Withering Rooms is a single-player, 2.5D, horror action game with many superb influences such as Silent Hill, Clock Tower, and Dark Souls. It pays tribute to a bygone era of retro survival horror games, a genre which I have always been a huge fan of. With that said, Withering Rooms manages to stand out as a unique and rewarding experience on its own. The game centers on a young girl named Nightingale who has been sent to Mostyn Asylum by her father. On her first night in the house, she finds herself trapped in a dream she is unable to awake from. The dream world is a parallel, albeit twisted, version of the asylum whose corridors are filled with all types of menacing, undead creatures that want Nightingale dead.
Withering Rooms was created by solo developer Troy West at Moonless Formless, a new game studio based in Seattle and published by Perp Games. Throughout my 20 hours of gameplay, I had a blast fighting my way through a dizzying variety of undead minions while experimenting with different builds. I also found myself invested in the strange world and its characters. The game sells itself as being ‘set in a procedurally generated Victorian mansion that changes each night,’ which led me to falsely assume there would be limited narrative. Thankfully, I was wrong. Withering Rooms provides a well-rounded, satisfying experience that is hard to believe was created by only one person. If you are a fan of retro horror and Souls-like challenges, then you are in for a treat.
Nowhere to Escape
A cast of unhinged and dangerous characters, all trapped in the dream, try to manipulate Nightingale for their own selfish purposes. The absurdity and imaginative design of some of them feels as if they have stepped straight out from the pages of Alice in Wonderland. Notes and books scattered throughout the game provide additional details as well. Unlike many games that overdo lore dumps, Withering Rooms sprinkles notes and books throughout that offer useful tips, solutions to puzzles, and interesting background details on the world and characters. The manageable amount of reading felt enjoyable and helped me feel more connected to the narrative, and it almost always provided a welcome break from white-knuckled combat.
The dream has corrupted some inhabitants beyond saving, turning them into mindless undead. These shambling creatures are hunted and harvested like cattle, their organs becoming prized trophies for witches that stalk the world. Nightingale’s own path to power becomes a dark reflection of the nightmare around her. To unlock more abilities, she will need to hunt increasingly formidable undead, a practice that blurs the line between survival and becoming a monster herself. This moral ambiguity is further explored through decisions the player makes, which evolves the direction the narrative takes.
Throughout the story you’ll venture beyond the walls of Mostyn Asylum and into a variety of disturbing locals, such as a haunted hedge maze, ancient Byzantine ruins, and a carnival show packed with drunken murderous clowns. I was surprised by how large and varied the world was. And each different area has its own enemy types, secrets, and traps to overcome.
Eventually, you discover a homebase you can return to between exploring called Nowhere. Nowhere acts as a safe haven, accessible from checkpoints scattered throughout the world. Players can then fast travel back to any unlocked checkpoint from Nowhere. This makes it much easier to return to a location where you died, or if you need to return to complete side quests or farm materials for upgrades. Nowhere starts sparsely populated but gradually expands as Nightingale meets new allies. New vendors, crafting stations, and upgrade options become available, eliminating the need for tedious backtracking while adding a gratifying sense of growing power.
Surviving Horror… In Style
A defining feature of Withering Rooms is its diverse array of gear and build options. The cosmetic variation that the different armor and helmets bring to Nightingale is a lot of fun to see. Players will find a wealth of unique gear throughout the world, each tailored to different playstyles. Exploration is a treasure hunter’s dream, with unique gear and tons of loot tucked away in hidden corners. Your loadout consists of a pendant, four rings, a helmet, and a chest piece, all offering a wide range of stat bonuses and special abilities. Players can choose between one-handed weapons, spells, shields, or ranged options like guns, and a quick-select menu makes it easy to favorite your favored weapons or items for easy access. You can even upgrade your favorite gear by finding rare upgrade materials throughout the world. The game allows players to save custom builds, enabling swift switching on the fly which is helpful for overcoming specific enemy types and challenges.
For Souls-like game enthusiasts, Withering Rooms combat offers a rewarding experience as deliberate and slow combat demands careful strategic planning. Upon death, players lose all items and restart the night. This means all enemies respawn with the exception of bosses. Luckily, the game offers a number of ways to ensure it doesn’t feel like a complete loss. You’ll uncover altars scattered throughout the world that allow you to purchase permanent inventory slots. You can assign certain pieces of gear and items to these permanent slots that carry over into the next run. Checkpoints are earned as you explore further, making it easier to make progress in the world without having to slog through the same areas over and over. Additionally, the player earns ability points which can be spent to bolster a variety of defensive or offensive skills, enabling players to grow stronger gradually and making each run rewarding and challenging.
A unique mechanic in Withering Rooms is the curse meter. Taking damage from specific enemies and traps, as well as the use of spells and certain abilities, will fill your curse meter. As the curse meter creeps towards the halfway mark, the world warps around you, transforming into a Silent Hill-esque hellscape. Not only does the atmosphere intensify, but cracks in reality may reveal hidden secrets. When the meter fills completely, you become affected with “curse rot,” causing you to take continuous damage over time. There are different items that help lower your curse meter, as well as gear which helps mitigate how fast your meter fills. Some gear benefits from filling the curse meter, offering bonuses the more afflicted you become. This opens the door for unique play styles that embrace the curse rather than fight it.
While the game introduces the ability to use the environment to hide from enemies early in the game, this didn’t become a core part of my playthrough. As I am not a huge fan of stealth in games, this was appreciated. My experience with Withering Rooms was focused on pure, outright nail-biting combat that forced me head-to-head with some truly nightmarish fiends for which you will want to ensure you are well stocked and prepared for.
The Organ Grind: Nightingale’s Path to Power
What truly stands out in Withering Rooms is the progression and pacing. Early in the game, encountering a new enemy instills a sense of powerlessness and fear. However, as you progress, your power and confidence grow, transforming you into a formidable force with an impressive arsenal of weapons and tools at your disposal. The game provides a great sense of accomplishment by not only granting increased power, but also unlocking quality-of-life improvements that enhance exploration, thus making each run feel more efficient and fun. The sheer number of items and powers to unlock makes each new discovery a satisfying milestone.
With a whopping 80+ different enemy types, each offering distinct challenges, the game boasts an impressive variety of foes. The sheer scale of enemy diversity is remarkable. However, I have to criticize the game for not having enough variety in boss fight mechanics. While I mostly enjoyed the fights, I found myself employing the same strategy each time. Mechanics didn’t feel different enough for me to shake up my playstyle as much as I would have liked. The combination of bosses inflicting heavy curse damage and my spell-reliant playstyle created a frustrating dynamic. Curse mitigation felt like a constant uphill battle, hindering strategic combat choices and turning meter management into a chore. I would have liked to see more variety in how boss fights as, with a well-stocked inventory of healing items, most encounters, even bosses, could be overcome through brute force, diminishing the need for strategic adaptation.
A feature I appreciated with the boss fights was the option to retry without the fear of losing progress. You’ll find a candle that can be lit before each boss encounter. When the candle is lit, you save your progress and return to that exact point in the game with all your items if you die, allowing you to repeatedly take on boss fights without the risk of losing your hard-earned progress. However, the candle’s save feature is confined to the boss room, so be prepared to lose that benefit once you leave the boss area.
The game features a New Game+ mode, allowing you to start fresh with all of your permanent upgrades and gear intact. It also ups the difficulty from the start, preventing the early game from feeling too easy. While I haven’t fully started my second playthrough, I plan to do so eventually. I don’t usually replay games in New Game+, so it is a testament to how much fun I had. I can see Withering Rooms offering many more hours of gameplay for those who want to continue the adventure past the first 20 hour playthrough. And with a large variety of build types to explore, I don’t expect things would get boring any time soon.
Overall, I can’t recommend Withering Rooms enough, and I hope more people experience this indie title. It is packed to the brim with a morbid charm that resonated deeply with me. The grotesque enemy designs and hauntingly beautiful environments create an unforgettable experience that stayed with me long after the credits rolled. There is so much more to this game that I haven’t touched on in this review because I think it is best experienced through blind discovery. While I did encounter a repeating minor glitch that caused load screens to get stuck while transitioning between areas, it was a very minor issue and didn’t seriously impact my enjoyment. It never required me to quit the game, but it sometimes could hold on a black screen for upwards of 30 seconds. This didn’t happen too often, however.
If you play Withering Rooms, prepare for a difficult and, at times, unforgiving experience. While the game’s punishing combat may not be for everyone, the sense of accomplishment from overcoming a difficult boss or area is rewarding. The game offers incremental rewards that keep you motivated throughout the journey. Withering Rooms isn’t for the faint of heart, but for those who persevere, a world of rewarding challenges, twisted horrors, and deep, satisfying progression awaits.
Sincere thanks to Perp Games for providing the review code for Withering Rooms. You can find Seasoned Gaming’s review policy here.
