The Fairview Files Episode Zero is a first-person indie horror game by Zed_Technician.
Late one evening in the town of Fairview a detective named Dalia welcomes her new assistant and recounts a tale of the local McKinley Cemetery that involves her nephew, Ted.
Urban legends say that the place is haunted and to never ever drive past it at night... which Ted unfortunately did in the hopes of getting come early and enjoying his chicken dinner. Now he's trapped in the middle of nowhere with the keys missing from his car and a whole army of restless spirits standing between him and his only chance of escaping McKinley Cemetery alive. To find his lost keys he'll need to dig up graves while avoiding wandering ghosts and try to make it back home in one piece without becoming yet another doomed soul cursed to wander this terrible place for eternity.
The Fairview Files Episode Zero contains examples of:
- Creepy Cemetery: The setting of the game is a place called McKinley Cemetery where creepy supernatural events are known to take place such as ghost sightings or keys disappearing from vehicles that try to pass by at night. The Player Character Ted is one such victim who had his car keys vanish straight out of the ignition just as he tried to get past the cemetery on his way home. Now he has to dig up graves to gather hidden keys while avoiding the wandering souls haunting the place and find a way to get his own keys back so he can start his car and get the hell out of there.
- My Car Hates Me: A deliberately invoked example by the cemetery itself. Any sort of vehicle that tries to pass by it at night risks having the keys stolen from the ignition and hidden within McKinley Cemetery behind a series of locks that can only be opened by finding other keys hidden inside graves. The only reason given that Ted doesn't simply cut his losses and walk home is that he has a hot meal waiting for him that he doesn't want to miss out on.
- Vengeful Ghost: It's implied that most of the specters haunting McKinley Cemetery are people who didn't heed the warnings about the place and were killed as a result. If Ted fails to escape with his car keys and gets captured by a ghost the narration states that he ultimately gets to join them as yet another restless soul in death.
