"Here I stand in remorse and fear. Fear of losing everyone I care about. So many lives lost, when does it ever stop? I have seen people turned into monsters, but not much worse than those who caused all this."
—Kyle, Intro
Leaden Sky is a side scrolling Psychological Horror Shooter by Rozkurwiacz_czaszek. You play as a soldier with a tortured past named Kyle who is tasked with infiltrating and securing an occupied zone in Poland crawling with hostile mercenaries and monstrous anomalies. After a distress call from his brother Felix, he ventures deeper into the zone and things quickly get uncanny.
When it was revealed in 2018 the story was minimal, and the main selling point of the game was a very detailed bodily damage system. However; due to technical burdens and a creative change in direction; the game significantly dialed back on the Gorn (though it's still graphically violent, just less gratuitously) and instead focuses on brooding atmosphere and surreal horror}}.
One demo is available here.
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The earlier gore-focused version(s) is still available, and has been retitled Final Response; and is available here.
Leaden Sky contains examples of:
- Action Film, Quiet Drama Scene: The game opens with very tender and softspoken exchanges between Kyle and his wife.
- Alternate History: The game takes place in 2005.
- Apocalypse How: Class 0 (regional area, social collapse) - the whole city is full of anomalies, hostile mercenaries, and monsters, but the rest of the world is doing just fine.
- Boom, Headshot!: Downplayed, helmets will often resist small arms fire.
- Crate Expectations: Wooden crates are placed everywhere around the levels, with small ones storing supplies, and the large ones serving as cover
- Driven to Suicide: A stalker is seen to have hanged themself in a storage closet.
- Exploding Barrels
- Gratuitous English: Main character dialog in dream sequences is voiced in English, whereas outside of them characters speak Polish. Graffiti and Mercenary chatter is in English as well.
- Grenade Launcher: The assault rifle has an under-barrel grenade launcher, and it shoots powerful grenades.
- Helmets Are Hardly Heroic: Subverted Trope - while the game starts off with Kyle being bareheaded, the nightmare sequence has him wearing a heavy armor suit with a helmet. You can also eventually pick up a helmet combined with a gas mask, which grants extra head protection, though you don't have to grab it
- Humanoid Abomination: In the latest demo. The player is quickly aquainted with electric zombie-like creatures of human shape.
- Humans Are the Real Monsters: Kyle more or less states so in the intro. And he has plenty of reasons to believe that, as the whole localized apocalypse is caused by an energy company's "upgrade" to a power plant, with their mercenaries mercilessly executing any civilian they see.
- Nightmare Sequence: The game starts in a nightmare of Kyle. In this nightmare, he gets attacked by ghastly anomalies.
- Noodle Incident: Diaries, dialog, and graffiti allude to a "failed mission" that weighs heavily on Kyle.
- Non-Player Companion: Your companion always follows you and she shoots your enemies alongside you.
- Private Military Contractors: The mercenaries hired by the energy company to secure the city and deal with any civilians around. As various encounters show, they're evil bastards who shoot anybody that isn't them.
- Quick Melee: Kyle can use his knife at any time, although it's primary use is in breaking crates, as many enemies have ranged weapons or are damaging to just stand near.
- "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Kyles brother Felix gives him a short one in the opening nightmare sequence.
Felix: Brother, look at the path you have chosen...you are better at killing people than saving them.
- Shout-Out: Civilian scavengers are refered to as stalkers.
- Take Cover!: Large crates and cars are placed for crouching behind in gunfights, with the mercenaries eagerly using them to avoid exposing themselves.
- 2½D: The game renders the environment, large objects, and structures in 3D while other elements like characters are rendered in 2D.
- Your Head Asplode: Shooting the head of an enemy with a powerful gun explodes their head in gory fashion.
Final Response contains examples of:
- Bayonet Ya: A bayonet is attached under the barrel of the AK rifle, so you can stab.
- The Cameo: From Update 4, you can find Valentin The Mad as an Easter Egg. He says "However, there are issues" like in his videos when interacted.
- Car Fu: Running over enemies with a car will instantly kill them.
- Everything Breaks: You can destroy floors and walls of some buildings.
- Finishing Stomp: You can stomp downed enemies to finish them. Although nothing stops you from brutally stomping already dead enemies.
- Gorn: Bodies can be endlessly mangled in excutiatingly detailed and brutal ways.
- The Joys of Torturing Mooks: You can agonize enemies in many different ways. Like cutting their arms with knife, dismembering legs with explosives, gutting their abdomen with an axe, or burning them alive with a flamethrower...
- Most defeated enemies don't die instantly. They scream and haplessly wiggle their limbs, or try to crawl away. Of course, you are allowed to brutalize them.
- Kill It with Fire: Torching enemies with a flame-based weapon is a quite fun and effective method to kill them. Once you set enemies on fire, they will be burned to a crisp while making horrific screams.
- Knee-capping: Shooting legs of the enemy will slow them down.
- Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me: Kyle's riot shield can protect him from enemy fire.
- Literal Disarming: Destroying arms of the enemy causes them to drop their gun.
- Ludicrous Gibs: Powerful guns can outright mutilate enemies. Also, you are allowed to brutalize corpses and turn them into a gory mess of dismembered limbs and bloody gibs.
- Mercy Kill: Sometimes, the enemies that you defeated are still alive and they scream and wiggle their body from extreme pain. You can end their misery with a headshot.
- Off with His Head!: You can cut the head of an enemy with well-aimed strike of an axe.
- One-Hit Polykill: Bullets from rifles can penetrate the body of enemies, and sniper rifle is especially good at this.
- Sickening "Crunch!": Loud sound of breaking bones always plays when you smash enemies with your sledgehammer, or stomp their limbs with your legs.
- Video Game Cruelty Potential: The main hook. If you can pick it up, it can be used to do nasty things to a body.
- The Tooth Hurts: You can actually destroy the teeth of your enemy by punching their jaw.
