After returning home from work late one night, Mama Rabbit is told by her frightened son Junior Rabbit, long past his bedtime, that the man from his book is coming to get him. The Rhymes on a Dime story has clearly spooked him. Mama doesn't believe Junior at first. But then she hears someone tapping on the window. The Man in the Window is here, and he is looking for a new friend. He will look for 5 minutes, after which he will leave. To avoid him, Mama must use the story to figure out how to stall him and stay hidden for those 5 minutes.
The game is available for free on itch.io
A sequel was released early 2023.——
The game contains examples of:
- Abduction Is Love: A platonic example. The Man considers anyone who reads his book his friend and will come to take them away, even if they clearly do not want it.
- Adults Are Useless: Subverted. Mama doesn't believe Junior at first when he claims the Man from the book he read is out to get him. But the second The Man makes his presence known by tapping on the window, and realizing someone left that book in their home, she drops her skepticism and does everything she can to protect Junior.
- Adorably Precocious Child: Junior is a little Cheerful Child that his overworked mother dotes on.
- Antagonist Title: The Man from the Window is the monster Mama has to fend off to protect both her child and herself.
- Big Bad: As stated above, the titular Man from the Window is the game's main threat.
- Big Beautiful Woman: Mama is very fat, but even as huge as she is, she's no match for the titular villain.
- Big Eater: If The Man finds the donuts, he'll immediately stop his search for Mama and Junior to eat them and takes only a minute to do so.
- Chekhov's Gun: Mama Rabbit brings a few donuts from her workplace with her when she returns home. The donuts can be used to distract The Man. If the box is left open, The Man will stop searching and waste one minute eating all of the donuts.
- Deadly Book: The Man from the Window summons the titular character when read, who will stop at nothing to find and take away his new "friend".
- Determinator: Nothing will stop The Man breaking into Mama Rabbit's home, the Humanoid Abomination will smash through locked doors and a Furniture Blockade to get inside.
- Disappeared Dad: Junior's father is never mentioned or seen the entire game.
- Failed a Spot Check: Even though the tub is anything but a good hiding place for Mama, unless he's directly searching it the Man will not find her there.
- First-Person Perspective:
- The first five minutes you play as Mama Rabbit, trying to find a suitable hiding spot for Junior and herself and doing whatever you can to stall The Man.
- When The Man finally comes to search for his new friend, the camera switches to his point of view for the entire search.
- The Fourth Wall Will Not Protect You: Everybody who reads The Man from the Window gains the dubious honor of being a potential new friend for The Man.
- Furniture Blockade: Mama can shove her big couch up against the apartment door. It won't stop The Man, but it will delay his search for a friend to abduct.
- The End... Or Is It?: Subverted. If The Man is successfully warded off, Junior asks Mama what they're going to do about The Woman from the Door. Mama is shocked, but Junior then admits he was just joking.
- Everybody Lives: If you manage to hide Mama and Junior as well as set up enough distractions to make the Man run out of time before he finds either of them, the family survives the night without a scratch.
- Ghostly Glide: Implied. When The Man notices his time is up, he rushes to the door with the camera noticeably lacking the step-animation it had before.
- Genre Savvy: Mama Rabbit is this, surprisingly. While she's initially skeptical of the existence of the Man, once it becomes clear that he is real and coming for them, she goes into survival mode and tries to hide her child and herself using the book as a guideline. If you do everything correctly, both her and her child survive the night unharmed.
- Hidden in Plain Sight: If Mama chooses to hide in the tub.
- Hide Your Children: As The Man seeks to abduct anyone he can, Junior is a potential target and Mama will refuse to hide herself until her little boy is out of sight first.
- Humanoid Abomination: The Man is clearly some sort of bogeyman or otherworldly monster, but his appearance is creepily human. However, the fact that he is summoned by reading a book about him (that appears in the victim's home out of nowhere) and that he's strong enough to break locks in thirty seconds and topple over couches with little effort makes it clear he's anything but.
- I Just Want to Have Friends: The Man will take everyone who has read his book and make them his "new friend". What exactly that means is up to interpretation.
- Jump Scare: Looking through the apartment door spyhole when time is running out reveals The Man grinning right back at you.
- Locked in the Bathroom: The bathroom has hiding places for both Junior and Mama: under the sink for Junior, in the tub for Mama. You can also lock the bathroom door to gain time when The Man comes searching.
- Mama Bear: Mama Rabbit does whatever she can to protect Junior from The Man, barricading the doorway with a couch, finding ways to stall The Man and even letting herself be taken in Junior's stead if The Man finds her first.
- Multiple Endings: The game has different outcomes depending on how well you do hiding Mama and Junior and setting up distractions for the Man.
- The Man finds Junior and takes him away. The game ends with Mama Rabbit begging the police to find her son, with it being implied that the police don't believe her story about The Man.
- The Man finds Mama and takes her. Junior comes out of his hiding place, calling for Mama and telling her that The Man is gone and that she can come out now. He receives no answer.
- The Man doesn't find Mama or Junior in time and is forced to leave. Mama and Junior rejoice over having survived The Man, though Junior is a bit miffed that The Man ate all the donuts. He also gives Mama a scare when he asks what they're going to do about The Woman from the Door, before admitting that he was just messing around.
- Nightmare Face: We never get a full view of what The Man looks like, as we only see half of his face through the doorway, and what little we see is quite harrowing, with bulging, bloodshot eyes, a sunken nose, pale skin, and an uncanny Slasher Smile.
- Nothing Is Scarier:
- What exactly is The Man? Obviously he's supernatural in nature, but why is he on a time-limit and why is he so obsessed with making "friends" in the first place?
- It's not revealed just what The Man does with his new "friends" after finding them and taking them away.
- Obliviously Evil: Implied. The Man genuinely doesn't seem to understand how breaking into someone's home and taking them away against their will could be bad. The narration from his point of view treats him coming to collect either Mama or Junior as a fun game, with no hint of malice or sadism on his part.
- Police Are Useless: In the ending where The Man succeeds in taking away Junior, Mama is heard desperately trying to convince the police to search for him, with her dialogue implying that the officer she's talking to is currently accusing her of making it all up. This despite the apartment being in clear disarray from the couch The Man threw in playthroughs where it was used to block the entrance and the locks having been broken should Mama have locked the doors.
- Room Escape Game: A variant. Both Mama and The Man are on a hide and seek Timed Mission, and due to the small apartment (and Mama's size) there are a lack of hiding spots. To survive, Mama has to use the rhymes of the Deadly Book against The Man.
- Smash to Black: The camera cuts to black if The Man finds Mama or Junior, with the narration simply stating that the Man found his friend.
- Sudden Soundtrack Stop: The ambience of crickets chirping outside will suddenly stop as The Man slowly approaches Mama Rabbit's apartment.
- Subverted Kids' Show: Downplayed, as even before she knows what's going on, Mama points out that The Man from the Window doesn't look like something a kid should read. Indeed, the book is written a lot like a kids' book with silly rhymes, but the subject matter is sinister from start to finish and there are no funny illustrations or bright colors whatsoever to make it appeal to younger people.
- Sweet Tooth: The Man loves confectionaries. Mama leaving the box of donuts open out on the table, will distract him, buying the rabbit household precious time.
- Timed Mission: Both for Mama and The Man. Mama has five minutes to find hiding places for herself and Junior and set up distractions that will make The Man waste his time. The Man has five minutes to find either Junior or Mama. Once his time is up he has to leave.
- Would Hurt a Child: The Man will take Junior away if Mama doesn't hide him well enough and doesn't put in enough effort to stall The Man.
