Nightmare Fuel / OFF

You can't help him.

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Don't be fooled by its simple graphics, OFF has enough creep factor to make Anatidaephobia genuinely plausible.

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Zone 1

• In the English translation, the description of the meat element reads: "Because without meat, people would have nothing to eat. They would die of starvation, one after another." However, in the original French, the second sentence reads: "Ils se devoraient", or "They would eat each other." Either this is one hell of an idiom, or just another layer of how screwed up Elsen life is. It also serves as sinister foreshadowing for Zone 3.
• Without smoke, everyone will suffocate. Without meat, everyone will starve. Both of these elements are produced in Zone 1 and exported to the other Zones. Zone 1 is the first Zone to be purified. No more smoke, and no more meat.

Zone 2

• After you finish your fight with Japhet, you're treated to the game's first example of Cerebus Syndrome in the works: instead of Japhet's body simply disappearing like Dedan's did, you're treated to a sprite of Japhet's mangled body lying at the Batter's feet, blood and feathers scattered everywhere.
  • Not to mention the fate of the Judge's brother, Valerie. He attempted to eat Japhet, but didn't chew enough...so Japhet controls him from the inside, and proceeds to horrifically burst out of his body for the boss fight, with Valerie's empty body hanging around his neck.

Zone 3

• The entire Zone serves as the game's Wham Episode. The cutesy ghosts that you've been fighting all game are shown murdering an Elsen in cold blood, the relaxed Elsen in this zone are revealed to be addicted to "sugar" and go Ax-Crazy if they don't eat it, "sugar" turns out to be made of dead bodies, and in the last area of the zone, the battle music is suddenly replaced by a horrifying remix of the normal battle theme that draws inspiration from the infamous "My Heaven".
  • The horrible low-pitched gasp the sugar-deprived Elsen in Zone 3 make.
  • Fighting a Burnt Elsen (pictured) for the first time after discovering the truth about sugar is perhaps one of the most potent Jump Scares in the game.
    • It's not just his appearance but the fact that he doesn't fight you at all and you are forced to kill him. Even trying to run away from the fight, the Batter will refuse.
      HELP
• The final walk through the long, identical halls of Zone 3's final area is bone-chilling. After discovering the truth of sugar, you're now avoiding Elsen like mad, and trying not to draw their attention on the field else they'll come right for you. The music of the treatment rooms has been replaced with nothing but the drone of a dying light bulb. Once you figure out the path forward, you come to an incredibly long hall, suitably referred to as the "Endless Hallway", with nothing in it but the one poster on the wall. There's plenty like them throughout Zone 3, instructions from the director on how to do one's job. They were all vaguely aggressive, but this is the first one headed by "executive suite's note," so you know it's important. What does it say?
  YOU MUST NOT BE HERE.
  • Also from the Zone 3 hallways: how about narrowly escaping the Advancing Boss of Doom only to turn a corner and find that everything's gone white, and the music playing is little more than whispers. The fact that the game doesn't even explain what happened to the hallway makes it much more disturbing. (Although you can piece it together yourself.)
• Everything about Enoch, the guardian of Zone 3. You walk into a room after miles and miles of silent nothingness to find a giant with a Slasher Smile who looks 100% ready to eat you. Then there's what he's been doing to his Zone.
  • There's also the Jump Scare he gives you when you arrive at the tram station. You're just walking around, looking for something to do about this huge guy who you simply couldn't hurt, and just as you enter the room, he comes bursting out of the floor, even bigger than before, and pissed off.
  • Enoch's giant head lying in a pool of blood after you kill him is creepy. Especially when he still talks to you.

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Purified Zones

• The game generally plays with the intention of going on to the next Zone after beating the previous one. However, there's nothing barring you from going right back to a Zone just after beating it. Doing so will probably shock a first-time player, since the world has gone completely white, every NPC is gone, signs and papers everywhere are completely blanked out, and the track is ominous music filled with whispering and sometimes the noise of someone slamming their fists frantically accompanied by muffled cries. The enemies are also replaced by demonic dolls called Secretaries, and the music continues playing during the battles.
  • Specifically about the music, the really unsettling thing is that while most of the whispers^note They are also in the Silencio track are unintelligible, some of them sound like "What have they done to deserve this?" and "Why did you kill them?" You can occasionally hear someone cry, "Au secours!" which is French for "Help!"
  • Just what happened to all the Elsen when the Zones were purified? Did they turn into Secretaries? Were they killed by the Secretaries? What did Enoch mean when he said that killing a Zone's guardian causes its inhabitants to "fall into nothingness, never to return"?
  • In the purified Zone 2, a single, solitary Elsen resides in the corner of an out of the way house. He's the only living thing left in all the purified zones. When you talk to him, all he says is:
    The specters are gone... The color is gone... Everything is gone... I'm finally safe...
    • What makes it even more terrifying is the fact that the music for purified zones is called Not Safe.
• The most disturbing thing about the Secretaries is that, whatever the hell they are, their presence indicates that the Zone is pure. Battles still say "Purification in progress..." but they are still an improvement in the Batter's eyes.

The Room

• In the final battle, if you go with the Judge's ending, you're forced to fight the Batter. After the screen transition, you see that the Batter becomes a huge hulking monster out of nowhere. The horrifying part is that Mortis Ghost confirmed that this is supposed to reflect how you (the player) see him now that you're fully aware of all the horrible things you two have done together.
• Just before the fight with the Queen, you find out that Hugo, the sickly-looking child you've been seeing in cutscenes, is the son of the Batter and the Queen, as well as their creator. You defeat her, and proceed through some corridors until you reach him. And then you're forced into a battle with him. The flee button doesn't work and using Wide Angle lists his description as "a little boy." He doesn't use a single move or fight back at all, and only coughs weakly when you hit him.
• Chapter 4 of the Room can also be unsettling, with the Art Shift to a much more detailed, desolate land and a map that looks straight out of a Nightmare Fuel Coloring Book.

Meta / Other

• Who told the Batter what to do all along his journey? You did. Who solved all the puzzles? You did. Who made the Batter kill the Queen and Hugo (excluding the use of Auto-Battle)? You did. In the official ending, who chose to side with the Batter and help him finish what he began? You did. Who chose to pull the final switch and end all existence? You did.
  • But did you really? Who or what prevented you from fleeing from certain battles? Who insisted on "purifying" those who didn't fight back? Who is the puppeteer and who is the marionette? Do you play the game or does it play you?
  • Didn't side with the Batter? Don't worry. You never really win, no matter what side you're on.
• Fun fact, some of the spectres, like the Gilles de Raises and the Von Gacys, are named after real-life serial killers.
  • Von Gacys themselves are pretty disturbing. While most spectres look more goofy than anything, Von Gacys resemble mutated bears with deranged expressions and tentacles coming out of their heads.