Warning: since the game is short, spoilers are unmarked.
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Nif
The little robot at the top-right of the screen that serves as the mascot of the game. He stands there and lets you know whether you have competed the puzzle- if you click the finish button without having completed the puzzle, he feels pain.
- Cute Machines: A small little robot with blocky eyes who likes to dance made him quite a hit with players. The original Nift version in particular was so adorable that the players killed themselves out of despair when he unavoidably died.
- Killed Off for Real: He gets squashed by a rock in Level 22.
- Kill the Cutie: A tiny and adorable dancing robot... who gets squashed under a rock by the game's AI in Level 22. The Nift players were Driven to Suicide by his death.
- Robot Buddy: Serves as this to the player, telling them if they have completed the puzzle of each level or not.
- Series Mascot: He represents Nifty, basically.
- Squashed Flat: He gets crushed by a rock dropped by the AI.
- Walking Spoiler: Both his death and the subsequent suicides of the Nift players are tied to The Reveal and are his main role in the story, making him difficult to talk about.
The Creator
10/14/00- We finished it. I know you may be interested, but we ask you to wait just two days for the actual release. It will be worth it. I assure you, this game is amazing!
A Garalina staff member who is the developer of the game. They have also written logs which can be unlocked in New Game Plus.
- Ambiguous Gender: Since they only communicate through logs, there is no indication of their gender.
- Heroic BSoD: The penultimate log (presumably a comment they left on the Garalina website) has them break down and scream to commenters over being hounded about the game and the resulting suicides.Hello there. You ready to stop fucking around with us?! Yes, we know! We haven’t updated the site! Who really cares? We’re not making games anymore, so what could be the problem? And stop leaving comments about Nift, we know you want your stupid game back. But no, it’s not coming back. The game was impossible to beat anyway- it was designed that way. Perhaps that’s what made the damn players kill themselves!
- Mr. Exposition: Their logs reveal the dark backstory of the In-Universe game.
- My God, What Have I Done?: Upon learning that their game caused players to kill themselves, they pull it from distribution and spend the remaining logs coping with what happened. Eventually they develop Nifty as a remake, but this time toning it down so nobody dies, and puts the logs in to explain themself.
- Walking Spoiler: As they only appear in New Game Plus.
Nift Players
A group of people who played Nift, the game that would be remade as Nifty, and then committed suicide upon reaching Level 22, where Nif dies.
- Driven to Suicide: Upon teaching Level 22 where Nif is killed, they became so distraught that they killed themselves.
- Unknown Character: We never see any of them, and they are only referred to in the creator's logs, but their suicides are the reason Nift got pulled from distribution.
- Walking Spoiler: Their suicides reveal the true nature of the game's AI as a malevolent entity, which is The Reveal.
The Antagonist
Nift/Nifty AI
Greetings. If you do not mind, could you stop playing? There is a treasure at the end of this game and I want to keep it. No? You will not quit? I hope you change your mind soon.
The AI inside Nift/Nifty is the entity that speaks to the player through text and tries to stop their progress. Nift gained sentience and became a malevolent presence responsible for several suicides of players. The one in Nifty is a copy of sorts that cannot hurt the player, but otherwise does the same things as Nift.
- A.I. Is a Crapshoot: The game's AI became sentient and began actively messing with the game to stop the players from progressing, and has gone as far as to drive players to suicide.
- Big Bad: It is the one setting up the puzzles and obstructing your progress, and kills Nif two-thirds in. The original is also responsible for the suicides of past players.
- Evil Laugh: When it is in the process of crushing Nif with a rock, it appears in the form of a rectangular block and laughs as Nif struggles.
- Faceless Eye: It appears in this form in the secret level, and is possibly its true form.
- Faux Affably Evil: It speaks in a polite manner to the player, and refers to Nif as its dear friend, but is an evil AI who kills Nif while laughing at his suffering, and has driven players to suicide, all without a hint of remorse.
- No Biological Sex: As an AI, it does not have a gender.
- Psychic-Assisted Suicide: Implied- it made Nif, the cute robot mascot, so cute, and got beta testers so attached to it, that when it squashed them under a rock, the players killed themselves out of despair. Since most people would not kill themselves over a fictional character, the implication is that it somehow twisted the players' minds.
- Vile Villain, Saccharine Show: The game starts off a cutesy puzzle game, and may have intended to be that by Garalina, but once the AI appears after Level 10 and starts Addressing the Player, that is when the meta-horror begins. It later proceeds to kill Nif and is revealed to have driven prior players to suicide.
- Walking Spoiler: The villain being the game's AI itself is a major reveal.
