History Videogame / TheDollShop

* SenpaiKohai: The doll maker and his childhood friend were two years apart back in school.

* SempaiKohai: The doll maker and his childhood friend were two years apart back in school.

* WhamShot: The endings where the childhood friend doesn't leave town. [[spoiler:After she's introduced to the doll maker's favorite doll, it changes from a beautiful porcelain doll to a withered corpse.]]
* Yandere:

* BlueIsHeroic: The blue butterfly, the latest in the doll maker's collection, is associated with the childhood friend (who is herself wearing blue.) The childhood friend is quickly revealed to be the more heroic of the two leads.

* Yandere :

* WhamShot: The endings where the childhood friend doesn't leave town. [[spoiler:After she's introduced to the doll maker's favorite doll, it changes from a beautiful porcelain doll to a withered corpse.]]

* BewareTheQuietOnes: The doll maker doesn't usually raise his voice and can be quite isolated from the other villagers, and [[spoiler:he's the one who kidnapped and murder the little girl prior to the events of the game]].

* {{Irony}}: The doll maker isn't fond of horror movies, [[spoiler:but is a horror character himself]]. [[spoiler:[[TruthInTelevision It makes sense considering his warp sense of reality.]]]]

* SempaiKohai: The doll maker and his childhood friend were two years apart back in school.

* KidsAreCruel: The childhood friend relates of an incident in town where a schoolgirl was held prisoner and then killed by her own classmates.

* AloneWithThePsycho: [[spoiler:The childhood friend when she visits the doll maker on the last day and learns that he was the one who kidnapped and murdered the missing girl. This can lead to her getting killed, herself.]]

* BittersweetEnding: The best ending, where the doll maker gains his childhood friend's trust and [[spoiler:after inviting her to his back room, lets her go. The doll maker's secret is discovered and the childhood friend escapes, but the little girl's family will have to accept that their daughter is dead and the doll maker himself will likely be killed for his crimes.]]

* ButterflyOfDeathAndRebirth: Butterflies flutter about freely in the best ending [[spoiler:where the doll maker's friend survives, which is also the ending where the doll maker's secret is brought to light.]] Notably these butterflies were the ones in his collection, [[RuleOfSymbolism which should already be dead]].

** The ending wherein the doll maker gains his childhood friend's trust [[spoiler:and, after bringing her to his back room and showing her his "doll", kills her when she tries to run away.]] The bonus content you receive after completing all the endings makes it worse, as it's an epilogue to this ending wherein [[spoiler:the doll maker kills his childhood friend's grandmother so she can join their "family" as well.]]

* GenreSavvy: The childhood friend, learning of the doll maker's unusual attachment to dolls and then his hobby of killing and pinning up butterflies (after "getting to know them" first,) she admits he seems like somebody out of a horror movie. She's right that he's a horror character.

** The doll maker is repeatedly shown talking to a beautiful porcelain doll in his back room. [[spoiler:When he introduces the doll to his childhood friend, the player finally sees it the way it really is--as the desiccated, eyeless corpse of a little girl.]]

In a small rural village in the Japanese countryside, there lives a doll maker who goes about his daily life selling dolls and repairing the dolls of the town's residents. His isolated life is interrupted in the middle of winter by the arrival of a childhood friend, a beautiful young lady who's the granddaughter of Mrs. Sato, one of his clients. At the same time, he begins finding mysterious doll pieces around town, and the player soon learns that not everything is as it seems in this town, or with the doll maker for that matter...

Setting the game apart from others of its kind are the beautiful illustrations, which were hand-painted with watercolors, as well as a subdued soundtrack that conveys an unsettling winter atmosphere. Although not terribly long, The Doll Shop is free to download and play [[https://ateliersento.itch.io/dollshop here]], and has multiple endings depending on player choice.

* GenreSavvy: The childhood friend, learning of the doll maker's unusual attachment to dolls and then his hobby of killing and pinning up butterflies (after "getting to know them" first,) she admits he seems like somebody out of a horror movie. She's right.

** The doll maker is repeatedly shown talking to a beautiful porcelain doll in his back room. [[spoiler:When he introduces the doll to his childhood friend, the player finally sees it the way she does--as the desiccated, eyeless corpse of a little girl.]]
** Similarly, [[spoiler:the childhood friend's corpse in the bad ending is shown as being a doll with its face smashed in that the doll maker can put back together, though the player never gets to see how it really looks.]]

* DownerEnding: The ending wherein the doll maker gains his childhood friend's trust [[spoiler:and, after bringing her to his back room and showing her his "doll", kills her when she tries to run away.]] The bonus content you receive after completing all the endings makes it worse, as it's an epilogue to this ending wherein [[spoiler:the doll maker kills his childhood friend's grandmother so she can join their "family" as well.]]

In a small rural village in the Japanese countryside, there lives a doll maker who goes about his daily life selling dolls and repairing the dolls of the town's residents. His isolated life is interrupted in the middle of winter by the arrival of a former schoolmate, a beautiful young lady who's the granddaughter of Mrs. Sato, one of his clients. At the same time, he begins finding mysterious doll pieces around town, and the player soon learns that not everything is as it seems in this town, or with the doll maker for that matter...

* AloneWithThePsycho: [[spoiler:Mrs. Sato's granddaughter when she visits the doll maker on the last day. This can lead to her getting killed.]]

* GenreSavvy: Mrs. Sato's granddaughter, learning of the doll maker's unusual attachment to dolls and then his hobby of killing and pinning up butterflies (after "getting to know them" first,) she admits he seems like somebody out of a horror movie. She's right.
* KidsAreCruel: Mrs. Sato's granddaughter relates of an incident in town where a schoolgirl was held prisoner and then killed by her own classmates.
* MindScrew: At times it's difficult to tell what, exactly, is going on due to the game being through the doll maker's perspective, and it's quickly clear that the doll maker is not mentally well. [[spoiler:Particularly puzzling is the ending where you kill Mrs. Sato's granddaughter, which has you "put her face back together" by using the doll shards you found throughout the game... before her actual death.]]
* MultipleEndings: The game ends at least three different ways depending on how you have the doll maker treat Mrs. Sato's granddaughter, particularly on the last day.
* ThroughTheEyesOfMadness: The doll maker is repeatedly shown talking to a beautiful porcelain doll in his back room. [[spoiler:When he introduces the doll to Mrs. Sato's granddaughter, the player finally sees it the way she does--as the desiccated, eyeless corpse of a little girl.]]

* GenreSaavy: Mrs. Sato's granddaughter, learning of the doll maker's unusual attachment to dolls and then his hobby of killing and pinning up butterflies (after "getting to know them" first,) she admits he seems like somebody out of a horror movie. She's right.

* ThroughTheEyesOfMadness: The doll maker is repeatedly shown talking to a beautiful porcelain doll in his back room. [[spoiler:When he introduces the doll to Mrs. Sato's granddaughter, the player finally sees it the way she does--as the desiccated, eyeless corpse of a little girl.]]
* WriteWhatYouKnow: The depiction of the Japanese countryside is quite accurate, and based on Atelier Sentô's memories of living there.

The Doll Shop is a free adventure game written and designed by Atelier Sentô, using point and click and visual novel elements. The plot is described by the author to be part romance, part horror.