Murder House is a 2020 Retraux Survival Horror game by Puppet Combo. Like his previous games, it is a retro-styled game heavily inspired by PS1-era survival horror games and later 20th century VHS-era slasher films. It is notable for being Puppet Combo's first official "full length" game, as well as the first of his games to be released on Steam.
Players take the role of Emma, an intern who is part of a news crew shooting footage at the abandoned house of Anthony Smith, the Easter Ripper, a serial killer of children who was executed three years previously.
Has a character page here.
Murder House contains examples of the following tropes:
- Action Survivor: Despite being a put-upon intern with a pulled tendon, Emma manages to survive against the Easter Ripper quite impressively.
- Adaptational Expansion: The book written by Regina Watts gives us more fleshed out with the characters, as well as more backstory of the Easter Ripper.
- Adaptational Nice Guy: The Real Estate Agent Jerry gets 2 full scenes in the book, where it portrays him as a decent family, who just wants to earn a little more money.
- Adaptational Villainy: Tom Smith is somehow made more evil in the book, doing away with his only redeeming quality and being revealed to murdered his mother and his crimes being portrayed even worst towards children, including an infant.
- An Arm and a Leg: Dana has her arm messily chopped off while running from the Easter Ripper before being killed.
- Asshole Victim: Aside from the children the Easter Ripper murders, all the victims killed during the game are this to varying degrees. Dana is snobby but pleasant to Emma when alone, Gary is a total sleazeball as listed under Fat Bastard below, the real estate agent who sold the news crew access to the house, and of course, the Easter Ripper himself, Tom.
- B-Movie:
- Like Puppet Combo's other games, Murder House is inspired by low budget VHS-era slasher films.
- The after-credits scene shows that the in-universe production of the Murder House film was so low budget and sleazy that the actress who plays Dana considers a film called "Bikini Babes on the Werewolf Planet" to be a major step up.
- Bedsheet Ghost: After becoming bored with the given story of Anthony Smith's house, Gary decides to invent a story of the house being haunted. This involves Emma dressing up in a sheet and running through the background of Dana's reporting, as if she is Smith's ghost.
- The Cake Is a Lie: The Easter Ripper's first note states that if a person can complete the Easter egg hunt, they can leave. But even if Emma collects the whole set, he still has every intention of killing her before she can leave.
- The Cameo: Youtuber Jacksepticeye has a short cameo as the mall's janitor in the prologue. It's entirely possible to miss him completely if you get caught by the Easter Ripper before meeting him.
- Chekhov's Gunman: Justin, the playable kid in the prologue who's murdered by the Easter Ripper years before the events of the main story returns as one of the zombie children who gets revenge on the killer.
- Contrasting Sequel Antagonist: The Butcher/Night Shift Abductor from Stay Out of the House was an Expy of Leatherface from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre; mentally impaired, but a Lightning Bruiser whom it was impossible to escape from once he spotted you unless you drove him away with gunfire. Much of the game is spend evading him inside his house as he goes about his daily routine initially unaware of your presence. The Easter Ripper is more intelligent and is actively stalking the player, playing a twisted game with her. He's also slower, can be outrun, and can be evaded simply by managing to keep away from him for long enough. Also, while a few shots will just make him run away, he can be brought down by enough gunfire in the Final Boss fight.
- Decoy Protagonist: The game starts with you playing as one of the Easter Ripper's victims, trapped alone in a closed mall at night while being stalked by the Easter Ripper.
- Devoured by the Horde: The Easter Ripper is eaten alive by his victims, who rise from their graves as zombies to kill him.
- The Dog Was the Mastermind: The Easter Ripper turns out to be Tom, the news crew's put-upon cameraman. Turns out he was the real Easter Ripper and the brother of Anthony Smith, who took the blame for the killings to protect his brother.
- Dumbwaiter Ride: Emma can ride down a dumbwaiter that sends her down to the Easter Ripper's dungeon.
- Faking the Dead: Tom fakes his death in a videotape found by Emma. It was pretty easy for him, as all the tape shows is Tom's perspective from the camera, and then Tom suddenly screaming and dropping the camera, with the Easter Ripper walking into view a few seconds later. Clearly, all Tom did was pretend to be killed offscreen, drop the camera, and walk into the frame.
- Fat Bastard:
- News manager Gary is a sleazeball who drags his news crew out to an abandoned house for a schlocky special based on a series of grisly child murders, talks down to reporter Dana when she tries to give advice, makes Emma carry all their supplies inside by herself (while making comments about her 'doing favors' to get up in the news business), and makes Emma dress up like a ghost to run around during the back of Dana's news segment.
- The real estate agent isn't seen until after he's long dead, but he's rather portly. He also gave Gary and his new crew access to the Easter Ripper's home all to make some quick money.
- Foreshadowing: In her news report, Dana says the Easter Ripper's crimes took place "8 years ago." However, the prologue takes place in 1986 while the news report takes place in 1987. This is the first sign that the suspected "Ripper" was wrongly accused.
- Horror Doesn't Settle for Simple Tuesday: There's a reason he's called the Easter Ripper.
- I Love the Dead: While it's hard to tell, the fact that some of the children's skeletons are posed sexually imply he may have had his way with them either in life or in undeath (skeleton or corpse).
- Ink-Suit Actor: Janitor Jack isn't just voiced by Jacksepticeye, he even looks like him.
- It's Not Supposed to Win Oscars: Happens In-Universe with Gary showing little care about the production he's leading. He shoots down Dana's request to redo some takes with "This isn't 60 Minutes, it's Channel fucking 9! We're not here to win a Pulitzer." He however seems to have a change in tone later on when he decides to cook up a bogus ghost story in the middle of shooting to make it more interesting for viewers.
- It Only Works Once: Justin escapes the Easter Ripper the first time by hiding under a stall, and it surprisingly works. When the Easter Ripper hunts him again later, Justin hides underneath a work desk. This time, it fails, and he is caught and implied killed offscreen.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Dana is very snobby, but she is working with a sleazy boss like Gary who constantly talks down to her despite her experience as a former news anchor. She however seems much more amicable with Emma and even later offers her a chance to bring her up in the news world if they find something story-worthy and her last act before being brutally murdered is to warn Emma that the Easter Ripper is in the house with them. It also helps that out of the Tarot Motifs, her character befits the only upright one (which tend to be positive) while all the rest are Reversed (which tend to be negative).
- Karmic Death: The Easter Ripper finally dies when his victims—who he alternatively starved and fed booby-trapped food—rise from their graves as zombies and eat him alive.
- Made of Iron: Like most Puppet Combo slashers, the Easter Ripper is only mildly inconvenienced by being shot with a pistol or hit with a fire poker, though it does give you an opening to get away from him and enough damage will force him to retreat (albeit at the cost of a decent chunk of your very limited ammo). When you finally fight him for real after acquiring enough firepower to actually deal real harm to him, it still takes 4 shotgun blasts and 3 pistol shots to put him down, and even then he doesn't stay down for very long.
- Nested Story Reveal: The after-credits sequence reveals the whole game was a sleazy B-movie being filmed by a film crew. However, rumor is that people actually were killed in the house the film crew rented for the film, and the Easter Ripper is stowed away in trunk of the car of the actress who played Emma (although it's ambiguous as to whether she murdered him 2 days before filming ended because she thought he was creepy, or whether he's stowing away in her trunk to ambush her later).
- Nice to the Waiter: As grouchy as she is to the producer (who is kind of sleazy), Dana is nothing but nice to Emma the intern.
- No Ending: During the final battle with the Easter Ripper his victims rise from their graves to eat him, a white light starts to engulf the greenhouse as Emma tries to make her escape and then the credits suddenly roll. Ironically, this is one of Puppet Combo's more-positive finales. A post-credits epilogue was added about a year after the game's initial release to give more closure to the plot.
- Noodle Incident: Dana was apparently busted down from anchor to D-tier reporter after an "incident with a poodle". She's quite surly about the whole thing.
- Off with Her Head!: Dana's fate, after several wacks to the neck with the Easter Ripper's sickle.
- Pædo Hunt: Not only does the Easter Ripper target children (although he doesn't discriminate), there are heavy implications that he has done horrible sexual acts alongside the torture and murder.
- Pink Is Erotic: The Easter Ripper wears a pink rabbit suit and was a sadistic, pedophilic serial killer who used BDSM tactics on some of his victims, who were only children. His rabbit suit also invokes the high sex drive of rabbits.
- Police Are Useless: The Easter Ripper continued his killing spree long after Anthony Smith was arrested and eventually executed for his crimes, and despite not changing his M.O. or preferred victims, the police never caught on that the continued disappearances were the work of the Easter Ripper, likely due to not wanting to admit they had executed the wrong man.
- Psycho Pink: The Easter Ripper is a serial killer who wears a pink rabbit costume.
- Real Life Writes the Plot: In-universe. The after-credits sequence reveals that Tom being the Easter Ripper and the abrupt ending are all a last minute plot twist written in because Nick, the actor who previously played the Easter Ripper, disappeared 2 days before the end of filming. Sarah, the actress who plays Emma, even complains that the plot twist and abrupt ending are dumb and make no sense.
- "Reason You Suck" Speech: In the book, Emma gives this to Tom, in which she rips him a new one and saying that despite his claims, he’s not anything to be afraid of and is just a loser with a video camera
- Retraux: A staple of most Puppet Combo games, taking influences from PSX era games like the original Resident Evil and low-budget VHS horror films from the 70's through the 90's.
- Self-Made Orphan: Revealed in the novel that Tom murdered his mother to prevent her from telling the police about his crimes
- Senseless Sacrifice: Tom's brother turns himself in to save his brother and ultimately ends up dying in the electric chair. This is possibly alluded to in a letter you can find written by one of the children, who talks about hearing "two adults screaming" while they're captured. This is likely Tom and his brother arguing about his decision to turn himself in. His sacrifice is all in vain though, given the fact that Tom continued to kill after his death.
- Shotguns Are Just Better: You can't do permanent damage to the Easter Ripper until you manage to find the shotgun; the pistol and fire poker just don't do enough damage to do the job.
- Sinister Scythe: As seen on the cover and in-game: the Easter Ripper's weapon of choice is a sickle.
- Sprint Meter: Emma mentions that she pulled a tendon during track practice, which is why she can't sprint for very long without getting winded. The sprint meter is presented as a VHS-like tape bar.
- The Stinger: A post-credits sequence was added in an April 2021 update to give closure to the plot. It reveals the whole thing was a sleazy B-Movie being filmed by a film crew at a rented house.
- Tarot Motifs: The Easter Ripper's eggs all have pictures of Tarot cards painted on them. Though possibly more symbolizing how each person with their eggs died. Some of their motifs fit as well.
- Dana has the Death Egg. She fittingly dies first. She also befits the meaning of the card in that she wants to change to better horizons and gigs in news crews, and her death also changes the game into the survival horror most Puppet Combo games are known for.
- Gary has the Hanged Man. After his body is chopped up to pieces, the Easter Ripper hangs his body up with chains. The Reversed Hanged Man also represents selfishness and missed opportunities, which fits Gary in spades.
- Tom has the Fool. On a video tape, it's shown that he was killed offscreen and his body couldn't be found, which befits the tarot card. It's actually a lie, as Tom is the real Easter Ripper and trying to fool you by thinking he's dead. He also fits the Reversed Fool: a feeling of wanting to move on but being held back by yourself. In this case, Tom is unable to move on from his killing impulses.
- The Real Estate Agent has Justice. He was killed trying to sell access to the house of the Easter Ripper's brother, Anthony, and he was killed by the true Easter Ripper, Tom. He also fits the Reversed Justice card, as he was unjustly and disproportionately punished by the Easter Ripper just for allowing access to his house.
- What Happened to the Mouse?: It isn't shown what happened to Janitor Jack after he leaves Justin in the prologue, and there is no mention of him afterward. It's unknown if he was killed or he somehow unknowingly evaded the Ripper.
- Would Hurt a Child: Several (if not most) of the Easter Ripper's victims are children. With several of their skeletons being found in a dungeon, alongside a few notes here and there detailing his horrible torture of said children. Two of skeletons can found in sexual poses and then there's one the size of a baby.
