History VideoGame / Daylight

* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: The voice guiding you just disappears by the time you reach the epilogue, without really having any sort of concluding speech or indication that he's going away or that things are coming to a close.

* CheckpointStarvation: Dying in a level sends you back to the beginning, so you'll have to re-collect all the remnants again.

The player takes the role of Sarah, a young woman who wakes up locked in the abandoned Mid Island Mental Hospital with nothing except a cell phone and a cultured male voice urging her to proceed deeper into depths of the hospital and unlock its secrets. The cell phone serves as both a flashlight and a real-time mapping device; Sarah can also carry a limited number of glowsticks and flares; glowsticks provide additional light and reveal secrets, while flares can be used to drive off the dangerous "shadow people" that inhabit the asylum halls. Flares are limited and Sarah has no other means of combatting the shadow people, so much of the game must be spent evading and escaping from them.

The main gameplay element of ''Daylight'' is that each maze-like level is procedurally generated, so the experience will be different on each playthrough. There are no traditional cutscenes, and pre-scripted events and even the voice's narrative are at a bare minimum, with most of the story being found in notes and logs. Similar to ''[[VideoGame/{{Slender}} Slender: the Eight Pages]]'', Sarah's goal is to collect all the notes detailing the hospital's past (referred to as "remnants") scattered throughout each level. As Sarah collects more and more notes, maze-like markings appear on her left arm, increasing the ferocity of attacks by the shadow people. Upon collecting all notes in a level, Sarah call collect the "Sigil", an item of significance from the hospital's past such as a teddy bear, a bible, or a doll. The "Sigil" can be used to unlock the "Seal of Shadows" blocking the way to the next level. The game has 5 levels of gameplay and a playable epilogue.

* BedlamHouse: The hospital's heyday was in the late 19th century to early 20th century, so this is to be expected. However, the notes portray the overall running of the hospital as generally orderly with the staff trying to do the best they could, despite a level of monetary-driven corruption by the management and recurring disturbing paranormal events.

''Daylight'' is a first-person horror game for the PC and Playstation 4, published by Atlus and developed by Zombie Studios, best known for developing ''ZorkNemesis'', the early tactical shooter series ''Spec Ops'', the budget tactical shooters ''DeltaForceTaskForceDagger'' and ''ShadowOpsRedMercury'', and the more recent ''BlacklightTangoDown''. They have also been involved in developing simulation software for the U.S. military. The game uses the Unreal Engine 4.

* TomatoInTheMirror[=/=]TheReveal: [[spoiler: Sarah is Patient 13, who born and raised in the mental hospital. Her mother was one of the patients, who died in childbirth, and she had no family to take her in and foster parents would return her due to supernatural occurrences surrounding her. She's also a descendant of the 13th witch, a young girl who avoided execution by accusing the other 12 suspected women of witchcraft, resulting in their execution and burial on the island. The other 12 accused witches are understandably pissed at her.]]

* BilingualBonus: The 13th node of the Seal of Shadows [[spoiler: is given in English as "Awakening" in the ending. However, the actual latin word inscribed on the node is Mortis, which is latin for "Death".]]

* ActionGirl: Averted. Like the male protagonists of other similar games in the genre, Sarah is just an ordinary person trying to cope with a terrifying extraordinary situation. She has no combat skills or extraordinary physical abilities, and is understandably freaked out by the terrifying entities stalking her.

* TomatoInTheMirror[=/=]TheReveal: [[spoiler: Sarah is Patient 13, who born and raised in the mental hospital. Her mother was one of the patients, who died in childbirth, and she had no family to take her in and foster parents would return her due to supernatural occurrences surrounding her. She's also a descendant of the 13th witch, a young girl who avoided execution by accusing the other 12 women of witchcraft, resulting in their execution and burial on the island. The other 12 accused witches are understandably pissed at her.]]

* BodyHorror: The maze-like markings appear to be carved into Sarah's arm as she picks up remnants, although they do disappear once she passes through the Seal of Shadows. The notes detail how some patients actually carved the markings into their own bodies for real; this process was usually fatal.

The main gameplay element of ''Daylight'' is that each maze-like level is procedurally generated, so the experience will be different on each playthrough. Cutscenes, pre-scripted events, and even the voice's narrative are at a bare minimum, with most of the story being found in notes and logs. Similar to ''[[VideoGame/{{Slender}} Slender: the Eight Pages]]'', Sarah's goal is to collect all the notes detailing the hospital's past (referred to as "remnants") scattered throughout each level. As Sarah collects more and more notes, maze-like markings appear on her left arm, increasing the ferocity of attacks by the shadow people. Upon collecting all notes in a level, Sarah call collect the "Sigil", an item of significance from the hospital's past such as a teddy bear, a bible, or a doll. The "Sigil" can be used to unlock the "Seal of Shadows" blocking the way to the next level. The game has 5 levels of gameplay and a playable epilogue.

The main gameplay element of ''Daylight'' is that each maze-like level is procedurally generated, so the experience will be different on each playthrough. Cutscenes, pre-scripted events, and even the voice's narrative are at a bare minimum, with most of the story being found in notes and logs. Similar to ''SlenderTheEightPages'', Sarah's goal is to collect all the notes detailing the hospital's past (referred to as "remnants") scattered throughout each level. As Sarah collects more and more notes, maze-like markings appear on her left arm, increasing the ferocity of attacks by the shadow people. Upon collecting all notes in a level, Sarah call collect the "Sigil", an item of significance from the hospital's past such as a teddy bear, a bible, or a doll. The "Sigil" can be used to unlock the "Seal of Shadows" blocking the way to the next level. The game has 5 levels of gameplay and a playable epilogue.

* PlayingAgainstType: Zombie Studios is best know for tactical shooters. ''Daylight'' is their first foray into the horror genre, unless you count the dark adventure game ''ZorkNemesis''.

* TomatoInTheMirror[=/=]TheReveal: [[spoiler: Sarah is Patient 13, who born and raised in the mental hospital. Her mother was one of the patients, who died in childbirth, and she had no family to take her in and foster parents would return her due to supernatural occurrences surrounding her. She's also a descendant of the 13th witch, a young girl who avoided execution by accusing the other 12 women of witchcraft, resulting in their execution and burial on the island. The other 12 witches are understandably pissed at her.]]

* WeakenedByTheLight: The shadow people will burst into flames and dissolve into ash when exposed to the light from a flare. However, the voice specifies that "they wither in flames", and they don't seem at all bothered by your flashlight, glowsticks, or the occasional dim bulb still active in the hospital. [[spoiler: Then you learn the shadow people are the ghosts of 12 accused witches who were executed on the island... granted, they were apparently hanged (as was historically accurate in the Americas), not burned at the stake.]]

* [[AndThenJohnWasAZombie And Then Sarah Was a Witch]]: Implied by the rather dark final image in the ending.

ArcNumber: 13. It reoccurs prominently throughout the remnants, Patient 13 is repeatedly mentioned, there are 13 nodes to the Seal of Shadows, and [[spoiler: 13 accused witches were supposed to have been executed and buried on the island 300 years ago... but only 12 were actually killed. The fate of the 13th witch is central to the story.]]