"You might not always like what you learn, but it will help to find Hannah. Trust me."
There is no trace of the kidnapped girl Hannah Donford. At least not until her friends receive a message from her phone. This message only contains a phone number...your phone number. This strange circumstance brings the group new hope, but what does that mean for you? Will you respond?
Duskwood is a small, quaint village surrounded by a dense forest. Strangers rarely get lost in this remote area, but when they do, they always describe the place as weird or even scary. The locals of Duskwood have never been worried about this. However, in the last 72 hours, many things have changed, and even among the villagers concern is growing: a girl has disappeared and the mysterious legends surrounding the ancient forest seem to come alive...
Duskwood is a Freemium game available for Android and iOS and released starting in 2019. It's played in a WhatsApp-style messenger app. The player does not play as a character, but becomes part of the story as him/herself, helping Hannah's friends track down clues about her disappearance. Hints on Hannah's whereabouts can be found hidden all through the game, but the main focus is on the dialogue with the other characters, who are embodied by actors and have an authentic life of their own. They update their statuses, pursue hobbies, and share news via video calls. Additionally, the player has the opportunity to unlock further hints and story segments by performing spy missions (such as hacking into cloud storage or listening in on private conversations).
Duskwood is being released in episodes. As of May 28th, 2022, all ten episodes are available.
This game provides examples of:
- Big Bad: Obviously the kidnapper responsible for Hannah's disappearance. As of episode, it appears he's Michael Hanson, the former owner of The Aurora Bar and father of Jennifer Hanson, a girl who died 10 years prior in a hit and run accident...and Hannah was the driver. But then it's subverted when it turns out that Michael was Dead All Along. Richy is the true culprit.
- Cliffhanger: Episode 2 ends on one, with Cleo in Hannah's apartment on a video call with the player, hiding upstairs as the front door creaks open... and the signal drops.
- Episode 3 ends with Dan ending up in a car accident with doctors unsure if he'll make it, and Cleo being stalked in the woods by the kidnapper.
- Episode 4 ends with Lilly doxing both the hacker and the player.
- Convicted by Public Opinion: Lilly makes use of this by posting a video denouncing the hacker and the player as Hannah's kidnappers and as the murderers of the dead girl in the forest, and doxing you both in the process. She has zero proof. You start getting angry messages anyway.
- Creepy Crows: The raven serves as an Animal Motif of sorts for the Big Bad kidnapper, as the legend of the Man Without a Face says that he puts signs of the raven on the doors of wrongdoers to mark them then punish them later.
- Deadpan Snarker: Dan is perhaps the biggest one in the game. Richy has his moments as well, and you certainly have the option to play as one too.
- Drowning My Sorrows: Dan does this in Episode 3 after Jessy stands him up and the guilt of having a key made for Thomas for Hannah's apartment starts weighing on his conscience.
- Everyone Is a Suspect: The hacker tells you very bluntly not to trust anyone in the group of Hannah's friends.
- Freemium: The game is completely free, yes. However, if you want to view the vast majority of images or listen to most of the phone calls, or take certain dialogue paths (some of which lead to a Romance Sidequest), you'll need to buy the media pack.
- Gondor Calls for Aid: Lilly does this in a reversal of her last big act, calling on the whole world to help Jake. And the whole world answers.
- It's Up to You: While the characters do the physical labour, so to speak, as the player has no physical presence, the player is the one doing everything that requires social interaction. This ranges from the understandable to the absurd. For instance, when the police find the body of a dead woman, who's going to break it to Hannah's distraught boyfriend Thomas? Will it be Cleo, Hannah's best friend? Richy, who's sympathetic and concerned? Jessy, the sensitive one? Nah, let's hit up the complete stranger, that's appropriate.
- Microtransactions: You can purchase additional "credits" which will allow you to access more moves should you fail to complete a mini-game in the allotted amount of movements. As the mini-games progressively become harder and harder and start to become more luck-based, the credits become increasingly valuable.
- Mini-Game: They're required to progress; each time you complete a story segment, you'll need to hop on over to the cloud and "decrypt" more of Hannah's data via matching lines of coloured cubes. The mini-game variations become increasingly difficult over time.
- Love Triangle: Two appear to be in play: Dan is interested in both Lilly and Jessy, while both Richy and Dan are interested in Jessy. The player can get in on this too by pursuing Jessy.
- Luck-Based Mission: The mini-games required to progress the story gradually gain elements of this as the difficulty ramps up. No matter how skilled you are, if there aren't any matching cubes in the vicinity of where you need them to be, you aren't passing the stage.
- Malevolent Masked Man: True to his name, the man without a face always appears wearing a mask.
- Never Suicide: Invoked. When Hannah's depression is discussed with the hacker, he sharply shuts down any possibility that she may have harmed herself or had anything to do with her own disappearance. Even if you insist it's a possibility that shouldn't be ignored, he won't consider it. To be absolutely fair, he does claim to have witnessed the kidnapping firsthand, which is pretty solid proof in his eyes that she didn't vanish willingly.
- Averted with Amy, who committed suicide out of guilt.
- Police Are Useless: While they are investigating, they aren't finding any leads, leaving the group desperate to do anything that will help them find Hannah.
- Also subverted by the fact that no one seems to tell the police anything. Receive threatening letters from the kidnapper, specifically telling you not to go into the forest, which you'd think would be an excellent reason to search the forest? Don't tell the police. Receive threatening phone calls? Don't tell the police. Missing girl's phone sends a text? Don't tell the police. The list goes on. It's entirely possible that the police are simply quite literally clueless, and thus can't be of any use because they have nothing to work with. Sort of patched at the end where Alan eventually gets persuaded by you and finds out the location thanks to a colleague of his, and even manages to get Hannah to freedom.
- Redemption Quest: Invoked. Chapter 6 as a whole serves story-wise as one for Lilly, deliberately orchestrated by Jake to force the player and Lilly to work together and therefore resolve their differences. At the end of the episode, a second one occurs of Lilly's own volition when she decides to help Jake.
- The Reveal: The Man Without A Face was Richy all along, who faked his death to throw suspicions off him. His motive is that years ago, Hannah and Amy came to him to ask them to drive to Grimrock because Amy lost something there. Because Richy had been at the festival all day and he was drunk, he instead gave them the keys to an AMC Gremlin. Minutes later, they showed up again with the car covered in blood. Richy drove them to the site and saw Jennifer's corpse, which they buried in the forest and never spoke of it again.
- Romance Sidequest: Possible options at this point appear to be Jessy, Richy, or the Hacker, though the Hacker is only with the media pack.
- Right for the Wrong Reasons: After Richy is attacked, Jessy is in deep denial and insists that he's still out there somewhere for them to find. She's right, but it's not because the culprit spared him, it's because he himself is the culprit.
- Star-Crossed Lovers: You can become this if you choose to date Jake with the paid package, as he always has to keep his location secret and will never be able to contact you in person.
- Surprise Incest: A one-sided variant. Jake contacted Hannah a few years before the game begins, wanting to get to know one of his half-sisters, as he had no other family. He never told her of his relation to her, though, as he didn't want to cause strife in her family — the problem being that with her not knowing the truth, she fell for him. Once he realized this, he distanced himself from her and eventually cut contact without ever telling her the truth.
- Urban Legend: The town of Duskwood has a lot of those surrounding it. You can even find a book in the library all about these legends. The Man Without a Face one becomes an important clue in the investigation.
- Wham Line: In episode 9, you gain access to Hannah's phone and looking through the chats reveals one between Hannah and Amy where they had a talk that confirms that they were in the car that hit and killed Jennifer ten years ago.
- Wham Shot: The man without a face taking off his mask in Episode Ten. It's Richy.
