Dream of Gluttony is a horror
game created by UminoAoi, who also made Veins.
You play as Sissy, a normal girl that got lost in the forest. She tries to find her way back home, and so decides to take the one that a mysterious man in the forest had mentioned. She then discovers a town, where people claim to be... food. She pretends to be a passion fruit to gain access, and goes through the town, meeting the quirky inhabitants and playing minigames to help them in whatever they need.
Everything seems to be cute and nice, but... something feels odd here... Maybe visiting this town only once isn't enough to learn the truth?
It can be downloaded both on itch.io and on Game Jolt. You can watch the trailer here.
Warning: Due to the nature of the game, spoilers are unmarked. You Have Been Warned.
Tropes associated with Dream of Gluttony:
- All Just a Dream: At the beginning of the game, a girl named Dreamy Rose is told to dream about an ideal world and ends up dreaming the whole story. She wakes up at the end of the second playthrough, lamenting that the whole dream turned into a nightmare by the end. To those that played UminoAoi's previous game, Veins, you'll likely know that the Campfire Quintet are dream beings, reinforcing this trope.
- Big Bad Duumvirate: The people of Food Town are collectively the antagonists in the second playthrough, seeking to kill Sissy for being a normal human out of fear that she will report their existence.
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Broken Aesop: The game talks about how Society Is to Blame as the cause of the deteriorating mental health of the outcasts caused by shunning them and hating them due to having a different mindset or having something that isn't the status quo. However, in the second playthrough, several characters try to convince Sissy to follow their mindset and live with them, attempting to murder her when she refuses in order to preserve their own perspective. - But Thou Must!: If you choose to wait for Dumpling to stop bickering with Cinnamon in the first playthrough, you'll be stuck. You have to send Sissy/Passion Fruit to Chili's area despite repeated warnings earlier on.
- The Cake Is a Lie: Food Town doesn't have a train station. Sissy can never leave, no matter what she tries to do.
- The Cameo: In the beginning of the game, Sissy encounters a quirky group of friends in a campfire. They're from UminoAoi's previous game, Veins.
- Cast of Personifications: The inhabitants of Food Town seem to be humanoid versions of many kinds of food, including condiments and a drink. Subverted when it's revealed that they all are just humans.
- Crapsaccharine World: Food Town looks like an idyllic place with quirky humanoid foods... except most of them are actually misanthropic humans who've shed their old identities to live a false life that they will violently protect.
- Disguised Horror Story: In the first playthrough, everything seems innocent enough- Sissy is a cute girl who goes through Food Town, a Sugar Bowl full of a quirky Ragtag Bunch of Misfits who identify as humanoid foods and act friendly to her. Then Sissy goes off on her own and encounters Chili, a Serial Killer who devours her victims, and she eats Sissy. The New Game Plus has Sissy admit to being a human, and then all hell breaks loose as the inhabitants reveal themselves as misanthropic humans who try to kill her for fear that she will expose them to the world. Sissy ends up going through immense Sanity Slippage while running for her life.
- Downer Ending: Both routes. No matter what happens, Sissy/Passion Fruit can't leave Food Town, and loses her sanity wandering it in the process.
- Evolving Title Screen: The title screen changes, showcasing the character Sissy is currently meeting. In the New Game Plus, the screen goes dark with black scribbles covering the character's face.
- Hidden Elf Village: Food Town itself is found deep within The Lost Woods.
- Insane Equals Violent: Played with; while the Food Town residents are clearly mentally ill, seeing as they genuinely believe themselves to be anthropomorphic foodstuffs, most are only violent towards humans. If Sissy claims to be a passion fruit, they let her in and act nice to her, being quirky at worst. Candy and Chili are the only ones who kill and eat their fellow "foodstuffs", while Grape and Strawberry never attack Sissy, remaining friendly even if they know she is human. It is shown that, with the exception of Milk and possibly Chili, all of them are societal outcasts with tragic pasts and Society Is to Blame as much as them.
- Limited Animation: The game has the same limited animations as fellow games made on RPG Maker (for example, two walking frames).
- The Lost Woods: Where Sissy initially ended up after getting lost.
- Madness Mantra:
- The description of all the skills you can use against Chili on the second playthrough's battle against her (excluding Don't Give Up) is just the word "kill" repeated.
- Sissy also repeats the word "please" as she pleads for Chili to give her food.
- Meat-O-Vision: Implied in Chili's district on the first playthrough. It's likely that the place's true colors are only visible to the player; Sissy/Passion Fruit is too far gone and starving to fight against Food Town's charm and realize she's looking at dead bodies rather than treats in the trees.
- Minigame Game: In both playthroughs, excluding the encounters with Chili in the first playthrough and Milk on the second playthrough, you play a minigame related to the character you're currently meeting at the moment.
- Mood Whiplash:
- The game's trailer starts with Sissy meeting Dumpling and it's followed by him presenting the other inhabitants of Food Town for her. Then, halfway, the music gets distorted to the point of Hell Is That Noise, until it ends in a Last Note Nightmare with Sissy (now called Passion Fruit) hungrily looking at the trees until the screen is overtaken by static. Then, it cuts to her black silhouette against a red background walking, with the only sound being feet walking on grass, and she says this before it cuts to the game's title:"I'm so hungry that I can't help it..."
- Turns out the trailer gave away the Mood Whiplash moment of the first playthrough: Sissy/Passion Fruit's idyllic view on Chili's district breaking apart in seconds in the midst of her hunger.
- In the second playthrough, it initially doesn't seem like much stuff will change. Until Sissy decides against playing along and shamelessly admits she's a human. Dumpling very thinly masks his disdain, and it only gets worse from there.
- The game's trailer starts with Sissy meeting Dumpling and it's followed by him presenting the other inhabitants of Food Town for her. Then, halfway, the music gets distorted to the point of Hell Is That Noise, until it ends in a Last Note Nightmare with Sissy (now called Passion Fruit) hungrily looking at the trees until the screen is overtaken by static. Then, it cuts to her black silhouette against a red background walking, with the only sound being feet walking on grass, and she says this before it cuts to the game's title:
- New Game Plus: After beating the game once and going to the right exit in the bonus room, Sissy can go through the game again, but this time will tell Dumpling that she is a human. This changes everything, making the game go a whole new route with new minigames.
- Ominous Pipe Organ: The music that plays in Chili's district, "Shiver", is a dramatic organ piece to emphasize that you're going to personally meet the most dangerous character of the town.
- Production Foreshadowing: If we go by
Word of God, Dreamy Rose appearing at the end of the second playthrough is this for a future game. - The Reveal:
- In the first playthrough's stinger (also carried to the second one): Food Town actually doesn't have a train station.
- In the second playthrough: The once-lovable cast of characters that Sissy meets aren't humanoid personifications of food, but actual humans who suffered bullying and scorn from other humans long enough to become unhinged to the point where they will attack anyone who doesn't have a food name.
- There Are No Therapists: You know it's bad when there's an entire village made up of outcast people that ran away from civilization due to Dark And Troubled Pasts.
- Town with a Dark Secret: The happy Sugar Bowl of Food Town is actually inhabited by misanthropic, Ax-Crazy humans who are outcasts from society and kill anyone who claims to be a human instead of a food.
- Trailers Always Spoil: Downplayed. The trailer's Mood Whiplash ends up revealing the kind of game it is, and it also reveals parts of the first playthrough's ending, albeit omitting the parts showing Chili. Notably, there's no footage of the Darker and Edgier second playthrough.
- Wham Shot:
- Sissy's Slasher Smile as she begins to embrace her Passion Fruit identity.
- Sissy being eaten by Chili.
- Sissy, covered in Chili's blood.
- The X of Y: Dream of Gluttony.
- Yank the Dog's Chain: Sissy suffers this on both of the playthroughs. In the first, she eventually begins to believe that she actually is a passion fruit. Although she initially begged to be given some food, she was content to die at the hands of Chili. In the second, the fluffy mask of the town shatters as soon as she reveals she's a human. Even after learning Society Is to Blame for the citizen's tragic backstories, she ruthlessly kills Chili. The result in both playthroughs is that she ends up in a camp full of trees, being to talk with all of the Food Town citizens, and when she tries to get out of it, she finds out she can't.
- You Can't Go Home Again: Sissy in both of the playthroughs is unable to return home.
