Game 5 of 2024: Home Safety Hotline

 Home Safety Hotline

Developer: Night Signal Entertainment
Publisher: Night Signal Entertainment
Platform: PC
Genre: Interactive Fiction/Horror

Difficulty: Easy
Hours: 2.5

Finished: Yes
Final Rating: 7.8/10

I love interactive fiction, but I am not crazy about horror. With a few exceptions, I don't really care for horror games, movies, books, whatever. Well, I am happy to report that I like Home Safety Hotline.

Another 90's computer simulator.

Really love that CRT filter they've got going on.

Much like Hypnospace Outlaw, Home Safety Hotline takes place in the 90's. It gives you a pretty authentic looking Windows 95 desktop and interface. Each day you log in and take calls from people who have strange occurrences that are outside the purview of the normal authorities. It's up to you to pull from your database of hazards, critters, and supernatural horrors and determine ails your caller. And hey, sometimes you get it wrong and they call you back to chew you out.

I've got one of these at my house.

While it doesn't have any jump scares (thank God), Home Safety Hotline packs in the creepiness. You get glimpses of office like through calls with your supervisor, Carol, and mysterious emails from an unhinged former colleague. The calls range from kinda funny to unsettling to downright horrifying. I really have to give Home Safety Hotline a lot of credit for not relying on a bunch of violence and gore for thrills; they give you just enough and let your imagination do the rest.

It's fairly short at maybe two or three hours and sure, it kind of drags here and there, but Home Safety Hotline is well worth an afternoon.