this game.
This visual novel is a work of fiction. Any references to real-world brands, including Vivienne Westwood, are purely for narrative purposes and are not intended to imply any official endorsement, affiliation, or sponsorship. The inclusion of these references is solely for character development and setting the scene, and does not indicate any connection between the creator of this visual novel and the mentioned brands. All trademarks, logos, and brand names are the property of their respective owners.
What Steam players say
Recent verbatim reviews from Steam — separate from playze.io community reviews below.
I'm still not used to having to scour the store page of every game I'm interested in for whether or not they use the plagiarism machine. Unfortunately I only found out this game uses genAI after I bought it. I can't in good conscience recommend it, regardless of how little they may have used it. To create art for a game only to use something so unethical as genAI which steals other people's art is unthinkable to me. Even if no stolen art was used in this particular game, the usage itself is still destroying the world in more ways than one. ALL genAI is unethical until made with consent, credit and compensation. It looks like an interesting story with nice psychological horror vibes, and I'm sure a lot of love was put into it. So it's quite sad, and I say all this with a heavy heart, but there are millions of artists, graphic designers, editors and photographers who would have happily lent their skills. Even free stock photos and video editing software supports someone and is still affordable. You can still create an uncanny vibe through art design. I'm sorry for the harsh review but I truly hope I never have to see another promising developer choose this path and that a lesson is…14 found this helpful
why would you add ai8 found this helpful
What I expected to be a simple VN with a fun aesthetic actually turned out to be very impressionate and well-written! Despite the short length and strong influences of other fictional works, the writing manages to delve deeply into the characterizations and psychological themes while maintaining a good pacing and forging its own style in a way. No idea how this game does it, but the ambience actually managed to unsettle me oddly much, it's very immersive and haunting! In particular the soundtrack stands out, plus the visual presentation is lovely and holds a creepily-pleasant nostalgic vibe. The plot may be rather predictable but conveys its messages neatly and with clear directions. Most of the story including details felt so realistic and even relatable, I wasn't expecting it to hit so close home lmao, that made me stress even more while playing. The only part I'm rather displeased with is the AI usage for some background modifications, considering it shouldn't have been difficult to achieve similar result by playing around with filters - even feels nearly comical, considering that art as a method of self expression is a relevant theme here - but at least it seems to be subtle…7 found this helpful
Signed Mary is a mesmerizing psychological horror experience that captures the thick, suffocating energy of Silent Hill and distills it into a Visual Novel format. For $2.99, it offers a haunting story about a young girl returning to her childhood home, where the secrets of her past slowly and uncomfortably unfold through well-paced narrative beats. The presentation is a major highlight; the background imagery captures the moody atmosphere perfectly, paired with a hauntingly effective OST and partial voice acting that adds an extra layer of depth to the characters. Its retro-inspired aesthetic gives it a distinct, unsettling feel that prioritizes psychological dread over cheap jumpscares, making every scene feel purposeful. While it is a shorter experience, it features three different endings based on your perception of the story, providing solid replay value. It is an exceptionally high-quality title that feels much more substantial than its price tag suggests. For fans of psychological horror and strong environmental storytelling, this is a 100% must-buy.2 found this helpful
good if you like this kinda thing +mastered the off-putting vibe, I was paranoid the whole time +/- lots of text, didn't find it too boring tho - loads of weird images/ concepts and vomiting sounds (just a warning..)2 found this helpful
[h1]Beautiful Atmospheric Work [/h1] [hr][/hr] I played this on [b]Steam Deck[/b] and ended up falling asleep near the end — [i]not because I was bored[/i], but because the game put me into such a beautiful state of calm that I just drifted off. And honestly, that was one of the sweetest sleeps I’ve had in a while. This project feels deeply loved by its creator. You can see it in the visual atmosphere, hear it in the sound design, and feel it in the symbolic structure of the story. [b]Everything holds together.[/b] What touched me most was the [b]trauma theme[/b]. That part felt especially meaningful to me, and I think the game has a genuinely strong message under its surface. A very beautiful, atmospheric work. Thank you, developer. 🖤 [hr][/hr]1 found this helpful
Community reviews
—
0 reviews
Sign in to write a review.
No reviews yet. Be the first to review this game.
