Cool concept and well done while it lasted. Surprisingly well voice acted, with a few of the callers being actually distressing. Only real gripe is the total lack of replayability. The calls you get every playthrough are the same and in the same order, meaning once you know the answers you are set forever. Some sort of Infinite mode or similar would be pretty cool and be a fun way to keep replayability.
I've got no clue what is going on story-wise, but it is quite fun to memorize all the hazards and try to deduce what the client needs. You're not allowed to ask follow up questions or anything but there's no time limit (afaik) so it wasn't all too hard
Some pretty funny and cool ideas. I like the concept, and wish it went a little more in depth with its concepts, maybe some more variation, but I think it'singenious, hilarious, and compelling. Loved seeing the creator's insights after the fact and hope he follows that type of thing to further ends. The soundtrack is also pretty dope. A worthwhile experience
Cool and eerie little indie game <3
This review contains spoilers
Home Safety Hotline is a “supernatural tech support simulator” developed by Night Signal Entertainment, a company which only recently released their first game “Night Signal” back in late 2022. The game was developed by Nick Lives, who had the idea for this game ever since he was a child when his grandmother got him a Dungeons & Dragons manual. Fascinated with the idea of a “bestiary”, he attempted to create titles based on the idea a couple of times from an art based fantasy game where you attempt to test dead bodies to 1-800-BESTIARY. Comments on Youtube would lead Nick down a rabbit hole woth “Analog Horror”, an aesthetic that would throwback to 80s and 90s found footage and low resolution camera grain. How do I know all of this? Once you beat the game you’ll actually get an Art Book where Nick goes behind the scenes. Speaking of Nick, how did I get into this game? I’m unsure if I found it first due to my love of Analog Horror or old throwback graphic games or if my buddy Nick (not Lives but an actual friend of mine) found it first but he told me about it through watching Vinesauce I think? Eventually he just gave me 20 dollars and told me to buy this game so we could play it together.
The plot is rather simple: you play as an unnamed recruit at the Home Safety Hotline, a call center where you give information on a variety of threats to people who call in looking for advice. At first you only get a few normal ones (ex. termites, bees or house fires (which is hilarious because why would anyone call a safety hotline and not realize what a house fire is)) but over the course of the week you’ll get access to more entries and calls; some of these entries range from funny to downright scary. The gameplay section will be here too because the gameplay is simple, you read entries and give answers. What’s REALLY interesting about this game is it’s world; whether you’re reading emails from someone who seems to be crazy and is sending you emails from a hole in the wall, to random videos that pop up over the course of the week on your computer that show you a bit of an insight into the lore, it’s fascinating to take in. If you get 100 percent accuracy each day, you’ll also get fake discounts expensive and hilariously stupid s h i t that you can’t even buy. Luckily if you fail a bit, you can choose to reset your weekly progress from the Home Screen on your computer, and all the answers are scripted so if you need a guide there’s one down in the links. You’ll learn that Home Safety Hotline isn’t all that’s cracked up to be once the “Crazy Email Guy” and the Prank Caller eventually disappear by mysterious means. Eventually on the last day, you’ll be given a final trial by “the people from the soil” who ask you riddles. You’ll have to identity which creatures correspond with what and sometimes it can be a doozy when you think you know the answer to what the issue is, only to learn that it’s something more benign (funny tip, house fires only shows up on the last day as a bit of a Chekhov's Gun). Once you beat the game (and through hints like the Prank Caller’s last words), you’ll learn that Home Safety Hotline is run by a bunch of Faes. The guy who lived in a wall? A previous employee who got turned into a mouse. Prank Caller? Same thing. If you get a horrible accuracy rate, you fail and get turned into a mouse. If you succeed however, you’ll get an ending where Carol (who speaks in yee ol’ english) appears to you in a forest FMV style and gives you a crown, and from here you get a promotion. Then the credits roll while a bunch of strange looking people in goofy costumes dance and sing.
My thoughts on the plot are as follows: it’s really fun and makes me ask questions. The Fae that run Home Safety Hotline, why are they running it? What else lives in this world? What’s the morality of the Fae? Truth be told, while I got a lot of the background lore, while doing research for this game I didn’t realize the amount of foreshadowing this game truly had. Between the entries on mice being “useless” to the logo being a celtic knot (shoutout to TVTropes for this). What does a promotion entail? There are creatures from folklore like Trolls and Goblins but are there other creatures beyond this? The lore, while it can be funny sometimes, also gets kind of freaky and existential. Some of the entries are downright terrifying, with some of the solutions including “screw over someone else”, “abandon your house” or “make peace and accept your fate” (shoutout to the Dorcha for being the scariest entry). The gameplay aspect of the game I feel fits perfectly, and the only thing one could really wish for is a sort of randomizer though that would require A LOT of voice lines and more work, of which I’m not sure one could do with how small of a scale this game is.
The art direction isenjoyable, again a throwback to the 90s with a distinct parody of Windows 95 chosen for the game’s style. You can switch the colors around in the Options Menu, but for the most part you’ll be seeing a Lime Greenish color. Getting calls will show you a digital picture of their face, sometimes with distortions or glitches. Actually looking at the entries themselves will reveal the same thing (with the loading times being slow-ish which fits into the era), pictures that have obvious photoshopped creatures in it that look unrealistic but fits perfectly at the same time. This will be most of the game outside of the Ending Cutscene, which will be a slower styled FMV video but with more fluid movement. The sound design to the game is also immaculate as hell, between the voice acting and the lofi music by David Johnson that just gives me this image of old 90s cyberspace. Starting with the soundtrack, while there are only a handful of tracks (the most memorable being Safety First, the main menu track) that are displayed in game, each one again has this soothing lofi essence that really encapsulates to me in my mind what this older styled hold music would sound like. It’s easy listening and gets a big thumbs up for enhancing the atmosphere. The voice acting is spot on for the tongue-in-cheek tone it’s going for, with the actress playing Carol and the doofus playing the Prank Caller (I never will get tired of the name Buzz Goober lol) just knocking it out of the park with the goofy vibes. Everyone who does the customer voices are actually great, mixing in that old crunchy low poly sound effect that garbles their voice just feels perfect to me. Speaking of sound effects, everything from clicking on computer apps to listening to the sounds that certain cryptids make just, I have no words for how immersive it is. The only other note I have for this is that sometimes it’ll be obvious when a female voices a male’s role but honestly I find it hilarious and campy, feeling right at home with the game’s vibes that it enhances it.
Overall, my time with Home Safety Hotline was pretty damn good, a fun little romp that both had me thinking a lot by the time we hit the end. We ended up playing by basically reading through the entries before making guesses on what the answer was, looking it up after to see which one was right or if we were right to begin with. Most of the time, we were spot on and in all honesty this game has a party game vibe to it. It has heart while also sprinkling in bits of creep factor. One of these days, I’d love to give “Night Signal” a try just to see what that was like, but they’re also in the middle of developing a new project titled “Please Insert Disc” that gives PS2 throwbacks. Home Safety Hotline is 15 dollars; I sunk in about 4 hours of gameplay time and since my buddy Nick handed me a 20 I wasn’t really concerned about the main price? Otherwise wait for a sale.
Links:
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/VideoGame/HomeSafetyHotline
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YT6cFzMQzTM&ab_channel=VHS
https://horrorgamenews.com/home-safety-hotline-answers/
From Steam Reviews: https://steamcommunity.com/id/gamemast15r/recommended/
The plot is rather simple: you play as an unnamed recruit at the Home Safety Hotline, a call center where you give information on a variety of threats to people who call in looking for advice. At first you only get a few normal ones (ex. termites, bees or house fires (which is hilarious because why would anyone call a safety hotline and not realize what a house fire is)) but over the course of the week you’ll get access to more entries and calls; some of these entries range from funny to downright scary. The gameplay section will be here too because the gameplay is simple, you read entries and give answers. What’s REALLY interesting about this game is it’s world; whether you’re reading emails from someone who seems to be crazy and is sending you emails from a hole in the wall, to random videos that pop up over the course of the week on your computer that show you a bit of an insight into the lore, it’s fascinating to take in. If you get 100 percent accuracy each day, you’ll also get fake discounts expensive and hilariously stupid s h i t that you can’t even buy. Luckily if you fail a bit, you can choose to reset your weekly progress from the Home Screen on your computer, and all the answers are scripted so if you need a guide there’s one down in the links. You’ll learn that Home Safety Hotline isn’t all that’s cracked up to be once the “Crazy Email Guy” and the Prank Caller eventually disappear by mysterious means. Eventually on the last day, you’ll be given a final trial by “the people from the soil” who ask you riddles. You’ll have to identity which creatures correspond with what and sometimes it can be a doozy when you think you know the answer to what the issue is, only to learn that it’s something more benign (funny tip, house fires only shows up on the last day as a bit of a Chekhov's Gun). Once you beat the game (and through hints like the Prank Caller’s last words), you’ll learn that Home Safety Hotline is run by a bunch of Faes. The guy who lived in a wall? A previous employee who got turned into a mouse. Prank Caller? Same thing. If you get a horrible accuracy rate, you fail and get turned into a mouse. If you succeed however, you’ll get an ending where Carol (who speaks in yee ol’ english) appears to you in a forest FMV style and gives you a crown, and from here you get a promotion. Then the credits roll while a bunch of strange looking people in goofy costumes dance and sing.
My thoughts on the plot are as follows: it’s really fun and makes me ask questions. The Fae that run Home Safety Hotline, why are they running it? What else lives in this world? What’s the morality of the Fae? Truth be told, while I got a lot of the background lore, while doing research for this game I didn’t realize the amount of foreshadowing this game truly had. Between the entries on mice being “useless” to the logo being a celtic knot (shoutout to TVTropes for this). What does a promotion entail? There are creatures from folklore like Trolls and Goblins but are there other creatures beyond this? The lore, while it can be funny sometimes, also gets kind of freaky and existential. Some of the entries are downright terrifying, with some of the solutions including “screw over someone else”, “abandon your house” or “make peace and accept your fate” (shoutout to the Dorcha for being the scariest entry). The gameplay aspect of the game I feel fits perfectly, and the only thing one could really wish for is a sort of randomizer though that would require A LOT of voice lines and more work, of which I’m not sure one could do with how small of a scale this game is.
The art direction isenjoyable, again a throwback to the 90s with a distinct parody of Windows 95 chosen for the game’s style. You can switch the colors around in the Options Menu, but for the most part you’ll be seeing a Lime Greenish color. Getting calls will show you a digital picture of their face, sometimes with distortions or glitches. Actually looking at the entries themselves will reveal the same thing (with the loading times being slow-ish which fits into the era), pictures that have obvious photoshopped creatures in it that look unrealistic but fits perfectly at the same time. This will be most of the game outside of the Ending Cutscene, which will be a slower styled FMV video but with more fluid movement. The sound design to the game is also immaculate as hell, between the voice acting and the lofi music by David Johnson that just gives me this image of old 90s cyberspace. Starting with the soundtrack, while there are only a handful of tracks (the most memorable being Safety First, the main menu track) that are displayed in game, each one again has this soothing lofi essence that really encapsulates to me in my mind what this older styled hold music would sound like. It’s easy listening and gets a big thumbs up for enhancing the atmosphere. The voice acting is spot on for the tongue-in-cheek tone it’s going for, with the actress playing Carol and the doofus playing the Prank Caller (I never will get tired of the name Buzz Goober lol) just knocking it out of the park with the goofy vibes. Everyone who does the customer voices are actually great, mixing in that old crunchy low poly sound effect that garbles their voice just feels perfect to me. Speaking of sound effects, everything from clicking on computer apps to listening to the sounds that certain cryptids make just, I have no words for how immersive it is. The only other note I have for this is that sometimes it’ll be obvious when a female voices a male’s role but honestly I find it hilarious and campy, feeling right at home with the game’s vibes that it enhances it.
Overall, my time with Home Safety Hotline was pretty damn good, a fun little romp that both had me thinking a lot by the time we hit the end. We ended up playing by basically reading through the entries before making guesses on what the answer was, looking it up after to see which one was right or if we were right to begin with. Most of the time, we were spot on and in all honesty this game has a party game vibe to it. It has heart while also sprinkling in bits of creep factor. One of these days, I’d love to give “Night Signal” a try just to see what that was like, but they’re also in the middle of developing a new project titled “Please Insert Disc” that gives PS2 throwbacks. Home Safety Hotline is 15 dollars; I sunk in about 4 hours of gameplay time and since my buddy Nick handed me a 20 I wasn’t really concerned about the main price? Otherwise wait for a sale.
Links:
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/VideoGame/HomeSafetyHotline
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YT6cFzMQzTM&ab_channel=VHS
https://horrorgamenews.com/home-safety-hotline-answers/
From Steam Reviews: https://steamcommunity.com/id/gamemast15r/recommended/
A fun game to stream. Took maybe 2 hours or a little over to complete, so it is only really worth a grab if getting on sale.
fun but a little unfulfilling
This feels very underdeveloped. Gets boring to play because yeah reading about Toilet Gnome or Wine Sprite is not that fun after seeing dozens of similar entries. After 2 or 3 in-game days I thought to myself "Is that really it?" and unfortunately it is. The idea is there, it's really cool, the visual style is also there, but the gameplay makes it feel soooo empty.
This is a really, really strong proof of concept, but I was a little disappointed that some of its potential went unfulfilled. Home Safety Hotline has a great art direction and creeped me out quite a bit. It's possible that I just have a big weakness for admin/tech support games like Papers, Please and its ilk, but this game was a lot of fun.
Normally I'm the first to praise a horror game for brevity, but here I felt like it was missing just a little something to take what an interesting idea and send it to the moon. The setup is subverted a little bit here and there throughout, but it never really reaches the crescendo that truly great horror demands. The gameplay too needed an extra wrinkle or two, as at the end of the day, you really are just answering a series of questions with no time limit.
Home Safety Hotline is definitely a little underbaked, but I like so much of it that I find it hard to hold that against it. Instead, I'll say that those potential points of criticisim make me want a sequel that can iterate and improve upon the already great stuff that's here and flesh it out into a truly brilliant experience. For now though, Home Safety Hotline is a surprisingly spooky way to spend an evening.
Normally I'm the first to praise a horror game for brevity, but here I felt like it was missing just a little something to take what an interesting idea and send it to the moon. The setup is subverted a little bit here and there throughout, but it never really reaches the crescendo that truly great horror demands. The gameplay too needed an extra wrinkle or two, as at the end of the day, you really are just answering a series of questions with no time limit.
Home Safety Hotline is definitely a little underbaked, but I like so much of it that I find it hard to hold that against it. Instead, I'll say that those potential points of criticisim make me want a sequel that can iterate and improve upon the already great stuff that's here and flesh it out into a truly brilliant experience. For now though, Home Safety Hotline is a surprisingly spooky way to spend an evening.
This ish was fun. Something so simple and yet so damn fun.
An interesting short (3-4 hours) horror-ish game, you work as a Home Safety Hotline who needs to answer people’s calls asking for help about trouble in their home and your job is to give them info about what is troubling them and how to solve it. So the gameplay is just listening to people’s calls, then picking whatever is bothering them from a list.
The main draw of this game for me is the disturbance entry itself, they are fun to read, especially when you’re trying to deduce what is bothering the person calling. Some are a bit obtuse though.
The disturbance ranges from the everyday stuff like mice, house fire, spider, etc, to something more fantastical like boggart, hobb, gnome, etc. Each entry will describe what the disturbance is, what danger it will (or won’t) do to the homeowner, and how to handle it.
But what’s even more fun is how some entries are connected to each other, like how Hobb has a lot of variation, or how some disturbance is a continuation from other disturbance if left alone, or my favorite, the spider entry seems to be mundane but it is actually connected to something else later on.
The main draw of this game for me is the disturbance entry itself, they are fun to read, especially when you’re trying to deduce what is bothering the person calling. Some are a bit obtuse though.
The disturbance ranges from the everyday stuff like mice, house fire, spider, etc, to something more fantastical like boggart, hobb, gnome, etc. Each entry will describe what the disturbance is, what danger it will (or won’t) do to the homeowner, and how to handle it.
But what’s even more fun is how some entries are connected to each other, like how Hobb has a lot of variation, or how some disturbance is a continuation from other disturbance if left alone, or my favorite, the spider entry seems to be mundane but it is actually connected to something else later on.
This review contains spoilers
interesting and fun for what it is, i really enjoyed watching wayne play this!! i like that it doesnt take itself too seriously either but the end credits definitely give u some whiplash even still LMAO
gameplay is easy, its all just the same thing but i like its format a lot
taking calls and having to figure things out from context clues......... like thats dope but i do wish there was a little more to it
it being short and the great ending trial segment makes it not be a slog, but its definitely not for everyone
and the slow reveal of a fantasy based world with little goblins and fairies being natural phenomena is so neat, i like the way it sets itself and its world apart from most other analog horror media. the way the dev injects this folklore with this creepy factor and puts his own spin on them (that i agree, has always been there) is really cool as well.
the part where he talks about struggling with making things that came from all over the world seem scary so he focused instead on things that could live inside your home was fascinating and resonated with me. there is nothing scarier to me than thinking youre safe in your home and youre just not for one reason or the other
left the wrong treat for my hobb now im doomed. LOL
i do feel it shows its hand a little early though with carol saying things like thee so quickly but thats negligible
its funny yet still creepy at the same time, i havent heard a lot of the failed calls yet but the ones wayne did get really put this sense of doom in u. definitely gets into the corny analog horror region a few times, especially with the videos, but thats ok. sincerely
music and aesthetic are nice, the voice acting work is great and outstanding at certain points, and obviously the art and writing add so much to the game, really impressive and immersive
i hope to see this sort of online horror concept a lot more in the future. my dream is something like hypnospace outlaw fully focused on horror
gameplay is easy, its all just the same thing but i like its format a lot
taking calls and having to figure things out from context clues......... like thats dope but i do wish there was a little more to it
it being short and the great ending trial segment makes it not be a slog, but its definitely not for everyone
and the slow reveal of a fantasy based world with little goblins and fairies being natural phenomena is so neat, i like the way it sets itself and its world apart from most other analog horror media. the way the dev injects this folklore with this creepy factor and puts his own spin on them (that i agree, has always been there) is really cool as well.
the part where he talks about struggling with making things that came from all over the world seem scary so he focused instead on things that could live inside your home was fascinating and resonated with me. there is nothing scarier to me than thinking youre safe in your home and youre just not for one reason or the other
left the wrong treat for my hobb now im doomed. LOL
i do feel it shows its hand a little early though with carol saying things like thee so quickly but thats negligible
its funny yet still creepy at the same time, i havent heard a lot of the failed calls yet but the ones wayne did get really put this sense of doom in u. definitely gets into the corny analog horror region a few times, especially with the videos, but thats ok. sincerely
music and aesthetic are nice, the voice acting work is great and outstanding at certain points, and obviously the art and writing add so much to the game, really impressive and immersive
i hope to see this sort of online horror concept a lot more in the future. my dream is something like hypnospace outlaw fully focused on horror
Pretty much Observation Duty x Hypnospace Outlaw. Pretty cool little game but not much to it.
i really wanted to love this game but, it just doesn't go far enough with it's ideas, it had so much potential for world building and it really just didn't hit, the monsters are cool and gameplay loop is ok, but man, this game just feels so underdeveloped.
a game you can truly tell was made with passion and love by its creators. less scary and more batshit insane, albeit that's not a bad thing at all. there were multiple "aha" moments with regards to the story and the analog horror aspect of things as well as making reading about monsters fun. highly recommend! go in blind!
Really love the aesthetics of this game, the monster pictures and subtle menace of the descriptions. Good for a couple playthroughs, but I think adding a few more cases and shuffling the calls could add a good deal of replayability. That said, the linear playthrough is solid and satisfying, and plays in to the sort of corporate horror I crave
Short and sweet game that while very charming, I am glad I picked up on sale. Customer service gameplay mixed with the child-like awe of flipping through a Dragonology 101 book. LOVED that the art book was included at the end and the developer explained their process - it kinda shot up the review by half a star, I found a lot of enjoyment in it : ]
I wouldn't say this game is scary, but it's quirky and unique in a way that is compelling enough to keep a players attention through the gameplay of "listening to phone calls and reading".
I wouldn't say this game is scary, but it's quirky and unique in a way that is compelling enough to keep a players attention through the gameplay of "listening to phone calls and reading".
Solid little game. Not scary, just sometimes off-setting that borders on quirkiness. I feel like they could've done a lot more with the story, however, and the ending was a bit tone-deaf. Regardless, definitely suggest playing it, as the gameplay loop is quite satisfying.
- Interesting idea, kinda reminiscent of Hypnospace outlaw but for monsters.
- Short and sweet, doesn't overstay its welcome.
- The voice acting is good enough, and the dialogue is funny to carry the playthrough.
- Thought the main mechanic would be harder but its actually easy to play this.
- Short and sweet, doesn't overstay its welcome.
- The voice acting is good enough, and the dialogue is funny to carry the playthrough.
- Thought the main mechanic would be harder but its actually easy to play this.
if the price bothers you think of it like going to the movies but you only need one ticket for the whole party
absolutely worth it
absolutely worth it
[7.5] The vibe of the game is immaculate for horror fans, specially thanks to its wide and imaginative bestiary, and also to the committed voice acting from everyone involved; nonetheless, the gameplay loop is not as intricate as it could be, leaving for an experience that prefers style over substance.