Imagine Phantasmagoria shot at your house with a DVD camera and you'll get Metron (МЕТРОН), a Full Motion Video adventure game made in 2004 by a Russian 'garage game developer' Korban Laser Games, who proudly proclaimed on the cover that it was playable on "PC, PlayStation 2 and DVD players".
The location is Korenevo, Kursk Oblast, Russia. Polina, the protagonist, finds herself investigating a series of murders committed by the evil Metron and trying to avoid becoming a victim herself.
The game was made extremely cheaply, and so was never exported overseas or translated to any other language - a relatively common situation for lower-tier Russian game developers before the GFC + the rise of Steam killed off the disk retail they were relying on. Nevertheless, it has become a popular title for Russian Let's Players due to how infamous it is, and videos of it can be easily found on YouTube.
Tropes seen in this game:
- Antagonist Title: Metron is the alias used by the supernatural Serial Killer.
- Bad "Bad Acting": 98% of Metron's victims die with smirky smiles on their faces. Including Polina.
- Bizarre Human Biology: At one point, we are shown a crude chart explaining that not only can Metron produce Eye Beams, but he possesses an 8-chambered heart as well. For reference, that's double the number of chambers a normal human has, same as any other mammal or bird, while amphibians and reptiles make do with three chambers, and fish with two.
- Bloody Hilarious: In the words of AG.ru, the only professional publication to have bothered
with a review: "Even B-movies use either special fake blood or an animal one. Here, brownish bottled ketchup "Baltimor" note with visible pieces of red capsicum in it gets spilled in truly industrial quantities." - The Butler Did It: Oh, of course Mityai.
- Camera Abuse: Amateur movies do not work that way. Some places, however, have a fully static camera for some reason.
- Covers Always Lie: The official cover above had drastically redesigned the characters. Suffice it to say, the actual in-game Polina a) never wears that low-cut purple dress, going in much more modest (and cheaper) white blazers and skirts instead; b) doesn't wear her hair in a ponytail; c) is actually dark-haired.
- Eye Beams: Metron possesses destructively malevolent gaze, which is represented with what are pretty obviously laser pointers.
- Heads I Win, Tails You Lose: Pick any bad ending, Metron kills Polina. Pick a good ending and Polina kills Metron... and then is being brought by Moscow's militia note to the mental institution, while Metron cloned himself and went on rampage in the same city.
- Heroic BSoD: ...Korban Laser Games's website. Under reconstruction since 2004.
- Late-Arrival Spoiler: Metron wears the same sweater and boots during the entire game, so the 'Just believe me' moment at school won't be the first to reveal Mityai's true identity.
- Press X to Die and Press X to Not Die: You're being cornered by Metron. You'd better run. But wait, what would you do in this case: press the 'wrong' action button to see the bad ending and then warp to the same scene again or run away like many adequate people would? Can't think of it? Don't worry about it, after all there is time to think, and you've got plenty of it.
- The Many Deaths of You: Or, rather, The Many Evil Wins Of Him. Strangely enough, not invoked till the third DVD.
- Multiple Endings: Many bad endings, and a single "good" ending that still has the heroine confined to a mental institution, while the villain clones himself and starts another rampage.
- Stock Footage: Used straight in the ending.
- Stock Sound Effect: A lot of the sound effects come straight from the CD sound libraries of the time.
- Wannabe Eldritch Abomination: Metron, of course. His father also fits his trope, because, you know... both of them are treated like these story wise, but don't have the appropriate look.
