BE WITH MOTHER
"THE NIGHTS HAVE BEEN COLD LATELY. HAVE YOU NOTICED?"
MOTHERED is a 2021 "Role-playing horror game" by Enigma Studios
released on Steam and itch.io. You are Liana, a young girl who has just returned home from the hospital after an unnamed illness followed by major surgery. However, her father refuses to come inside, her brother won't come out of his room, and her mother has been replaced by a talking, barely animate mannequin who wants nothing more than for everything to go back to normal...
DESCRIBE TROPES HERE.
- Analog Horror: Contains many hallmarks of the genre, from VHS effects and eerily warped early 20th century classical music to title cards that wouldn't be out of place on a local weather channel.
- Arc Welding:
- Liana's Father developed the Enigma robots from Enigma Studio's previous title, The Enigma Machine. The company name Enigma and the phrase "Contamination Level" also appear in a few Freeze Frame Bonuses.
- The plot of the "DLCquel" Mothered: Home ties directly into Enigma Studio's forthcoming title, Echostasis. It becomes clear pretty early that we're playing through the memories of a copy of Liana's CORE, in which she is constantly warned to stay away from [HER]. One of the endings has Liana fall directly into [HER] hands. It also ties into The Enigma Machine, suggesting that we're the same RED that was later reduced to a training AI.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall:
- Liana becomes aware that the player is controlling her. She also starts berating the player for doing things that go against her goals.
- It's revealed late in the game that the player character is a robot referred to as "the vessel", with Liana and her CORE being referred to separately.
- In Mothered: Home, Father hides "a barcode" in the bathroom. It's actually a QR code that must be scanned in order to proceed further in-game.
- Easy Amnesia: A side effect of Liana's surgery, which Mother and Father assure you that it will wear off once you get back into your daily routine. It's actually because Liana's CORE isn't fully integrated with her robot body, and can't integrate without corrupting it or being corrupted.
- Foreshadowing: A large amount can be found throughout the game, before the reveal.
- The first hint that something is off is when you bring Father's box to his car and he states he'd love to give you a hug, but he can't let you see his face.
- Heading to bed brings up a Blink-and-You-Miss-It prompt saying DISENGAGING CONSCIOUSNESS which confirms to eagle-eyed players that Liana is actually a robot.
- Mother explicitly warns Liana not to go to the barn behind the house. An out-of-place notice covers the screen ("SURVIVAL NOTICE: DO NOT ENTER THE BARN.") after the warning. Seeing as the current version of Liana will get her head cut off in the barn every Sunday if she's not integrated with her CORE by then, it's exactly what it looks like.
- Mother keenly mentions watching the sunset every Sunday night. Mother explicitly gets Liana to focus on the sunset while she cuts her head off.
- The Fourth Wall Will Not Protect You: It becomes clear after a while that the game knows you're there.
- A document found late-game in the DLCquel Mothered: Home says that the player is looking through altered copies of CORE memories with differences only noticable to "those already familiar with the source reality".
- Mother outright says "If there was indeed a way for you to escape this world, then you have ALREADY MISSED IT" at one point.
- Golden Ending: Played with, as Enigma Studio stresses that "the game isn't over until you see the credits." Opening a secret passage during Wednesday Afternoon allows Liana to access her father's terminal, unlocking his diary and her full memories. Her CORE becomes fully integrated with her body and she escapes into Father's waiting car. He drives off, relieved to see a fully sentient robot. The other ending, with Mother kiling the corrupted Liana, simply continues into the next Sunday night when a fresh copy of Liana is brought home by Father.
- "Groundhog Day" Loop: Imposed by Father, who brings a new version of Liana home every Sunday, just after Mother kills the previous one. They repeat the same routine, looking for signs that Liana's CORE has integrated with her chassis properly. The game starts on what is theoretically the last loop.
- Hell Is That Noise: When "Liana" finally speaks, she does so in a strained, creepy electronic voice which horrifies both Mother and brother.
- Heroic Mime: Played with. Though Liana doesn't talk for most of the game, when she does try she finds out that she can't. When she eventually does synchronize with her robot body enough to speak, she horrifies Mother.
- Interface Screw: Several glitchouts tell the player that all isn't what it seems with Mother and Liana.
- Madness Mantra:
- "SURVIVAL NOTICE: DO NOT ENTER THE BARN."
- BE WITH MOTHER.
- Meaningful Background Event: There appears to be a barn on fire in the background of the night that you arrive. It's actually a bonfire in a giant pit underneath that barn, and it's burning the ashes of your previous incarnation.
- Nothing Is Scarier: No threats. Nothing can hurt you. Just a large, mostly empty house with a big orchard and Mother.
- Off with His Head!: How Mother has been dispatching the Liana duplicates whenever they become corrupted.
- Old Save Bonus: The game was featured in the 2022 edition of the Haunted PS1 Demo Disc. Because the Demo Disc was released a year after the game's official release, the demo seen there is the version with new content, provided you have a finished save file from the full game. This bonus is in fact an entire sequel game called Mothered: Home that was hidden beneath the veneer of a demo version.
- Ominous Visual Glitch: These start appearing as the game continues. The most notable one is covering up the real Liana's grave.
- Once More, with Clarity:
- As the game begins again immediately after the standard ending, it's possible to pick up on all the foreshadowing that led up to The Reveal on a second playthrough.
- On Friday Night, it's possible to hear an argument between Mother and Father behind closed doors and come to the conclusion that it doesn't concern you. It's possible to sneak into the closet in their bedroom during Friday Evening to hear the conversation, which nets the clues to access the Golden Ending.
- Exaggerated in Mothered: Home, which glitches out heavily as the plot progresses.
- The Reveal: Liana died before the events of the game. Her father, a developer of realistically-functioning robots, found a way to transfer her consciousness (or "CORE") into a robot, and is bringing a new and improved model home every single Sunday to see if the CORE and chassis will integrate correctly in order to make a truly sentient lifeform. So far this hasn't worked, and Mother has had to repeat a routine of teaching and eventually killing each replacement once they start going off the rails by herself, as Father is constantly working covertly on a new Liana and Liana's brother is self-medicating via constantly sleeping or hiding from his family by staying online.
- Replacement Goldfish: The reason Mother can't stand you is because you're not the real Liana, nor a good copy of her. It's strongly implied Liana's brother has the same feelings. They're only going along with this because Father is relentlessly optimistic about the eventual success of this project.
- Rotten Robotic Replacement: "Liana" (and the duplicates that came before her.) As the game progresses, she begins experiencing various glitches and behavioral abnormalities that unnerve her Mother. The mirrors in the house are also covered up, likely because "Liana" doesn't appear to look like a human at all and to prevent her from discovering this.
- Stable Time Loop: In a sense. Mother kills the corrupted Liana every Sunday Evening, with a fresh copy arriving Sunday Night. If the player does get killed by Mother on Sunday, the game continues directly into the opening scene.
- Title Drop: Occurs in Mothered: Home once things really go off the rails, indicating that yes, this really is a separate, hidden video game inside of the first one.
- Tomato in the Mirror: You're not Liana. The real Liana didn't survive her illness. You're an experimental robot body with her CORE implemented inside it in the hope of bringing her back to life, and you're not the first one either... So far, this hasn't worked. Ironically, all the mirrors in the house have been covered up to prevent you from finding this out.
- Uncanny Valley: One of the primary forms of horror is how strange and lifeless the Mother is. The game's store page even calls her a mannequin. Ironically, she also sees you as this, and it's one of the main sources of the Mother's increasing displeasure and horror around the Liana duplicates. It's implied that Mother's mannequin-like movements and appearance are a result of "Liana"'s mental projection.
- Your Mind Makes It Real: Liana's CORE memories are the thing that make her house and Mother look how they appear. Removing her CORE causes everything to go haywire.
