It Was a Dark and Stormy Night."
Dead Estate: The Unofficial Novelization is a fan-made literary adaptation of Dead Estate (specifically the events that take place in 1998, as well as the Flash Forward Awakening Endings in 2004) written by M.D. Tealman, taking the form of what a hypothetical Novelization of the game's story would read like, given that the game is a pastiche of an era in which video games in general were more likely to receive novelizations. It attempts to be as accurate to the original story as possible, with "minor embellishments" added to make the story more enjoyable and interesting to read.
The novelization was started on November 11th of 2024 and finished on February 13th, 2025. It can be viewed here
. Tealman would later adapt the short side campaign
Assignment Anya as well, under the pretense of a Framing Device where a successful gaming CEO Anya is being interviewed by Game Informer about her past in 2013.
Tropes
- Adaptation Expansion:
- In the game, Luis and Lydia mostly get together offscreen after 1998. The novelization gives them more Ship Tease moments together to better develop their romance onscreen.
- A single shot of Albert being at the mercy of Diavola in the Exit Realm from Cordelia's Normal Ending cutscene is used as the basis for Chapter 21, which contains a lengthy flashback of Albert's first meeting with Cybil and a conversation he has with Diavola in the present.
- Jules is confirmed to be specifically from Detroit, which is subtly implied to contribute to why she's such a ruthless and bloodthirsty fighter.
- Adaptational Early Appearance: Diavola is first introduced in a conversation with Cybil in Chapter 12 (albeit as a voice wreathed in darkness), in order to foreshadow her as the story's Big Bad a little more heavily.
- Adaptational Explanation:
- The novelization gives a definitive resolution for why Jules dropped out of college and was hitchhiking in the middle of the night; she didn't drop out and her grades were average, but she was expelled for starting a fight with three other boys and hospitalizing them. Likewise, the reason she's on a desolate stretch of road is because the last guy who picked her up propositioned her for a blowjob and then dumped her on the roadside when she declined, based on this artwork
by one of the game's character designers. - Axel briefly mentions "never hav[ing] to make another Tijuana porno again". This is based upon the oblique dialogue he spouts during his secret Wag the Director death screen in the game where he says that he does "a little romance [films], but what happens in Tijuana stays in Tijuana", explaining why he's hesitant to bring it up.
- A mention is given of how Cordelia placed magical wards that incinerate anybody she doesn't give the OK to on the doorways leading into her shops and the kitchen where Roselia is located, as a way of explaining why no monsters ever seem to make their way into those rooms in the game (aside from the logic that they're "safe rooms" that can't have enemies to begin with).
- Though the pieces are all there to potentially put together in the original game, the story firmly establishes that Albert Valentine's interdimensional research was sponsored by Cybil and the Mors Mundi cult, but that he was manipulated into creating the portal to the 3X1T Realm and didn't intentionally build it for them.
- The novelization gives a definitive resolution for why Jules dropped out of college and was hitchhiking in the middle of the night; she didn't drop out and her grades were average, but she was expelled for starting a fight with three other boys and hospitalizing them. Likewise, the reason she's on a desolate stretch of road is because the last guy who picked her up propositioned her for a blowjob and then dumped her on the roadside when she declined, based on this artwork
- Adaptation Deviation:
- The one major place where the story is different from the game is in how it welds together the Normal Ending and the True Ending by explicitly stating that Chunks wasn't killed by the blast from the Rocket Launcher, in an attempt to consolidate what is otherwise a Continuity Snarl between the endings.
- The climax of the story features Cybil in the Exit Realm personally sacrificing Albert to Diavola. While details in the game allude to her doing this in the past with other sacrifices, it's not actually depicted in the game itself, and Cybil is normally only encounterable in battle as a boss in the Laboratory.
- Adapted Out:
- All of the normal floor bosses aren't depicted in the story, only the alternate floor ones. This also means that the Leviathan Egg and Nataleviathan, the Mors Mundi cult's previous attemots to rebirth the Leviathan, aren't mentioned.
- Since they primarily act as a gameplay mechanic and don't have very much of a bearing on the story, Filia and Faith and their respective Hellmart and Heavenmart shops don't appear at all.
- Most of the actual Exit Realm is skipped over, cutting straight to the Sacrificial Grounds instead (though Cordelia does mention they had to fight through "a ton of monsters" to reach Albert, indicating it still probably happened).
- Almost Kiss: Luis and Lydia nearly kiss in the Dark Mood Woods before they are rudely interrupted by the Pumpkin Prince. They both resolve to continue what was happening when they're out of danger.
- And Some Other Stuff: The narration describes in vague terms how BOSS teaches Digby the process of fashioning homemade explosives without saying anything specific.
- The Big Damn Kiss: During the Dénouement around the bonfire, Cordelia places a fat one right on Fuji's lips. With tongue.
- Bill... Bill... Junk... Bill...: There's a gag that follows this format in Albert's flashback chapter, when he goes through his mail to find a "grant rejection, grant rejection, grant rejection, Hammacher-Schlemmer catalog, grant rejection, grant rejection, invitation to a conference and another grant rejection".
- Did I Mention It's Christmas?: The story lampshades how the original game takes place on Halloween night but this fact isn't mentioned anywhere when Digby brings it up at the very end of "Fireside Respite", and then bursts out laughing realizing he could have spent the night trick-or-treating like a normal kid.
- Distant Prologue: The introductory chapter contains two. The first is a scene from 1894 of George Kostopoulos battling the harsh winter and babbling to himself, while the second is a family dinner between the Valentines in 1984 (14 years before the events of the game) where Albert introduces Chunks to everybody.
- Fastball Special: Diavola is ultimately defeated by Fuji throwing the small but incredibly dense Mumba like a shot put into her transformed form's giant eye.
- Let's Split Up, Gang!: After reaching the Basement (which is a Warp Zone in the game), Cordelia's group each buddy up and take a separate elevator to one of each of the alternate floors to look for the key to the coffin while she and Fuji return to the steeple to see if they can dig up anything further on Albert's research. The following set of chapters then detail what each pair of characters gets up to before they all reunite in "Return to the Balcony".
- Neck Lift: Cybil is introduced hoisting one of her cultists off the floor by the neck and berating him for their failure to secure the mansion from intruders.
- Painting the Medium: Diavola's iconic shriek that she makes during her phase transition is transliterated as "HRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGHHHHHHHH!!!" and written in a much larger font than all the text around it to make it seem visually "louder".
- Pragmatic Adaptation: In the original game, the Static Demon pretends to crash your game with a fake error message. Since this obviously wouldn't translate to the written word, here it instead pulls a The Fourth Wall Will Not Protect You stunt and hijacks the narration for the duration of chapter 27.
- Mythology Gag:
- Jeff's trucker handle is "Tankman", a reference to how in the original game his likeness is based on Jeff "JohnnyUtah" Bandelin, the creator of Tankmen.
- Many of the chapter titles are named after tracks on the game's OST ("Sex Sells", "Missing Persons", "Lights, Camera" and "ACTION", etc.)
- The part at the beginning of "The Basement" where all the playable characters are crammed into a single elevator is based on the cover of the game's OST, which depicts exactly that happening (though BOSS and Axel are missing since they weren't added when it was drawn).
- Luis says that Albert "Really likes breaking all his house's keys into fragments and hiding them all over the place for some reason", an allusion to all the Solve the Soup Cans puzzles and the three collectable keys that are all split into two pieces in Assignment Anya.
- Mumba mentions that the Golden Mask is similar to a flaming DJ he once fought (DJ Flame from Ugby Mumba 3), alluding to how both are Giant Hands of Doom bosses and have vaguely similar attacks.
- Cordelia affixes a bunch of cheese to Digby's head in order to draw out Chunks, a reference to the Bait item from the game (which is a big slice of Cartoon Cheese) that causes Chunks to take longer to spawn in a level.
- Cordelia mentions that her broomstick is way over capacity and was built for "like three people", a reference to how a maximum of three people are only ever shown riding it at a time in the game.
- Noodle Incident: Cordelia offhandedledly mentions that what's currently happening at the Estate is nowhere near as bad as what happened during her tenth birthday party (it's unclear if she's being serious or, given later interior thoughts of hers, if she's just trying to seem calm and in control of the situation).
- Shout-Out:
- Axel's character's girlfriend in Axe to Grind is named "Linda", in obvious homage to The Evil Dead (1981) (and how Axel himself is heavily inspired by Ash Williams).
- Digby's introductory chapter mentions that the only other boy scout in his troop to ever earn the Lab Rat badge was a "Todd Jalansky", a "John Smith"-style Midwestern placeholder name often used in the comedy sketches of Midwestern comedian Charlie Berens.
- In Lydia's despair at realizing the Valentines' house isn't for sale, she mourns how she'll never be able to acquire enough money so that she could "dive in [it] like a porpoise or burrow through it like a gopher or toss it up and let it hit her on the head".
- Right before their Big Damn Kiss at the end, Cordelia says "Gimme some sugar, baby" to Fuji.
- In the first epilogue, Jeff responds to Jules' assertion that she wants to be come a monster hunter with "...Y'know, up until a little while ago, I would've found that strange."
- Shown Their Work: The novelization demonstrates a serious attention to detail about very small background elements of Dead Estate's world that are often only found in a single Freeze-Frame Bonus, if that much (The names of the Axe to Grind crew, the address of the Valentines' mansion being "666 Hamlin Street", Lydia being from somewhere around Cleveland, etc.), ways in which it interconnects with other Milkbar Lads games (events from Ridgewood Road are brought up a few times, Mumba mentions plot and world elements from Ugby Mumba, etc.) and even incorporates some Word of God elements that don't really appear in the game itself (Jeff being The Vietnam Vet, Mumba weighing 240 pounds, etc.).
